Oh Kansas. I love you so much. You are my heart. You are my
home. But lately, you’ve been getting bat-shit crazy, and we need to talk.
Yesterday, in the hallowed halls of the recently refurbished
Kansas Capital building, State Sen. Mary Pilcher-Cook, R-Shawnee arranged for a
live sonogram to be performed at a Public Health and Welfare committee meeting.
Pilcher-Cook is the chair for said committee.
Someone held up a big blue tarp while the sonograms were
performed on two pregnant volunteers, one at 12 weeks and the other at 24.
So many thoughts. So many questions.
First off: Ew. I love a good freak show as much as the next
person, but I think I’d decline to watch another woman’s sonogram, thank you
very much. I attended my own, along with my husband, and I think we can both agree
that we considered it to be a very personal event.
Secondly: Oh. I see. We’re going to start having
demonstrative governance now? How fun! There have already been several
suggestions from Kansans all over the internets for future State Capital
demonstrations:
Public prostate exams because we can’t leave the dudes out,
right? If teabaggers wanted, they could use public prostate and colonoscopy
exams to demonstrate how OBAMACARE WANTS TO GETCHA!
Public mammograms and pap smears because we can’t let women
forget that government is so small and perverted it wants to get its hands on
their goodies.
A live sex demonstration so that there’s absolutely,
positively no confusion about how babies are made.
Personally, I think that democrats should start organizing
some demonstrations of their own. They could invite some struggling families in
to show how food stamp cuts have hurt them. Or how about the Senate Public
Health and Welfare Committee take a field trip to my kid’s classroom, which,
since Governor Sam Brownback has taken office, has increased in size from an
average of 18-20 kids to 25-30 kids?
Now, one might think that this was a stunt performed in protest
of abortion, but Sen. Pilcher-Cook has drafted legislation banning surrogate
pregnancies in Kansas, so the sonogram was somehow supposed to be demonstrative
of … what, exactly?
Because Pilcher-Cook is very publicly against abortion. So
one would think that she’d be all pro-pregnancy, right? All for helping fertility challenged couples have every conceivable (see what I did there?) method for
having kids at their disposal. Babies all around! She also claims to be “small
government,” but she’s all for banning the legal contract of surrogacy, which
as far as I can tell, isn’t hurting anybody except for possibly the parties
involved.
This is from Pilcher-Cook’s own web page:
Limited Government
Kansas leadership has been relying on a
disturbing trend recently of using governmental control as solutions to issues.
Whether you are talking about health care, education, or even business, our
state has shown a trend toward a Topeka-centered mindset.
I believe our state
thrives and our people benefit from a system which reduces the role of
government in people’s lives and removes all unnecessary burdens upon
businesses, families, and individuals. I believe parents know what is best for
their children and entrepreneurs know what is best for their businesses.
Really, Mary? Is that really what you think?
Finally, I have one big question for Mary: ARE YOU FUCKING
KIDDING ME? I have friends and families who are SUFFERING in this shit-ass
economy (which, by the way, is only shit-ass for poor people. The rich are
doing fine.) and you are WASTING TAX DOLLARS AND LEGISLATORS’ TIME with this
poor-ass excuse for governance. So very seriously: SHAME ON YOU.
How about as the chair for the Public Health and Welfare
committee you talk to your buddy Sam about reinstating some food stamp money?
Or expanding Medicaid in Kansas instead of blocking it?
Also, if you’re gonna play the sonogram card, how about a
live sonogram of a woman carrying a horribly deformed post-20-week fetus? So
that legislators understand exactly what they’re doing to a woman—to her family—if
they decide to draft legislation that takes the decision to terminate such a
pregnancy out of the hands of that woman, her family and her doctor?
If you have thoughts for Mary, you can contact her here:
E-mail: mary@pilchercook.com
Thanks to the Kansas National Organizationfor Women for the photograph!
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