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(Everything you did not want to know about melanoma - and never wanted to ask)
As a 10 year melanoma survivor, I am absolutely furious about the most recent Obama ad. Granted it is from a 3rd party, PAC, founded by Howard Dean’s brother, but still it is part of the Obama-Dean Machine. Coming from someone with a medical background, it is a mass of abject ignorance, which is enough to make anyone who has had to deal with the horrors of melanoma - well, speechless. I’ve seen some nasty, vicious, cruel, and vile things before in my life, but this strikes at the heart of anyone who is surviving cancer. No matter how “minor” the stage (mine, thank God was insitu) we all live with the specter, the sub-conscious fear that they did not get it all.
A cancer survivor becomes a little paranoid about cancer spreading somewhere in the body. A melanoma survivor is no different. The advantage a melanoma survivor has is the fact that if the cancer is caught early like mine or like the one John McCain had, there is an excellent survival rate. The only real danger is having the staging mis-diagnosed. This happened to Diana Ashby, wife of astronaut Jeff Ashby. Unfortunately she was mis-diagnosed. If she had been able to receive treatment, properly, she would have survived much longer than she did. Unfortunately her misdiagnosis was a death sentence. One of the things Jeff stressed to me was to make sure my insitu was properly diagnosed.
One thing melanoma survivors do is have a full body mole exam every 6 months - for the rest of their life. John McCain has one every 3 months. Of all the deadly cancers, melanoma is the one most easily “cured”. Everyone - even if they do not fit into the ABC’s of Melanoma should have a 6 month body check. You could be saving your life. I like to tell people - if you have a specific nevis (mole) and do not have it removed YOU WILL DIE. It is my crusade. My life was saved. You can save yours by a simple body check. FYI - then have every mole that could ever become cancerous removed. I did.
Here is a guest post by community member Deb Della Piana from Turn Left.
[If you would like to be a guest blogger on The Political Voices of Women, just join our community, and start posting.]
It’s election season, and I’m not about to let up on the McCain-Palin ticket. If I put these two at the larval stage, I’m giving them too much credit. To show that I’m not just a one-issue voter when it comes to McCain and Palin, the issue of women’s rights will not play into the article (but only this one time). I’ve done that article before, and there are other reasons I’d never vote for this ticket.
We already have people in government who believe they are above the law (one resides at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue right now) and it looks like McCain would like to add one more. Initially, Sarah Palin said she would cooperate voluntarily with the ongoing abuse of power investigation against her. Suddenly, the Alaska legislators are under pressure to wait until after the election to continue the investigation, and her husband is now going to ignore the subpoena he has received. I wonder if he’s getting pointers from campaign advisor Karl Rove about how best to ignore a subpoena and get away with it. It doesn’t take much in America these days, particularly if you’re an elected official. We’ve lowered the bar here to the point where we should all be doing the limbo.
McCain campaign spokesman Ed O’Callaghan is falsely accusing the supporters of Barack Obama of controlling the investigation. The fact is that the investigation was recommended prior to Palin’s selection by a bi-partisan Legislative Council, the vast majority of whom were Alaska Republicans. There’s no way this investigation should be delayed until after the election. If McCain chose this woman as a running mate with full knowledge of the accusations against her (and he says he knew from the beginning), then let the chips fall where they may.
McCain wants to distract, not inform. If he distracts, you may not learn that his plan is to privatize and cut Social Security approximately one percent per year, along the lines of the proposed Bush plan. Workers who retire ten years after the McCain plan is put in place would see a ten percent reduction in benefits from the very beginning.
Next on the McCain-Palin hit list is the nation’s health care system. Their plan would effectively dismantle the employer-based coverage that protects most American families by converting health care benefits into income on which employees would have to pay taxes. The idea is to force millions of Americans into the non-group market where costs are high and services are limited. Benefits that millions now have would be lost. This is what the Republicans call the ‘free market’ system, much like the one currently bringing down Wall Street at the taxpayers’ expense.
John McCain’s confusion about who’s who in the world continues to embarrass. This from a candidate supposedly superior to Barack Obama in the foreign policy field. When asked if he would commit to a meeting with Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, McCain refused. Apparently, McCain thought Zapatero was a Latin American autocrat. Randy Scheunemann, McCain’s foreign policy advisor, denied it was yet another McCain gaffe, but rather an intentional policy position with regard to Spain. Why would McCain refuse to commit to a meeting with a Democratic NATO ally with 1,000 troops serving in Afghanistan? Either McCain is intent on hiding his confusion from the public or he is upset (as is President Bush) that Spain pulled its troops from Iraq in 2004. Someone should point out to both George Bush and John McCain that there sometimes are repercussions when other nations find they’ve been deliberately lied to.
Dear Readers,
If the last few days have left you with the same feelings that you had during the run up to the Iraq War you’re definitely not alone.
Remember the WMDs that posed an imminent threat to America?
Remember the statements that implied that the Iraqi oil revenue was going to pay for the war?
Now the Bush Administration and The Fed are saying that we have a financial crisis that needs an immediate $700 billion infusion from the American taxpayer. Did you know that some of that money could be used to bail out foreign owned banks?
Within the next 24 hours, Congress is expected to make an historic choice in addressing America’s financial crisis:
Cut the Bush administration a $700 billion blank check for Wall Street
OR
demand sensible public checks and balances in the $700 billion bailout.
Well, before you let them cut that blank check think about this?
Remember the brave US service men and women who were sent to war in Afghanistan and Iraq without proper body armor.
Remember the appalling conditions at Walter Reed Medical Center.
Remember that the US embassy in Iraq which cost in excess of $600 million to build and is projected to have an annual operating cost of $1.2 billion.
Remember that President Bush vetoed a $35 billion expansion to the SCHIP program which would have provided health insurance to millions of America’s uninsured children. He said that we couldn’t afford it.
Remember the devastation caused by hurricanes Katrina, Rita, and now Ike. There are still parts of New Orleans’ 9th Ward as well as many parishes in Western Louisiana which have yet to have all of the debris removed.
Remember that five years after the worse blackout in US history, the energy grid is still “in dire straits“.
Americans, Get Over The Shock Already!
Are you going to let The Fed, the Bush Administration and Congress rush through a $700 billion dollar bailout of Wall Street and the banking industry when all of the aforementioned have put America and Americans last time after time after time after time?
Now, I’m not saying that nothing needs to be done to fix this broken economy. But are you going to let them rush to a bailout like they rushed to a war?
I just took action with the Campaign for America’s Future to weigh in for common sense solutions. I wanted to urge you to do the same. Please write an emergency letter to Congress now, and tell them: **No $700 Billion blank check to the Bush administration for Wall Street!**
Enough is Enough!
Video Roundup - Taxpayers To Fund 700 Billion Dollar Bank Bailout. Who Bails Out The People?
If you’re like me, you may have missed the Sunday talk shows. But, with a financial collapse that can only be compared to The Great Depression, you may want to know what you’ve missed. So, here is a video roundup of the Sunday morning talk shows. What do you think about this bailout? Is it going to help or hurt our economy? Is it going to help or hurt your ‘personal’ economy? Is rushing into this bailout really the best plan? Let me know what you think in comments.
700 Billion Dollar Bailout…
From Meet The Press…
As reported on US News & World Report, The Huffington Post and Feministe, the Wasilla police department changed their policy under the Sarah Palin mayoral administration to charge rape victims for the cost of their rape kits. Police Chief Charlie Fannon, who replaced the former chief of police when Palin fired him for not supporting her, decided to eliminate rape kits from the budget. Chief Fannon felt that the good people of Wasilla already had too high a tax burden, and forcing rape victims to pay for their own evidence gathering would save the town between $5,000 and $14,000 per year.
Of course, this makes perfect sense if you believe that rape victims asked for it. I mean, if women are going to go out wearing short skirts or tight pants, what do they expect? Or if they go out alone at all. Or if they stay home alone and someone breaks in. Thank goodness Palin hired a person who cares so much about the community.
The upshot of this policy is that the state of Alaska passed a law barring local law enforcement from charging rape victims for their rape kits. How many towns had this policy in place? One. That would be Wasilla, under the “leadership” of Sarah Palin. Who objected to the new law? Chief Charlie Fannon, complaining that the town would need to increase its budget to cover the cost of these routine law enforment procedures. Yes, that Palin sure has women’s best interests in mind.
[Contributor Suzanne Reisman is also at CUSS and other Rants, and BlogHer Feminism and Gender]
Will John McCain’s Health Care Plan Help or Hurt You? With the economy spiraling out of control, it’s important that we can all be secure in the availability, and quality of our health care. If you have a pre-existing condition, are receiving your health care through your employer, or are a woman…You may be in trouble with a McCain Health Care Plan. Here is some of the latest information, let me know what you think in comments.
Journal Disputes McCain’s Health Care Claims
Senator John McCain’s top domestic policy adviser, former Congressional Budget Office director Douglas Holtz-Eakin, recently said in a conference call with reporters that Mr. McCain’s health care proposal would “put 25 to 30 million individuals out of the ranks of the uninsured, into the ranks of the insured.” In an article released Tuesday, a panel of prominent health economists concludes that Mr. Holtz-Eakin’s projection is off by, well, 25 to 30 million.
The article, published in the journal Health Affairs, argues that “initially there would be no real change in the number of people covered as a result of the McCain plan.” After a short-term reduction of 1 million in the number of people without coverage, the number of uninsured would increase by 5 million after five years, the authors predict. There are currently 45 million people without insurance, or 15 percent of the population, according to the Census Bureau.
On Obama’s Health Care Plan…
By comparison, Senator Barack Obama’s plan, which would provide heavy government subsidies for insurance for low-income workers, would reduce the number of uninsured by 18 million in 2009 and by 34 million in 2018, according to the Urban Institute/Brookings Institution report. That would still leave Mr. Obama well shy of his goal of achieving universal coverage.
Think You Know John McCain? His Health Care Plan Will Penalize Women…
Presidential candidate John McCain’s health care reform plan would have a devastating impact on women, according to a new analysis.
“Tens of millions of women would be at risk of losing their current insurance coverage even though they use health care services more frequently than men, suffer chronic illness more often than men, and require maternity care and other reproductive health services,” concludes a report by the Planned Parenthood Action Fund and the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
The aim of McCain’s health care plan is to break up the existing employer based health care coverage system and replace it with a market-oriented system funded in part by the government.
Employers that currently offer health care coverage would find fewer incentives to continue doing so under the McCain plan. Instead, individuals would be given a tax credit of $2,500 (families would receive $5,000) so that they could shop around on the open market for the best plan for them, whether that insurer is based in the same state or not. The catch, though, is that the private insurance market doesn’t treat women that well.
The study reports that if McCain’s plan is implemented, “more than 30 million women with employer-sponsored health insurance who suffer from a chronic condition could lose their coverage, find it harder to obtain coverage, or have to purchase supplemental insurance to cover their chronic condition.”
Here is a guest post by community member Deb Della Piana from Turn Left.
[If you would like to be a guest blogger on The Political Voices of Women, just join our community, and start posting.]
Although the story I’m about to tell you is personal and happened to me and my family, it’s not just my story. It still happens everywhere, everyday. It’s a story of what it’s truly like to be gay in America. I don’t speak much about this these days, but I’m telling it to you today because I fear the country we face under John McCain and Sarah Palin. Under their virulently right-wing rule, this type of disenfranchisement and gutter treatment could spread exponentially throughout this nation.
I once worked for what I believed was one of the best Fortune 500 companies, a company that I had been loyal to since joining them in 1974 and I expected some type of loyalty in return. I was naïve back then. What I have learned is that companies expect loyalty, but they absolutely do not return it at the same level. No company name will be given, but let’s just say that with the advent of some new management came some discrimination. In this case, it was based on my sexual orientation (which, by the way, had not been an issue prior to management change). In 1997, after several ugly encounters between myself and my boss, I was roundly fired.
The circumstances are not important. The fact is that I signed an agreement not to sue (I was stupid, in retrospect) in exchange for a severance package. At the time, I had a small child under a year and a very sick partner, who had contracted pre-eclampsia during the final twenty weeks of the pregnancy and was saddled with a diagnosis of perinatal cardiomyopathy post-pregnancy. I saw no other way to survive and keep them both healthy and safe. One decision I had made, however, was that I would never again give my all to a corporation.
Here is a post from our newest community member Anita S. Lane. You can read more from Anita at her blog Unconventional Politics.
[If you would like to be a guest blogger on The Political Voices of Women, just join our community, and start posting.]
Is it possible to be a good, well-meaning individual and say something stupid? Of course it is.
I was recently talking with a relative whose brother in-law was a soldier who had been killed in Iraq. In the course of the conversation I made the remark, “So, does that make it any easier to decide who you’re going to vote for?”
My relative kindly informed me that it’s really not wise to mix the death of a beloved soldier with politics. Point well-taken. I guess that was kind of stupid. But I was uninformed and insensitive.
Yesterday, Senator Joe Biden found himself in a similar position. While out on the campaign trail, he mixed a very delicate real-life situation with a hot-button political issue. . He stated that “If you care about it [issues surrounding children with disabilities] why don’t you support stem-cell research?”
Yes, Senator Biden’s remark was stupid. Or to put it in a more politically correct form—his remark was uninformed and insensitive. The reality is that the type of individual who would knowingly carry to term a baby with a disorder or birth defect is exactly the type of individual who values human life in any form, and may not be inclined to support using human embryos for scientific research.
To date, to my knowledge there has been no scientific breakthrough using embryonic stem cells—not to say that there won’t be in the future. However there have been significant breakthroughs using adult stem cells. Most Americans support stem cell research—it’s only over embryonic stem cell research that we’re having this huge, overblown debate.
So, when Senator Biden stands up and says, “If you care about it [children with disabilities], why don’t you support stem cell research?” he is speaking from an insensitive, uninformed position— a position I don’t think Obama himself would have asserted.
As a mother of a developmentally disabled child, I was offended by Biden’s comment and the insensitive tone in which he made it. I love my child. In fact, I love my child just the way he is and would never, ever trade him in for a “normal” child—even if I could. However, if stem cell research is able to correct the chromosomal condition that causes Down syndrome for future children, fine.
But Biden needs to be sensitized and informed—just as I was— to know that it’s just not wise to mix one’s intense and passionate love for their child (who happens to be disabled) with the current hot-button political issue of the day. Not only is his argument flawed, but the two just don’t mix.
Also see a related post by Anita - Passing Up on Down Syndrome
Here is a guest post from community member Kimber Caldwell, from The Politics of Joy.
[If you would like to be a guest blogger on The Political Voices of Women, just join our community, and start posting.]
Not too many days ago, Cynthia and I were discussing Sarah Palin’s right to choose HOW she gave birth to Trigg.
#1… She chose to complete a pregnancy that was probably considered high risk, considering her age, the discovery of Down’s Syndrome in the baby and the fact that this was at least her 5th pregnancy. I have 5 children, but have had 6 pregnancies, one that ended in a miscarriage at 12 weeks. I don’t know many women who haven’t miscarried who have this number of children. It is not unusual.
#2… She chose to travel, despite how far along she was. When her water broke in Texas, she made the choice to fly home and then subsequently drive 50 miles to her chosen hospital or birthing center. Now, I’m not sure about you, but I remember the times when my water broke… As Cynthia pointed out, she would have had to have SEVERAL changes of clothes and a box of chux pads. Not to mention that labor usually intensifies after the water breaks, so I am sure she had the complete attention of the flight crew. But this was HER choice.
At first, I was a little appalled about some of her choices. But then I recalled the choices I made in my pregnancies.
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