Trump set to hand key family planning role to anti-contraception advocate

Donald Trump has reportedly appointed to a position overseeing the US’s family planning safety net a law professor who once stated that “contraception doesn’t work” and “family planning is something that occurs between a husband and a wife and God, and it doesn’t really involve the federal government.”

The prospect of Teresa Manning becoming deputy assistant secretary for population affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services, first reported by PoliticoPro, has led reproductive rights activists to demand that Trump withdraw the appointment, saying his choice could jeopardize the federal program responsible for preventing millions of unplanned pregnancies, and by extension, abortions.

Manning’s appointment would give her oversight of Title X, a quarter-of-a-billion-dollar federal program that provides contraceptive services to low-income and uninsured women and men, and a hand in guiding the federal government’s policy toward teen pregnancy, family planning, and pregnancy prevention.

“Teresa Manning’s appointment is unacceptable,” said Dawn Laguens, Planned Parenthood’s executive vice-president. “This is the fox guarding the hen house, and women with low incomes will pay the price. We are at the lowest rate of unintended pregnancy in 30 years and a historic low for teen pregnancy because of access to birth control. Someone who promotes myths about birth control and reproductive care should not be in charge of the office that is responsible for family planning at HHS.”

Manning is an adjunct law professor teaching legal research and writing at George Mason University. She previously worked with the National Right to Life Committee, an anti-abortion group, and the Family Research Council, an arch-conservative lobbying group known for its virulent opposition to LGBT rights.

Manning once sued the University of Iowa law school for passing her over for a professorship, claiming the dean of the law school had discriminated on the basis of her political views. (The school claimed that Manning didn’t offer to fulfill all of the job’s requirements.)

The administration has not publicly confirmed Manning’s appointment, but PoliticoPro reports that she already appears in the agency’s directory.

Manning made her comments on contraception and family planning during a 2003 media tour to promote a book she had edited about the future of the anti-abortion movement.

“I always shake my head,” she told C-Span, explaining her views on family planning. “You know, family planning is something that occurs between a husband and a wife and God, and it doesn’t really involve the federal government, much less the United Nations, where we hear about family planning all the time. What are they doing in that business?”

In an interview with Boston’s NPR affiliate, Manning, who at the time went by Teresa Wagner, claimed that “contraception doesn’t work”.

“Its efficacy is very low,” she said, “especially when you consider over years – which, a lot of contraception health advocates want to start women in their adolescent years, when they’re extremely fertile, incidentally, and continue for 10, 20, 30 years. The prospect that contraception would always prevent the conception of a child is preposterous.”

In fact, many types of contraception, particularly IUDs and other implants designed to stay in the body for long periods of time, have a nearly 100% success rate at preventing pregnancy.

The federal family planning program which Manning will oversee has provided thousands of such devices to US women.

In 2014, Title X provided contraceptive drugs, devices, and counseling for nearly 4 million women who rely on the public safety net for their family planning needs. The same year, the program prevented nearly 1 million unintended pregnancies and more than 300,000 abortions.

Earlier this year, in a move that could weaken the network of family planning clinics that use Title X funds, Trump signed legislation encouraging states to divert Title X funding away from Planned Parenthood.

Manning is not the first opponent of reproductive rights to receive a high-level appointment in the Trump administration.

Tom Price, the head of the HHS, opposes the Obama-era requirement that health insurance plans cover contraception with no co-pay and once challenging a reporter to “bring me one woman” who struggled to afford contraception on her own.

In February, Trump named a health policy aide to the White House Domestic Policy Council, Katy Talento, who believes that taking birth control before pregnancy can lead to miscarriages and infertility, assertions unsupported by any medical evidence.

And on Friday, the administration named Charmaine Yoest, the former president of Americans United for Life, to head the health department’s public communications strategy. Yoest is a longtime foe of abortion rights who dismisses the notion that contraception has a role to play in reducing abortions as a “red herring”.

Trump set to hand key family planning role to anti-contraception advocate

Trump administration removes Obama surgeon general pick Vivek Murthy

The Trump administration has removed Dr Vivek Murthy as US surgeon general, leading one Democratic senator to accuse the president of “politicising the position”.

Murthy was appointed by Barack Obama and confirmed by the Senate in December 2014 after a long delay. Murthy had incurred the wrath of the National Rifle Association by saying gun control was a “healthcare issue”.

During his tenure, he helped produce a White House report that said climate change had become a public health crisis, and launched Facing Addiction, the first surgeon general’s report on alcohol, drugs and health.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services said Murthy was asked to resign after “assisting in a smooth transition”. His deputy, rear admiral Sylvia Trent-Adams, will serve as acting surgeon general and leader the US Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, of which Murthy will remain a member.

Chris Murphy, a Democratic senator who has campaigned for new gun laws since the 2012 massacre of 20 children in Newtown, issued a statement on Saturday in which he praised Murthy’s handling of gun control, addiction and outbreaks of Ebola and Zika. The Connecticut senator called the doctor “another in a long list of political targets by the Trump administration”.

“Surgeons general are not supposed to be fired mid-term,” Murphy said. “They have served administrations of both political parties because keeping Americans safe and healthy isn’t a partisan issue.

“By firing Dr Murthy, President Trump is politicizing the position of surgeon general and risking the credibility of our nation’s top public health official.”

In a statement posted to Facebook, Murthy said: “Two years and four months ago, I was honored to be sworn in as the 19th surgeon general of the United States. For the grandson of a poor farmer from India to be asked by the president to look out for the health of an entire nation was a humbling and uniquely American story.”

He also summarised some of his achievements, which included educational initiatives on addiction, the opioid epidemic, vaccines and food insecurity.

Murthy added: “We worked with thousands of Commissioned Corps officers to protect our nation from Ebola and Zika and to respond to the Flint water crisis, major hurricanes, and frequent healthcare shortages in rural communities.

“I am exceedingly proud of what our team and our officers have done to bring help and hope to people all across America.”

The president has also dismissed several other high-profile appointees who he had either promised would stay on or left without replacements. In January he fired Sally Yates, then the acting attorney general, for her refusal to defend an order banning travel from seven Muslim majority nations, which was later halted in courts. Then in March he fired Preet Bharara, the powerful prosecutor in the southern district of Manhattan and the justice department dismissed dozens of US attorneys without new appointees. Scores of positions in the state department and other agencies also remain vacant.

Trump administration removes Obama surgeon general pick Vivek Murthy

How Donald Trump was silenced | Emma Brockes

Despite living in the US in Trump end times, I’m not often shocked. Scandalised, depressed, outraged, yes; but not really shocked. But I was at the weekend, standing in the playground with another mother when she said something so outlandish I couldn’t believe what I’d heard: that she’d had a tough month, what with getting the city to exempt her kids from having vaccinations.

Now, getting into it with another parent about vaccinations is like bringing up the Middle East on a Guardian comment thread. People go insane. There’s a debate raging right now on one of the mummy blogs I read, in which a handful of women are losing their minds, having been mauled by other users for their decision to “space out” their kids’ vaccinations.

But this wasn’t spacing out. This was full-on exemption, which I didn’t even know was legal. “Oh yes,” she said, “the city of New York permits it on religious grounds, even for kids in the public school system.” She wasn’t doing it for religious reasons, as it happened, but because she believes vaccines are dangerous.

“That’s nuts!” I said, and she looked taken aback and told me that the Centers for Disease Control is suppressing evidence because it’s in the pay of the drug companies. I couldn’t have been more surprised if she’d said the moon landings were faked. “There’s no scientific evidence whatsoever,” I said and used the term “anti-vaxxer”, and she looked angry and things got more socially awkward from there. Honestly, it was thrilling.

“You know Trump’s on your side?” I said, which in New York should be enough to end any argument.

“Yes!” she said and gave me a dark look. “And he’s been silenced.”

Grief by algorithm

Sheryl Sandberg is everywhere this month with the release of her book, Option B, a chronicle of her grief after the death of her husband. Something about it struck me as curious.

A few caveats first. People are, of course, entitled to grieve any way they like. And Sandberg isn’t trying to be Joan Didion. Plus I like Sandberg. I think a lot of the criticism directed at her has been spiteful.

But when I read the interview with her in Time magazine last week, it gave me the creeps. Partly because it was full of horrible lines (“suddenly, Superwoman became very human”). And partly because, a few days earlier, I’d finished reading Dave Eggers’ novel The Circle, a vicious takedown of Facebook.

Sandberg was talking about the mistakes she thinks she made while in the depths of her grief, labouring under the misapprehension of the three Ps: the idea that adversity is personal, pervasive and permanent. There was nothing wrong with this, except that it sounded like the application of a business rationale – a “scalable solution” – to personal experience. It had the bright ring of someone searching for an algorithm to manage human emotions. Given her power and position, it made my blood run a little cold.

First date soup

Then again, maybe we need it. A man and a woman at the soup bar in my local supermarket this week, on what was clearly a first date: “What are you having?” he said, solicitously.

“The chilli.”

“The chilli?”

“Yeah. What are you having?”

(Fraught pause.)

“The chicken.” (There was no chicken.)

“ … noodle soup?” she said.

“Um. The turkey!” (There was no turkey.)

“You’re having the turkey … chilli?”

(Dreadfully embarrassed.) “Ignore me, I’m loose change today.”

How Donald Trump was silenced | Emma Brockes

Trump tried to burn down Obamacare. He set his hair on fire instead | Ross Barkan

Burning Obamacare to the ground was always a House Republican obsession that Trump, in the heat of the campaign, took up to spite the president while tossing a little red meat to Republicans. “Repeal and replace” is alliterative, after all: it sounds nice enough on an arena stage. It’s just hard to pull off in the real world, as Donald Trump found out on Friday.

Blessed with total control of government, Republicans can only think of how best to burn the house down – and they’re not even doing a good job at that. The House speaker, Paul Ryan, unjustly heralded as a policy wonk, tried to rush his healthcare bill to the floor for a vote on Thursday, only to find the moderates and extremists in his party rebelling. On Friday, Donald Trump was forced to pull the bill, due to lack of support from his own party.

It was a humiliating defeat, which he tried to blame – unbelievably – on the Democrats.

Paul Ryan on failed healthcare bill: ‘This is a disappointing day’

Ryan’s Trumpcare was a horrendous concoction and should disabuse fawning congressional reporters of the notion that the speaker is a man of deep intellect and self-reflection. Had the bill not fallen flat on its face this Friday, it would have had little chance of passing the Senate.

What remains is the fact that Donald Trump couldn’t close the deal. He is hoping everyone blames Ryan, and Trump is lucky that his supporters might do just that. The diehards, inhabiting his post-factual universe, will simply write Ryan off as a loser – they hated him anyway – and hail their king for the bounties he’s still promising.

But healthcare will ultimately be Donald Trump’s problem. That’s how our politics work. So far, the president has been more fatuous than fascistic, though he belatedly realized what an albatross the bill had become. His negotiating powers, whatever they ever were, failed.

Were Trump the deal-making genius his ego tricked himself into believing he was, he would never have taken up this healthcare venture. A recent Quinnipiac University poll found that only 17% of Americans approved of Trumpcare. Trump’s poorest and least educated supporters had much to lose and nothing to gain from the legislation.

That’s why demolishing Obamacare never made sense. After all, Trump, via Steve Bannon, promised economic nationalism, a robust spending plan for those who he believed deserved it most: the white and native born. Trump wasn’t going to lose any votes by focusing on immigration and infrastructure spending at the expense of Obamacare, which rank-and-file conservatives resent less now that Obama himself has been removed from the equation.

President ‘pulled out every stop’ to pass healthcare bill, Spicer says

Far from upholding the most basic protections for the working-class, the Trump administration has, instead, evolved into one of the most rightwing in recent memory. It is stocked with the kind of appointees (Mick Mulvaney, Tom Price) who could have been plucked from Congress by Presidents Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio.

This is the difference between Trump and someone like the French presidential candidate Marine Le Pen, the Front National leader who identifies closely with the billionaire. Le Pen’s fiscal platform is unapologetically leftist, rejecting the austerity measures embraced by Europe’s financial class.

Trump rages with all the hate of Le Pen and none of the savvy. Blaming Ryan for Trumpcare’s failure will not absolve him of trying to do a very stupid thing. If he chooses to weaken healthcare in other ways – to somehow prove Obama left the country with a self-destructing system – he’ll still be the president when premiums skyrocket as insurers struggle to adapt to this instability.

In 2018, 2019, and 2020, screaming Obama’s name won’t matter anymore. The country will just know President Trump and the damage being done.

Trump tried to burn down Obamacare. He set his hair on fire instead | Ross Barkan

If Trump were a clever populist, he"d demand universal healthcare for America | Ross Barkan

Donald Trump understood the average Republican voter well enough to disregard the party’s tired orthodoxies and still win the presidency. He figured out that most Republicans could care less about shredding entitlements and adhering blindly to Milton Friedman’s soulless economic agenda, as long as he was bashing immigrants. To this day, Trump still won’t fulfill Paul Ryan’s Ayn Randian fever dream of gutting Social Security and Medicare.

But he does promise to do Ryan’s bidding and repeal Obamacare, a move that is all but guaranteed, if successful, to make a lot more people who voted for him sick. This probably doesn’t worry Trump too much in the short term, since senior citizens in the West Virginian hollows and dead factory towns of Ohio can’t afford dues at Mar-a-Lago anyway. Republicans in Congress, unused to and uninterested in governing, want to tear up Barack Obama’s signature achievement as quickly as possible because that will fill the emptiness of a nihilist campaign vow.

Few rational people think Ryan’s American Health Care Act is anything but a disaster-in-waiting. Swapping a mandate for ungenerous tax credits and eventually killing the Medicaid expansion while preserving the most expensive and popular aspects of Obamacare (not discriminating against people with preexisting conditions and letting everyone under 26 remain on their parents’ health plans), the AHCA will strip coverage from 24 million people by 2026, according to estimates from the Congressional Budget Office.

Were Trump a cannier tactician – or just a very different man – he would try to co-opt a beleaguered Democrat party by actually bolstering Obamacare, triangulating to save his party’s historic majority. Imagine if Trump’s team seriously considered the flaws of the ACA and tore a page from the playbook of the most populist Democrats to address them.

We already know there’s an overlap between the people who voted for Obama and Bernie Sanders and those who eventually chose Trump. The desperate working class of this country, white and black and brown alike, are seeking answers as automation and globalization threatens to sideline more and more laborers forever. Trump can gratify his own galactic ego and do some good by actually saving them.

As it stands, Trump’s obsession with pushing Ryan’s catastrophic bill is the best gift an otherwise pathetic Democratic Party could envision. Republicans control every branch of government, two-thirds of governorships and far more state legislatures than Democrats, a level of dominance unseen in more than a half century. But the sooner any version of the AHCA becomes law – no sure thing as Senate Republicans and moderates in the House balk – the more furious the backlash against the party of Trump will be.

Democrats are giddy that Republicans are on the verge of owning a healthcare catastrophe. Smarter Republicans are catching on. Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, usually a reliable ideologue, recently said voting for Ryan’s bill would put the Republican’s formidable House majority at risk.

As unlikely as this scenario would be, the Trump White House could heed Cotton’s warnings and change course. Support increasing subsidies for the lower and middle class people who truly find Obamacare unaffordable. Expand Medicaid coverage. Try to entice younger, healthier people to buy insurance or just force them. Discover the unreliable New York liberal lurking somewhere in that tanned hulk and back a cheap public option to compete with private insurers, driving prices down.

Rebrand the effort. Obamacare can become Trumpcare, except Trumpcare will actually work for everyone. For all his business failures, Trump does know something about marketing and reinvention. What’s the best way to stick it to his bête noire, Obama, and punish Democrats for good? Make Obamacare (Trumpcare) better.

It’s easy to snicker about a Republican president doing this. But Trump owes his party little, and its orthodoxies even less. He is a cult of personality, a ringmaster who can command his legions of followers to the end of the Earth, no matter what he says or does. The working class white Americans and Midwestern swing voters who put him in power won’t punish him for making government more generous and welcoming.

Trump can choose the courageous and practical path of attempting to usher in an era of affordable, universal healthcare coverage to a nation in profound need of both. Or he can punish the American people and his own party with Ryan’s dreadful legislation.

Just don’t expect him to choose wisely.

If Trump were a clever populist, he"d demand universal healthcare for America | Ross Barkan

Game of Thrones offers hope against Trump | Letters

Your article (Trump supporters in the heartland fear being left behind by GOP health plan, theguardian.com, 12 March) is unfortunately very consistent with a study that I recently commissioned looking at changes in white working-class death rates in California over the past 20 years. It showed that against a backdrop of improving white death rates in California, rural California is a veritable hot zone of white working-class mortality. Forty per cent of California counties (23 counties) voted for Donald Trump. Of those 23 counties, 21 of them are experiencing pronounced increases in death rates for whites aged 40-64. In some of these counties, white death rates have increased over 50% since the late 1990s.

This crisis of white premature death is being driven by alcohol and drug-related causes and includes a surge in suicides. These are the very types of health problems that are most amenable to high-quality mental health care and drug treatment services covered by Medicaid, which was expanded to millions of Californians under the Affordable Care Act. Our theory is that rapid shifts in the economy over this period without a meaningful social compact is the underlying cause of this epidemic of white death. These folks are watching the American dream slip further and further from their grasp and they are quickly losing hope. Tragically, their vote to repeal their healthcare access will likely exacerbate their pain.
Dr Anthony Iton
California Endowment, Oakland, CA, USA

• It’s reassuring to hear that Bernie Sanders is campaigning again (Journal, 11 March), but the examples given of his fightback are hardly likely to keep the light-sleeping President Trump awake at night. The usual emphasis on ever-more protests will soon meet the “too many marches” law of diminishing returns, as will I fear the hopes that his young supporters will still feel “the Bern” when the election is five years away rather than being imminent. His call for the Democrats to have a progressive platform geared more to the fears of steelworkers and less to the priorities of the liberal elites won’t on its own see off an increasingly authoritarian Trump. To do that it will need to include policies to cope with potential Democratic voters’ concerns about future immigration and to propose concrete steps to protect American jobs from imports.

This will require the Democrats to consider a progressive form of protectionism that will benefit all countries. Its core aim should be the nurturing and rebuilding of local economies not just in the US but worldwide. To adequately protect domestic jobs will need a permanent reduction in the level of international trade in goods, money and services and the prioritising of the ability of nation states to control the level of migration that their citizens desire. Without such an approach, Sanders could make more likely the ghastly prospect of an eight-year-long Trump reign.
Colin Hines
East Twickenham, Middlesex

• Trumps “Muslim ban 2” is planned to come into effect on Thursday 16 March. The ban, with very limited alterations, is just a repeat of the executive order that led to a global wave of protests. Islamophobia is at the heart of Trump’s agenda. The suspension of refugee programmes and the targeting of Muslim countries show just how far he is prepared to go to play divide and rule. We refuse to stay silent as Muslim communities are targeted and call on all those who oppose the ban to join us on the streets on Saturday 18 March as part of the global protests marking UN anti-racism day.
Dr Shazad Amin Mend, Abra Javid Rotherham 12 Campaign, Rashid Majid KhanSolicitors, Amal Azzudin Human rights activist, Tanzil Chowdhury Northern Police Monitoring Project, Nahella Ashraf Stand Up To Racism, Dr Amel Alghrani University of Liverpool, Dr Waqas Tufail Leeds Beckett University, Saleem Ahmed Bury Unison Black Members Officer, Maz Saleem Daughter of Mohammed Saleem, Sabia Kamali TV Presenter and Director of Sisters Forum, Vakas Hussain Barrister, Zlakha Ahmed Founder and manager of Apna Haq, Murad Qureshi Chair of Stop The War

• Rebecca Nicholson (Harry Potter and the Election of Horrors, G2, 14 March) tells an important story about the responses of Harry Potter fans to Trump’s election. She should certainly add to her account the case of the Harry Potter Alliance, the organisation of Rowling fans committed to acting out the values of non-discrimination and inclusiveness. But in just saying that each generation may have its effective “fictions”, she misses out the most important feature of this: that it is contemporary fantasy more than anything that is providing the means to this around the world.

It began with the Lord of the Rings films, which were accompanied for many by a picture of George W Bush wearing a gold ring with the slogan “Frodo has failed”. Then came Avatar, and the adoption of the Na’avis’ blue skin by environmental protestors. The Hunger Games provided anti-military protesters with the three-fingered salute of defiance. And of course Occupy borrowed heavily from V for Vendetta for its symbolism. But perhaps most interesting is the adoption by a number of anti-Trump protestors of the slogan “Winter is coming” from Game of Thrones. The difference being that on the face of it Game of Thrones is exceptional in being so dark and pessimistic. Yet it seems that it is helping people to feel hope within adversity. We are currently exploring this with our ongoing project, developed by 40 researchers in 12 countries. I hope some of your readers will be interested to visit, and perhaps contribute their views, at www.questeros.org.
Martin Barker
Emeritus professor, Aberystwyth University

• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com

• Read more Guardian letters – click here to visit gu.com/letters

Game of Thrones offers hope against Trump | Letters

What Happened to Obama Era Of Mass Shootings Under the Trump Administration?

It has been horrific to watch all mass shootings in America over the last 8 years. Everyone has been traumatized by the images of carnage week in and week out. Have you noticed these mass shootings are no longer happening in America?

In any political environment, it is important to observe what is actually happening not just what is being said. This is an observation only. Considering all the Machiavellian possibilities. Looking through history, it would be naïve not to question the surge of mass shootings in the Obama era in this context.

Under the Obama Administration, mass shootings were up many times over any previous president. A constant bombardment of horrific incidents involving mass shootings was endured by the public during the last 8 years. It seemed every couple of weeks a deranged person was killing in mass. Hardly a month went by without these scenes being projected through the media. With hyperventilating commentary from mainstream media on how gun rights were to blame. The constant drumbeat of gun control as the only answer to stop the carnage. Obama himself saying this had become routine. Routine indeed as there was a mass shooting on average of about every 3 weeks. Some shootings in clusters and others further apart. Sometimes multiple instances in a row when certain legislation was being pushed. Always used to for political advantage.

Accompanied by ridiculous coverage ready to go by the mainstream media. In many instances, the killers were known to the Intel Agencies like the San Bernardino shooters and the Boston Marathon bombers. Yet the Intel Agencies were called off months before each incident. This has happened many times. Instead of talking about false flags, Operation Gladio, or the Obama justice department protecting their wind up toys from an investigation. Let’s ask a simple question. What happened to all the Obama Era Mass Shootings under the Trump Administration?

Mass Shootings under the Last Five Presidents

Ronald Reagan: 1981-1989 (8 years) 11 mass shootings
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 5

George H. W. Bush: 1989-1993 (4 years) 12 mass murders
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 3

Bill Clinton: 1993-2001 (8 years) 23 mass murders
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 4

George W. Bush: 2001-2009 (8 years) 20 mass murders
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 5

Barrack H. Obama: 2009-2015 (in 7th year) 162 mass murders
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 18

Source: List of each event by TruthStreamMedia

What happened to all the Obama Era Mass Shootings under the Trump Administration?

We are already well past the longest time without a mass shooting under Obama. Statistically, if these were all organic events, there would have been one by now. Under Obama, there would have been several by now. Sometimes week in and week out. Trump has been in office for 52 days as of the writing of this article. Not one mass shooting or terrorist attack. Canada had a conveniently timed shooting when the temporary travel ban was introduced but nothing in America.

Why hasn’t there been one of these attacks in America since Trump was elected? Perhaps without the lax oversight or outright protection of a corrupt justice department. These wind-up toys can no longer operate in the continental United States. In the most heavily surveilled population on the planet, it would be very difficult to pull off one of these operations if the government were actually intent on stopping them. These types of operations take money and coordination that is very detectable by Intel agencies.

Trump has instructed the Justice Department to focus resources on actual terrorists, not veterans and gun owners. Breaking up and disrupting plans that would have gone through under Obama. Bringing to bear all of the surveillance tools used on the American people to stop actual plots.

 Is this what we are seeing?

Now there is no clear political advantage is to be gained through such acts by the establishment, mainstream media or gun control advocates. If a mass attack were to happen, it would only bolster Trump’s calls for better vetting of immigrants, border security, and 2nd Amendment rights. So they stop. Very interesting. Of course, mass shootings and terror attacks will never completely end. Yet the suspicion is there will be much less under a Trump Administration. Just an observation that many may be thinking themselves.

Sources:

Visit RaptormanReports for news, science, and history

Why Have There Been More Mass Shootings Under Obama than the Four Previous Presidents Combined?

http://truthstreammedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Mass-Murders-1981-2015-under-5-presidents.pdf

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/mass-shootings-mother-jones-full-data

http://www.naturalnews.com/035849_domestic_terror_plots_FBI.html

What Happened to Obama Era Of Mass Shootings Under the Trump Administration?

Why Donald Trump should play even more golf | Patrick Barkham

Scrolling through Twitter last night, I wondered why I felt so well. Not smug, just mystified by a mental and physical glow that made me strangely impervious to the toxic aspects of social media.

It had been an unmemorable weekend. I’d had a distressing argument with one daughter over her disinclination to go swimming; visited a garden centre without buying anything; spotted a marsh harrier; and played “the wheelbarrow game” in the garden, which involves carting one child in a wheelbarrow in pursuit of the others.

Then I read an interview with Florence Williams, author of The Nature Fix, who mentioned that we spend on average 5% of our day outdoors. I totted up my 15-hour Sunday: I’d spent exactly half outside.

We’re oblivious to one of our most obvious requirements. Homo sapiens is supremely adaptable, but westerners have lived predominantly inside for 10 generations at most. We need air, sky and some kind of engagement with the earth – but we’re bouncing off mental and physical walls.

There’s no intrinsic moral blessing to it. We may be shooting grouse, paintballing, cycling, gardening or climbing rocks, but a big portion of the pleasure is simply being outdoors.

There’s a furore about Donald Trump playing golf so often in the first weeks of his presidency. This might just be keeping him calm and sane. Play on, Mr President.

The west does not need the grinding physical labour that sent farm labourers to an early grave, but we must reimagine work and schooling to permit more time outdoors. We’d be wise to protect green space in cities and allow more of the solar-powered, pollution-fighting machines otherwise known as trees, which enhance our wellbeing more than we realise.

These are not new arguments. Octavia Hill, a co-founder of the National Trust, was banging on about “open-air sitting rooms” for the urban poor in the 1870s. But we now have neuroscience to prove what we overlook: we need nature far more than it needs us.

The nitrogen nightmare

‘Thuggish’ species such as nettles thrive on excessive nitrogen and ammonia, smothering rarer wildflowers Photograph: Alamy

Detoxifying the air is our most immediately pressing environmental challenge – for obvious, self-interested reasons. Less obvious is the impact of air pollution on plants. Nitrogen and ammonia unleashed by burning fossil fuels, traffic and farm fertilisers are having a devastating impact on plants, according to the charity Plantlife. A staggering 90% of nature-rich habitats in England and Wales are suffering from excess nitrogen. In such conditions, a few “thuggish” species such as nettles thrive, smothering rarer wildflowers, fungi, lichen and the invertebrates that depend on them.

We need to talk about nitrogen, says Plantlife. We do. And somewhere in a parallel, enlightened world, politicians sport baseball caps embossed with the vote-winning slogan: Reduce nitrogen Deposition Now.

Notes on a very small island

The British Isles is an archipelago of about 6,000 islands but we lost a big one, Doggerland, 8,000 years ago. Our neolithic forebears would have been delighted by plans to rebuild a 2.5 sq mile island on Dogger Bank, in the North Sea. The old Doggerland was swamped by rising seas; Doggerland 2.0 will be devoted to renewable energy, helping to lessen the sea-level rise caused by global warming.

Sadly for romantics, this idealistic island is called the North Sea Wind Power Hub, and will be built by energy companies from Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands. This is our ancestral home. We must participate, if only to preserve the Doggerland brand. But I suppose Brexit means we’re a lonely set of small islands these days.

A fishing boat in the North Sea, where there are plans to build a 2.5 sq mile island on Dogger Bank. Photograph: Owen Humphreys/PA

Why Donald Trump should play even more golf | Patrick Barkham

What Happened to Obama Era Of Mass Shootings Under the Trump Administration?

It has been horrific to watch all mass shootings in America over the last 8 years. Everyone has been traumatized by the images of carnage week in and week out. Have you noticed these mass shootings are no longer happening in America?

In any political environment, it is important to observe what is actually happening not just what is being said. This is an observation only. Considering all the Machiavellian possibilities. Looking through history, it would be naïve not to question the surge of mass shootings in the Obama era in this context.

Under the Obama Administration, mass shootings were up many times over any previous president. A constant bombardment of horrific incidents involving mass shootings was endured by the public during the last 8 years. It seemed every couple of weeks a deranged person was killing in mass. Hardly a month went by without these scenes being projected through the media. With hyperventilating commentary from mainstream media on how gun rights were to blame. The constant drumbeat of gun control as the only answer to stop the carnage. Obama himself saying this had become routine. Routine indeed as there was a mass shooting on average of about every 3 weeks. Some shootings in clusters and others further apart. Sometimes multiple instances in a row when certain legislation was being pushed. Always used to for political advantage.

Accompanied by ridiculous coverage ready to go by the mainstream media. In many instances, the killers were known to the Intel Agencies like the San Bernardino shooters and the Boston Marathon bombers. Yet the Intel Agencies were called off months before each incident. This has happened many times. Instead of talking about false flags, Operation Gladio, or the Obama justice department protecting their wind up toys from an investigation. Let’s ask a simple question. What happened to all the Obama Era Mass Shootings under the Trump Administration?

Mass Shootings under the Last Five Presidents

Ronald Reagan: 1981-1989 (8 years) 11 mass shootings
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 5

George H. W. Bush: 1989-1993 (4 years) 12 mass murders
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 3

Bill Clinton: 1993-2001 (8 years) 23 mass murders
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 4

George W. Bush: 2001-2009 (8 years) 20 mass murders
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 5

Barrack H. Obama: 2009-2015 (in 7th year) 162 mass murders
Incidents with 8 or more deaths = 18

Source: List of each event by TruthStreamMedia

What happened to all the Obama Era Mass Shootings under the Trump Administration?

We are already well past the longest time without a mass shooting under Obama. Statistically, if these were all organic events, there would have been one by now. Under Obama, there would have been several by now. Sometimes week in and week out. Trump has been in office for 52 days as of the writing of this article. Not one mass shooting or terrorist attack. Canada had a conveniently timed shooting when the temporary travel ban was introduced but nothing in America.

Why hasn’t there been one of these attacks in America since Trump was elected? Perhaps without the lax oversight or outright protection of a corrupt justice department. These wind-up toys can no longer operate in the continental United States. In the most heavily surveilled population on the planet, it would be very difficult to pull off one of these operations if the government were actually intent on stopping them. These types of operations take money and coordination that is very detectable by Intel agencies.

Trump has instructed the Justice Department to focus resources on actual terrorists, not veterans and gun owners. Breaking up and disrupting plans that would have gone through under Obama. Bringing to bear all of the surveillance tools used on the American people to stop actual plots.

 Is this what we are seeing?

Now there is no clear political advantage is to be gained through such acts by the establishment, mainstream media or gun control advocates. If a mass attack were to happen, it would only bolster Trump’s calls for better vetting of immigrants, border security, and 2nd Amendment rights. So they stop. Very interesting. Of course, mass shootings and terror attacks will never completely end. Yet the suspicion is there will be much less under a Trump Administration. Just an observation that many may be thinking themselves.

Sources:

Visit RaptormanReports for news, science, and history

Why Have There Been More Mass Shootings Under Obama than the Four Previous Presidents Combined?

http://truthstreammedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Mass-Murders-1981-2015-under-5-presidents.pdf

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/mass-shootings-mother-jones-full-data

http://www.naturalnews.com/035849_domestic_terror_plots_FBI.html

What Happened to Obama Era Of Mass Shootings Under the Trump Administration?

Most Still Don’t Know ObamaCare Penalties Waived by Trump Executive Order

The I.R.S has been instructed by the Trump Administration via Executive Order  not to collect ObamaCare Penalties. Giving millions of Americans and small businesses a huge break and boosting the economy. Ordering the I.R.S. not or ask about your healthcare situation makes sure no further penalties can be assessed. Effectively throwing a monkey wrench into the ObamaCare tax and penalty system that has wrecked the American economy. As Congress sits on their hands and does nothing this one act alone has given millions of families much needed help. Millennials who don’t get ObamaCare will actually get a tax return this year. Small business can expand not having to worry about the mandates. Majorly boosting the consumer confidence and adding to the stock market rally. Trump can do this because the President has the responsibility to direct all employees of the federal government. Congress may wait and try to introduce ObamaCare Lite but Trump has beat them to the punch back on January 20th.

Why is this not more widely reported on mainstream fake news? Nothing on nightly news. A couple begrudging mentions in the national papers. Local or city newspapers and television? Forget about it. Alternative sources and conservative economic media have reported on it. The answer is obvious. It is not politically convenient.

This is such cause for celebration for all Americans yet almost nothing is being done by the 5th column to advertise the fact to the people. This is important. A lot senior citizens who rely on these “news sources” are not even aware of this. Lower income people and even low information consumers are still making financial and healthcare decisions based on old information.

Executive Order Minimizing the Economic Burden of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act Pending Repeal

Section 2 of the Executive Order of Jan 20th reads.

Sec. 2.  To the maximum extent permitted by law, the Secretary of Health and Human Services (Secretary) and the heads of all other executive departments and agencies (agencies) with authorities and responsibilities under the Act shall exercise all authority and discretion available to them to waive, defer, grant exemptions from, or delay the implementation of any provision or requirement of the Act that would impose a fiscal burden on any State or a cost, fee, tax, penalty, or regulatory burden on individuals, families, healthcare providers, health insurers, patients, recipients of healthcare services, purchasers of health insurance, or makers of medical devices, products, or medications.

Small businesses over 50 people that don’t comply with the Obamacare can pay as much as $ 5000 per employee as places like Macdonalds get waivers. The penalty to an individual can be as high as $ 2800 in the higher tax brackets. Even at the lower end even $ 600 can be be a low income earner’s entire tax return. The effect goes far beyond that.

Now families and individuals can effectively ignore the disastrous law all together. No longer saddled with having to get useless health insurance with high premiums. Saving many hundreds of dollars a month for an average family. Choosing alternative means of healthcare not prescribed under the draconian ObamaCare. If they know about it.

Sources:

RaptormanReports

https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/01/2/executive-order-minimizing-economic-burden-patient-protection-and

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyphillipserb/2017/01/20/trump-signs-executive-order-to-roll-back-obamacare/#7858a7643eeb

Most Still Don’t Know ObamaCare Penalties Waived by Trump Executive Order

Tories wary about plugging Trump gap in family planning funding

The hastily convened global gathering of governments in Brussels to pledge tens of millions of euros to family planning charities who had their US funding pulled by Donald Trump’s so-called “global gag” has been a tightrope to walk for the British government.

Trump reinstated the rule by executive order in his first few days in the White House, meaning US government funding cannot be provided to charities whose work includes offering abortion services.

Perhaps more than any other country, the UK has been keen to demonstrate that, whatever the concerns about the Trump administration, the answer is engagement rather than isolation. In January, Theresa May became the first foreign leader to meet the US president on a trip criticised by some as overly hasty. Given the UK’s need for new and fast free trade partners after the exit from the EU, such a position is perhaps unavoidable.

Viewed through this prism, its decision to send Rory Stewart, a junior minister, rather than Priti Patel, the secretary of state for international development, could be interpreted as a mild snub to the She Decides conference, an event intended by its organisers to be a symbol of solidarity against Trump. Ditto the UK decision not to pledge any additional money, when countries from Norway to the Netherlands are stumping up millions.

But that is not how ministers at the Department for International Development see it. They say they have been planning to host their own major global summit on family planning over the summer with the UN and that – far from ignoring the issue – the department has intensified UK aid efforts on family planning.

Observers might detect a sense of irritation that the UK will now be put in a position where it is a follower, rather than a leader, given that this week’s conference has been convened by the Dutch, Belgian and other northern European nations.

However, critics have warned that the determination of the department to forge its own path, rather than be perceived as embarrassing Trump, could leave charities in limbo, without specific pledges that their loss of support from the US will be matched elsewhere.

That uncertainty could have long-term consequences for reproductive health in developing countries. About half of all abortion procedures worldwide – more than 20m – are unsafe, with the vast majority in developing countries. About 68,000 women die annually after backstreet abortions, making it one of the leading causes of maternal mortality, according to the World Health Organization.

Five Labour MPs wrote in January to Patel to urge her to commit emergency funding to the She Decides effort, arguing that policymaking needed to be reactive to a volatile political climate. “We would implore you to take urgent steps on funding and policy as the Dutch government has, and as the UK government has done so previously, to mitigate the impact of this decision,” they wrote.

At least one of the MPs is speaking from experience. Gareth Thomas was a minister at DfID in 2006 when the Labour government publicly defied George W Bush’s own reinstatement of the global gag rule to pledge money for safe abortion services where US funding had been cut off.

At the time, the International Planned Parenthood Federation praised the bravery of the UK, saying they were “deeply grateful for the gesture not only financially but politically”.

Any kind of similar statement of thanks from charities in 2017 would be deeply unhelpful to the Conservative government in the post-Brexit era, connecting international aid spending to diplomacy.

Sources at the department see the decision by European and other governments to make immediate pledges to match the support as too hasty and say the scale of the funding gap from Trump’s order has not yet been fully calibrated. The UK’s 2006 funding pledge came five years after Bush’s order, and in a very different political climate.

Tories wary about plugging Trump gap in family planning funding

Dutch minister calls on UK to join safe abortion fund after Trump ban

The Dutch government has voiced hope that the UK will join 20 countries to set up a safe abortion fund to fill the gap left by Donald Trump’s “global gag rule”.

Lilianne Ploumen, the Dutch international development minister, is leading an international campaign to raise $ 600m (£480m) to compensate for the Trump administration’s ban on funding for NGOs that provide abortion or information on the procedure to women in developing countries.

Belgium, Denmark and Norway have joined the Netherlands in pledging $ 10m each, while at least 15 other countries are preparing to join the scheme, including Canada, Cape Verde, Estonia, Finland and Luxembourg.

The British government has yet to declare whether it will sign up to the initiative, prompting concerns from British Labour MPs that Trump’s ban could undermine the Department for International Development’s work in promoting the health and education of poor women around the world.

Ploumen said she had contacted the international development secretary, Priti Patel, and her DfID predecessor, Justine Greening, who serves as minister for women and equalities.

The British government and the Netherlands were working closely on international family planning topics, Ploumen said, voicing hope that the UK would join the latest initiative. “It is up to them to voice their support. They are a strong partner in all of this so I do hope they will be able to join.”

“The UK has been a great champion of international cooperation and not only when there were Labour leaders in charge,” she said, praising David Cameron and Theresa May.

The Dutch government wants donors to step in to support family planning programmes.

Campaigners fear the ban will choke off funding for maternal health services and work to combat Aids, malaria and the Zika virus.

Already, 3m unsafe abortions for 15- to 19-year-old girls are carried out each year, the World Health Organisation estimates, leading to lasting health problems and, in some cases, the mother’s death.

The Dutch minister voiced optimism that a coalition of international donors – governments, foundations, companies and individuals – could raise the money, despite tepid responses to international fundraising drives for humanitarian emergencies in Syria and Yemen.

The $ 600m goal was a “very ambitious target” that “signalled the US has been a great partner in the last years”. But she acknowledged that countries were struggling to “make ends meet and it is really unfortunate that the US has now given us another challenge”.

The Dutch government has also approached US foundations. A few individuals have handed over money in envelopes to the Dutch embassies in Washington and London, prompting the creation of the fundraising page at SheDecides.com

NGOs have praised the Dutch government and other countries, but fear the plan may not go far enough..

We are counting on the UK government to continue supporting the family planning cause

Irene Donadio, IPPF

“We are witnessing a new version of the global gag rule,” said Irene Donadio, an expert at the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF). “It has been enormously expanded and that will affect expenditure on all global health programmes. We know that at a minimum it could be $ 600m a year, but it could be much more.

“We admire and support those governments who want to stand up for women and their dignity, but we are not sure this will fill the gap or how quickly it will fill the gap.”

The IPPF had “always admired the UK’s commitment to family planning”, but “could not help noticing that the UK has not been very vocal [on the global gag],” Donadio added. “We are counting on the UK government to continue supporting the family planning cause.”

A DfID spokeswoman did not address a question about whether the UK would contribute to the international fund, saying: “The UK is a global leader on family planning, sexual and reproductive health and rights. We are continuing to work closely with partners, including governments and civil society, to deliver this, and are stepping up our leadership even further by hosting a major international summit this summer to secure commitments that increase access to family planning services for women and girls in the world’s poorest and most fragile countries.”

Aid experts have voiced concern that Brexit will damage Britain’s international development role, by eroding budgets and prompting an isolationist turn.

But Ploumen voiced optimism that the UK would not shrink from its promises. “Listening to your prime minister, she has voiced the importance of Britain in the world on several occasions, and international solidarity is part and parcel, I would assume, of that relationship with the rest of the world.

“If you are a trading nation, if you are an open economy like the UK and the Netherlands, there is a deep interest in a stable world.”

Dutch minister calls on UK to join safe abortion fund after Trump ban

Trump once said women should be punished for abortion. Now, he"s making it happen | Lucia Graves

In the mass of protesters thronging the National Mall in Washington DC on Saturday, one sign stood out to me. It was a wire close hanger mounted on cardboard, held by a young woman of color in pigtails. “Never again,” it read.

As it turns out, for poor women overseas, never was only as far away as Monday.

Donald Trump used his first full day as president to reinstate a Reagan-era executive order that will have a devastating impact on those with the fewest resources: women and girls in impoverished parts of the word. The order, best known as the “global gag rule,” will strip funding from any international NGO that provides abortions services, or even discusses abortion with patients seeking educational materials or referrals.

Study upon study has shown eliminating access to abortion services doesn’t eliminate abortions, it just forces women underground into dangerous situations.

What is the ‘global gag rule’, and why does Trump support it?

For a guy who has been billed as a populist, it’s perhaps surprising that having roughly half a million people – three times the number that attended his inauguration – flood the streets of Washington has done nothing to alter his policy.

It did, however, do something else: it hurt the president’s feelings.

Trump’s defining qualities as a child, according to multiple biographers I spoke with, is that of a schoolyard bully. And it’s the rare thing about him that hasn’t changed. That’s why the fact that he dedicated one of his first acts in office to undermining the rights of women seems to me like something close to tit for tat.

Because Trump has been outspoken with regard to the other executive orders he signed off on Monday – instituting a federal hiring freeze, and withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. But he hasn’t made a point of talking about abortion access unless asked. While it’s true executive’s implementation of the “global gag rule” has historically been reversed as soon as the opposite party takes over the White House, previous proponents – Ronald Reagan and George W Bush – ran on platforms of social conservatism. Trump was less easy to pin down. As he told Howard Stern of his stance on abortion in 2013: “it’s never been my big issue.”

Trump seemed to have outsourced the question to his running mate Mike Pence, a staunch anti-abortion advocate whose selection by Trump was widely seen as a peace offering to evangelical voters alienated by Trump’s lifestyle. The peace offering worked and Trump won evangelicals in a landslide.

But illusions Trump would, as he put it in a fleeting election night gesture, “be the president of everybody,” just went out the window. “The president, it’s no secret, has made it very clear he’s a pro-life president,” his spokesman Sean Spicer said in the first White House press briefing. “He wants to stand up for all Americans including the unborn.”

It’s quite the way to describe the gutting of a policy that’s spared an estimated 289,000 women from pregnancy- or childbirth-related deaths, according to the World Health Organization.

And it’s not just about abortion. Service providers denied funding under the gag rule could be stripped of the ability to carry out even the most basic women’s healthcare, as global family planning group Population Action International (PAI) has previously reported, resulting in the collapse of entire healthcare networks. WHO estimates 21 million unsafe abortions are performed globally each year, resulting in nearly 13% of all maternal deaths globally. And Marie Stopes International, a major global family planning advocacy group, estimates the loss of its services alone could mean 6.5 million unintended pregnancies, 2.1 million unsafe abortions, and 21,700 maternal deaths in Trump’s first term alone.

PAI puts it even starker terms: “The only goal the policy will achieve is to punish women in already challenging circumstances by blocking access to essential care.”

If Trump’s desire to “punish” women sounds familiar, that’s because, well, it should. In March of last year he said those seeking abortions should endure “some form of punishment” for doing so. And while yes, he walked back his tone-deaf statement in the explosive political aftermath, his actions Monday spoke louder than words.

Trump once said women should be punished for abortion. Now, he"s making it happen | Lucia Graves

"Global gag rule" reinstated by Trump, curbing NGO abortion services abroad

In one of a number of sharp reversals from the Obama era, Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order banning international NGOs from providing abortion services or offering information about abortions if they receive US funding.

The rule will put thousands of international healthcare workers in the difficult position of deciding whether to continue to offer family planning care that includes abortion at the expense of a critical funding stream.

The US is the single largest donor to global health efforts, providing nearly $ 3bn toward health efforts through the United States Agency for International Development (USAid) alone. The state department and groups like the Peace Corps offer additional funding.

Many international health advocates insist that their efforts are not comprehensive without abortion services. Unsafe abortions are a major cause of maternal mortality and kill tens of thousands of women every year.

What is the ‘global gag rule’, and why does Trump support it?

“President Trump’s reinstatement of the global gag rule ignores decades of research, instead favoring ideological politics over women and families,” said Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a New Hampshire Democrat who serves on the foreign relations committee.

“We know that when family planning services and contraceptives are easily accessible, there are fewer unplanned pregnancies, maternal deaths and abortions.

“And when women have control over their reproductive health, it improves the long-term health of mothers and children and creates a lasting economic benefit.”

Trump’s signature reinstates a Reagan-era rule that was not in effect for most of the Obama administration. The order does not eliminate international aid for abortions, which is already prohibited by federal law under the Helms amendment. Rather, the gag rule takes the Helms amendment one step further by preventing NGOs from using private funds to offer abortions or even refer women to groups that provide abortions.

The gag rule also prevents health workers in foreign countries from advocating for abortion rights, which includes testifying about the impacts of illegal abortion.

The rule does not enjoy uniform support along party lines. In 2015, Senate legislation introduced by Shaheen that would have made the gag rule impossible to reinstate by executive order attracted support from several moderate Republicans.

Still, the reinstatement of the global gag rule, also known as the Mexico City policy, has been long sought by opponents of abortion rights. To their eyes, funding groups that perform or even discuss abortions is tantamount to funding the procedure.

“President Trump is continuing Ronald Reagan’s legacy by taking immediate action on day one to stop the promotion of abortion through our tax dollars overseas,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the anti-abortion political advocacy group Susan B Anthony List.

“President Trump’s immediate action to promote respect for all human life, including vulnerable unborn children abroad, as well as conscience rights, sends a strong signal about his administration’s pro-life priorities.”

Trump is not the first president to reinstate the rule after it was suspended. George W Bush signed a similar order when he entered office in 2001.

As a result, more than 20 developing countries in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East lost access to contraceptives provided by the US and many NGOs were forced to shut down or lay off staff, according to EngenderHealth, a global women’s health organization that supports abortion rights.

EngenderHealth observed the impact in three places – Kenya, Nepal and Zambia – and found that in these countries, the gag rule reduced the availability of family planning services, HIV programs and maternal and child health programs.

"Global gag rule" reinstated by Trump, curbing NGO abortion services abroad

Experiencing Trump image overload | Brief letters

The news section of the Guardian on 14 January contained four pictures of the US president-elect (pages 6, 26, 28 and 41), not to mention the political cartoon rendering on page 29. It seems to me this is helping to create an icon. As I admire and appreciate the excellence of the Guardian, I wonder how you determine when enough is enough, or in this case, too much.
Tom Miller
Stromness, Orkney

• Surely if NHS hospitals didn’t have to pay business rates (Rates pain for hospitals, 12 January) the problem of NHS funding would almost be solved. Or perhaps they should declare themselves a charity, as private hospitals do, and ask for an 80% rebate. I suggest the Guardian starts a petition to stop this anomaly.
Moira Robinson
Kidlington, Oxfordshire

• I have a question for your anonymous correspondent (Letters, 16 January). If the job of a GP is the cushy number, why do so few medical graduates want to make a career in that branch of the NHS?
David Nove
Duffield, Derbyshire

• I remember from my childhood 65 years ago that my mother had a Weetabix butter spreader (Letters, 16 January) which I believe she had inherited after my grandfather died. It was a short knife with a rounded bulbous blade end which was cross-hatched (presumably to aid the spread of hard butter on crumbly Weetabix) and bore the legend “Weetabix Spreader”.
Judith Kent
London

• I used to note that, during interviews, politicians began their answers with “clearly”, while scientists began with “so” (Letters, 16 January). “Clearly” has all but disappeared, while “so” is widespread. Evidence that we have stopped listening to politicians?
Jennifer Gale
Littleham, Devon

• I would suggest a fourth cause of finger cuts that need hospital treatment (Letters, 14 January) and that is the one after the ceremony of the corned beef tin and the key.
Linda Gresham
Birmingham

• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com

• Read more Guardian letters – click here to visit gu.com/letters

Experiencing Trump image overload | Brief letters

Digested week: Trump showers satirists with gifts

Monday

Even if it was primarily intended as a diversionary tactic to stop people asking her about Brexit for a few days, it was good to hear Theresa May talking about making mental health a priority. Though I couldn’t help thinking her words might have sounded a little more sincere if she had offered a little more than the £1bn for mental health services that David Cameron had promised, but never delivered, in an almost identical speech the year before. Under the Conservative and coalition governments there have been 4,000 fewer nurses and 600 fewer doctors working in mental health. I consider myself fortunate to have been able to pay for my all-too-frequent visits to psychiatrists and therapists over the past 30 years; without that ability, I dread to think what would have happened to me. Or if I would still be around. But I’m all too aware that many people aren’t that lucky, and either have to struggle on alone or wait a long time to get help. By which time for some it will have been too late.

Tuesday

The last that I – and most others – saw of Dominic Cummings, the eccentric former special adviser to Michael Gove and passionate advocate for Brexit, was at his remarkable appearance before the Treasury select committee during the EU referendum campaign. He got things off to a bad start by telling the chair, Andrew Tyrie, how busy he was and that he had to get away early. He then refused to engage with the committee’s concerns about the accuracy of Vote Leave’s figures. “It’s only a couple of decimal points,” he shrugged petulantly. “There’s quite a few decimal points between £33bn and £16bn,” Tyrie observed. At which point Cummings started muttering about Tyrie chatting to his wife in his slippers, just in case he hadn’t been offensive enough already. But now Cummings has partially re-emerged, having written a detailed blog about the Vote Leave campaign. Much of it is very entertaining but, perhaps not surprisingly, some of it doesn’t ring entirely true. He insists that both Boris Johnson and Gove could barely contain their excitement the morning after the referendum. That doesn’t quite square with the impression left with those of us who attended their joint press conference. Johnson acted like a mute zombie while Gove looked like someone who had come down off a bad trip to discover he had murdered his best friend.

Wednesday

Fifa has come in for a lot of criticism for expanding the World Cup from 32 to 48 countries from 2026. Having just under a quarter of all the world’s countries qualifying for the finals does seem rather excessive – though maybe not if you’re Scottish as your team will probably still struggle to make the cut. I suspect the increase in numbers has more to do with lining Fifa’s pockets than making football more inclusive. But at least one good thing should come out of it – the 2026 Panini sticker album should be the biggest yet. Panini began making sticker albums for the 1970 World Cup and it was rather a low-key affair. For a start only 16 teams appeared in the finals and Panini didn’t even bother to print stickers for all the players; teams like Israel and Peru were designated a squad of just 11 players. Still, if you’re like me, you’re sitting on a completed 1970 album your nerdiness has paid off to the tune of about £1,500. By Rio 2014, the number of stickers had expanded well into the 600s and for 2026 we might even get past the 1,000 mark.

Thursday

What with the coalition, the Scottish referendum, the 2015 general election and Brexit it’s been a good few years to be a political sketch writer. Scarcely a week has gone by without at least one politician managing to embarrass themselves. This week we had Theresa May slagging off the Red Cross and Jeremy Corbyn contradicting himself at least three times on the same day of what was supposed to be his relaunch. But part of me would love to be in the US right now. Donald Trump may not be great for the US but he’s a gift to satire. The president-elect’s Twitter feed is a goldmine in itself. With Trump there is no filter; he just wakes up in the night and tweets the first thing that comes to mind. No British politician would dare having a pop at Judi Dench the way Trump went for Meryl Streep. More’s the pity. Then there was THAT press conference. If a British politician was caught up in a sex scandal – made up or not – he or she would first try to ride it out in silence and when pushed make a brief two-minute statement with no questions. Trump went for it big time. On and on he went, shit-bagging any member of the press who happened to have upset him and trotting out “germaphobe”’ – a word that once heard can never be forgotten. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

Friday

There’s no part of an MP’s life that goes unrecorded these days. A new organisation, Polimonitor, has taken to counting the number of swear words used by MPs on Twitter. Excluding retweets MPs swore 256 times in 2016, with Labour taking up six of the top 10 places. Perhaps that’s a sign their opinion poll ratings are getting to them. The sweariest MP was Jamie Reed, who has already announced his resignation, with 20. Mike Dugher was second equal with 17. The top Tory was Nicholas Soames, also with 17. It was Brexit that did it for him. Labour’s Jess Phillips – the only woman on the list – will be disappointed to have only made it to fourth place, but not many would bet against her making a concerted effort for top spot in 2017. Perhaps the most surprising entrant was Douglas Carswell who finished in seventh place: the Ukip MP is one of Westminster’s more sensitive souls and usually takes to blocking anyone who doesn’t understand his brilliance rather than swearing at them. I got blocked by him long ago. Still, Carswell’s language might be severely tested if Nigel Farage contests and wins the Stoke byelection following Tristram Hunt’s resignation to become director of the V&A. Carswell and Farage hate each other far more than they do the Tories or Labour and won’t be pleased at having to sit next to each other in Westminster.

Digested week: Snow and showers.

Digested week: Trump showers satirists with gifts

Will Trump cause progressives to forget about women"s rights? | Jessica Valenti

If you were concerned that forced funerals for fetuses and zygotes wasn’t quite horrific enough, rejoice! In the last week, Ohio has passed a law banning abortions after 20 weeks and Oklahoma wants to mandate that businesses post anti-abortion signs in women’s public restrooms.

In the wake of Trump’s win, reproductive rights opponents have not wasted a moment in their plan to roll back access to abortion and birth control. And, as has been the case for some time, these harmful policies are being presented as wins for women.

When Governor John Kasich of Ohio passed the 20-week ban, for example, he also vetoed a six-week ban – the hope being that the move would be seen as moderate in comparison. But 20 weeks is around the time that women find out about fetal abnormalities – a leading reason for later abortions. And while the Oklahoma plan is being touted by pro-life groups as a way to offer women “alternatives”, what it’s really doing is shaming women and requiring that businesses spend money on ideological propaganda. (Also, so much for the Republicans caring about women’s privacy in bathrooms!)

The research is clear: women suffer when you deny them access to birth control and abortion. In fact, despite anti-choice rhetoric to the contrary, the only kind of negative mental health impact that abortion has on women occurs when someone seeks out the procedure and is denied.

The challenge we have in front of us, though, is not just the danger of Trump’s administration or the emboldening of Republicans. In a time when bad news for progress is around every corner – as Slate writer Jamelle Bouie put it, “what disaster to write about today?” – we have to make that sure that women’s rights don’t get lost in the shuffle.

It wasn’t so long ago that gender and race were considered ancillary or distracting topics in progressive politics – a notion still being bandied about as people blame “identity politics” and “political correctness” for Trump’s win. If history is any indication, it won’t be long before we start hearing murmurings from so-called progressives that women should sacrifice working on issues that affect them in service of “the greater good”.

It’s vital that we not forget or lose the momentum feminism has had over the last decade, especially on reproductive rights. The stakes are just too high. Hundreds of thousands of American women have already sought out illegal abortions, in part because of state-level restrictions. And as the Affordable Care Act comes under fire, it could leave millions without coverage for contraception.

These are not small things, these are not side issues or special interests. Women’s ability to control their bodies and plan their family size is a human rights issue. And while we have a tremendous amount of work to do on so many fronts, Americans cannot afford to treat feminism and women’s progress as something that can be pushed aside for a time and picked up later. Let’s not allow our the fact that we’re overwhelmed to get the better of us – not now, and not for the next four years.

Will Trump cause progressives to forget about women"s rights? | Jessica Valenti