Politicians being stupid

I originally planned to call this post "Men being stupid", but I realized women are politicians too and likely voted from some of the bills mentioned in my rant against decent common sense. Common sense from this chair anyway. And the news stories?

Well, the state of Nebraska, which I thought was better than the Dakotas for their treatment of women, have one-upped them with a new bill doing two things. One it requires women planning an abortion be "screened" for mental health and other problems before be allowed to get an abortion. It's clearly meant to slow down the process and get pro-life counselors to talk to women seeking abortions as a screen for a mental health exam.

It's clearly inappropriate and only shows the narrow morality and mentality the Nebraska legisltature and Governor have for women's rights. It's just another sign they don't trust women, but it's hypocritical as we all know if men were faced with the same situation, they wouldn't hesitate to scream foul as an afront to their rights. Men, and some women, being stupid.

On top of that, the law bans abortions after 20 weeks, which is just near the end of the second trimester, not for health reasons often used, but because it says "fetus feel pain" and an abortion would inflict pain on the fetus. Except it's still tied to the mother and the procedure accomodates this issue. It's cow pasture material and apparently they dragged some of it into the Nebraska legistlature chamber as this bill and now law.

They're trying to take away the mother's right to choose and the protections with that choice. That's not good law, it's simply politicians being stupid.

Ok, next item. The news story saying Democrats may not pass the 2011 appropriations bills this fall until after the November elections. Not because of pottential problems with Republicans to pass the bills, but because they're afraid. Afraid of Republicans in the elections focusing on the deficit problem with the appropriations. This isn't just politicians being stupid but spineless or gutless, take you pick.

This is the annual problem with Congress, they rarely pass appropriations before the deadline of September 30th, to fund the federal government October 1st. It's both parties at fault, regardless of which is in power. They always pass continuing resolutions funding government at the previous year spending until they can pass the appropriations measures, that is except one, war funding.

But for some reason, they never seem to fail to pass the appropriations for the wars in Iraq and Afghaniston. Well, except once but then they fixed it with a quick fix bill before the final bill. That's because these funds are unique and separate funding measures and the wars are pay as you go or no war. And we all know Congress likes funding wars, it's sells votes.

But not to pass the appropriations bills because you're afraid the Republicans will hammer you in the election ads isn't not good politics. It's not good government. It's simply being stupid out of fear of an imaginary enemy, something that hasn't happened. The incumbents are going to get hammered in ads anyways, this just adds ammuntion to their ads.

So the Democrats are shooting themselves in the foot, er mouth, or more so their own political future, or so they fear. They're not thinking, just having no balls to actually represent the voters who put them there. Just politicians being stupid.