The following happened at 4 am early one morning after my
return.
AP, Police: Man killed himself after ramming US Capitol barrier
Both New York City and
DC are accommodating migrants being sent north by the Texas governor. A worker
shortage means they will probably find jobs.
https://nypost.com/2022/08/15/row-nyc-hotel-being-turned-into-migrant-shelter/
https://dcist.com/story/22/08/
Accu Weather, Mom
charged with leaving her 6-month-old baby in hot car for 5 hours The infant’s death and that of a child in
Arkansas Tuesday who was found unresponsive in a closed vehicle brings the
total number of hot car deaths among youngsters to 18 this year. [This happens every summer. In winter, babies
die in freezing cars. Not only does the child die, but the negligent parent
suffers life-long repercussions.]
My sister and her husband had both been vaccinated and boosted, always wore masks in public, and limited their contacts. Both still came down with Covid, though did not become severely ill. Perhaps they had the more transmissible but less virulent Omicron strain. The virus keeps evolving. Will we never get rid of it?
USA Today, ‘I don’t know if I will be deported’: Young immigrants prepare for DACA to end
Ukraine has actually been holding out better than
expected against Russia, but not without controversy.
https://bylinetimes.com/2022/08/08/why-did-amnesty-international-ignore-my-warnings-about-their-ukraine-investigation/
Amnesty International’s apparently fluctuating Ukraine policy
has led to high-profile resignations worldwide, though having been in Honduras,
I had not been not been following the controversy closely. Some have objected
to any criticism of Ukraine’s forces, which they consider to have been acting
defensively. Civilians have been injured and killed by both sides, but have
casualties by Ukrainian forces been merely unintended “collateral damage?” I’ve
been an Amnesty member and activist since 1981, but focused on the Caribbean,
and after being out of the loop just now in Honduras, I don’t have a firm
opinion.
Here is one member’s comment.
Amnesty International has been criticized for its wavering Ukraine policy. As one activist comments: The only question that should be asked is 'Are the Ukrainian forces endangering civilians?' or 'Are Ukrainian forces violating international humanitarian and human rights law?'.
I've seen these concerns and the blowback for decades in relation to our reporting on Israel and armed Palestinian groups, including Hamas. When is it appropriate to report that armed Palestinian groups are committing a war crime(s)? When and if it's actually happening. Same for Ukrainian forces. Of course, Russia will use this reporting - just like Israel uses our reporting to bash Palestinians when we hold THEM accountable, but this shouldn't stop us from doing it. This is not a new song. Just a new setting.
There is a whole debate
within the international human rights community about IHL and if it was created
by colonial powers and thus is inherently unfair to the oppressed who are
fighting for their freedom or against the oppressor - and those discussions are
legitimate and need to take place. But for Amnesty International - at
this moment - as a non-political, global human rights movement - our concern
should only be about the facts and the laws/standards, and making sure we hold
all parties accountable. Otherwise, we become a political animal like
everyone else and not the steadfast leader that everyone knows they can trust
in ANY situation.
Death in Slow Motion.
Is the title of an Amnesty International report about Afghanistan.
Amnesty
International USA has put out a call for mentors to help with refugee casework
also to create model asylum support letters.
The Hill, Liz Cheney defeated in Wyoming primary
This was totally expected. Trump and his supporters still hold sway in the Republican Party.
While Donald Trump’s retains a tight grip on the Republican Party, he himself is squirming now that his lifelong lies are catching up with him. Lying and cheating have been his habitual modus operandi, beginning with his phony draft deferment, next with sending substitutes to take his college entrance exams, then moving on to cheating on his wives and in business, on taxes, and even as president. He’s always gotten away with it, so why not keep on doing it? Trump has been reported to have told more than 30,000 lies during his 4 years in the presidency. And he’s not done yet, but has been keeping his mouth shut lately. He reportedly took the Fifth Amendment some 450 times during recent questioning by New York’s Attorney General. In 2016, he told an Iowa rally: “The mob takes the Fifth Amendment. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?”
Operation
Smile is back in business once again,
asking for contributions for cleft palate and harelip surgical brigades, efforts
I’ve always supported by bringing Honduran patients for surgery and volunteering
as an interpreter and assistant in the operating room. However, Operation Smile
might do more to promote adequate nutritional supplementation for pregnant
mothers, especially of folic acid, to diminish the prevalence of such birth
defects to begin with.
AP, 187 Cuban migrants arrested after landing in Florida [in 10 boats]
One of my correspondents asks:
As mentioned in the WSJ, Castro's former son-in-law Luis Alfonso, was the shaker and mover in the Armed Forces as head of GAESA, owner 70% of Cuba's best hotels and infrastructure. As he just passed away and Raul is on his last legs, what raison d'etre remains to the 'revolution'?
Reuters, Nicaragua’s
Catholic Church says priest detained as crackdown intensifies
AP, Nicaraguan police prohibit religious procession in capital
Reuters, Nicaragua's government shutters one of last opposition radio stations
Los Angeles has a high homeless population, in part,
because the weather there is mild all year round.
Arizona doesn’t get cold either
and has a long border with Mexico.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/arizona-gov-begins-sealing-gaps-border-wall-shipping-containers-topped-razor-wire
Back now to the abortion wars. Some women, who might have initially felt unwilling or unable to raise a child, have found that they are actually pretty good at it and have become devoted parents. Hormones triggered by pregnancy and later by nursing help many mothers bond with their babies. Watching and helping kids grow and develop is really pretty interesting. But a minority of women are never able to forge a strong or healthy connection with their offspring.
Now, in the wake of Roe vs. Wade and its aftermath, abortion for some women has become not just a right, but a secular sacrament, a symbol of female liberty, sexual autonomy, and equality with men. Thus “the right to choose” has become for them a matter of almost religious devotion. In the mainstream press, abortion is referred to with euphemisms such as “reproductive rights” or “abortion care,” not simply as “abortion.” And online abortion postings typically highlight cases of fetal anomaly or extreme maternal conditions. These are cases where even pro-life folks would not oppose the practice. However, the vast majority of abortions do not fall into that category, rather, are done to prevent a birth by a woman who simply doesn’t want a child. And there is still a strong divide on the issue. I find myself continuing to waver “in between”, though tending to feel that by the time a woman actually notices she is pregnant, an individual human life is already underway. Now abortion has become an issue in the upcoming midterms.
AP, Planned
Parenthood to spend record $50M in midterm elections
Planned Parenthood, the nation's leading reproductive health care provider and abortion rights advocacy organization, plans to spend a record $50 million ahead of November's midterm elections, pouring money into contests where access to abortion will be on the ballot.
NBC News, Florida
court says teen is not 'mature' enough to have an abortion
A 16-year-old teen was denied an abortion without parental consent because she was deemed by an appeals court to be insufficiently mature to make such a decision without parental consent, though she apparently was mature enough to become pregnant without such consent in the first place.
Earlier
in my own life here in the US, most unwanted or unexpected pregnancies simply went
forward to a live birth, as they still do almost everywhere, Honduras included.
A nation needs an average of about 2.1 births per woman of childbearing age to
keep overall population distribution optimal. The US is not producing that many
babies right now. Will our country go the way of Europe and Japan with an aging
and potentially shrinking population? In China, abortion is being discouraged to
increase birthrates. Might similar concerns underlie some anti-abortion sentiments
in our own country?
In Russia, Putin is rewarding fecund women.
Putin revives Soviet ‘Mother Heroine’ award for women who have 10 children
If the government now intends to force women to produce human capital, shifting motherhood from a voluntary act to a compulsory one, the government must pay women for this service. And they must pay mothers well beyond the going welfare rate. Women forced to produce the economy’s most valuable asset deserve at least the salary of the average American worker. So says Tennessee columnist Ren Brabenec.
Pensacola News Journal How can I still not know if I'm anti-abortion or support abortion rights? I'm not alone. This is the question that Dick Rizzo, now retired from public broadcasting, asks himself. He ends up remaining uncertain, neither supporting nor opposing “abortion rights.” He cites divided polls, “Abortion should be legal in most cases (36%) or in all cases with some exceptions (6%). Abortion should be illegal in most cases (27%) or in all cases with some exceptions (2%). That leaves 2% who, like me, have ‘no answer.’ Beyond the political and personal, what about the ethical and moral elements connected to anti-abortion and abortion rights? Again, a PRC survey finds small bookends. Just 7% of U.S. adults say abortion is morally acceptable in all cases and 13% say it's morally wrong in all cases. The majority are again in the middle: abortion is either morally wrong in most cases (33%) or it's morally acceptable in most cases (24%).”
For nearly all of human history, biological motherhood just happened, as most women lived sexually partnered with men. As a result, people were simply born, lived, and died, ad infinitum. Parents may not have been ready to welcome another baby, another mouth to feed, but they accepted their fate and most cope the best they could. As mentioned before, my paternal great-grandparents living on a Canadian wheat farm had 12 children. Countless humans still continue to be born and to die every day. But now producing offspring might be considered a voluntary act, as there are many ways to prevent births, through both birth control and sterilization, as well as sexual abstinence, which has always been a way.
There is also abortion, which ends an unborn human life, though disagreement persists about whether that unborn human has as yet become a person, therefore deserving of protection. While we might agree that a fertilized ovum, which can be held indefinitely in a suspended frozen state, is not yet an actual person, I now find myself tending to advocate for protecting a newly developing potential person at the early point when a woman first realizes she is pregnant, that is, when that potential person is already starting to become an actual person living among us. The only way that particular life will stop developing is if the fetus dies or is killed. And, at what point does a fetus begin to feel pain? After all, we protect dogs and cats from pain.
I tend to believe that all human lives, for better or worse, have value and that none should be deliberately killed or terminated, even by the death penalty for a convicted murderer. So I find myself advocating for protection of that early invisible fetal life. The developing fetus, that eventual baby, toddler, child, teen, adult, seems as entitled as any of us to have a chance to live a full lifespan, even though he or she might not become someone we personally would admire, and might even turn out to do us harm. Obviously, not everyone would agree with me, which is why the matter is now subject to such bitter debate.
When a woman realizes she is pregnant, is her life the only one that matters, or are 2 lives involved? I do tend toward the latter position, influenced by my own personal experience as both a birth and adoptive mother--of children adopted before abortion became legal on the US and of a child from Colombia, where abortion was still illegal. But now American women in the early stages can simply take a pill in the privacy of their own home to end a pregnancy without ever knowing the person who would have been born and many will continue to do so, despite local laws or religious edicts.
Dog
catches monkeypox after sharing owners’ bed A dog sharing a bed with 2 gay men ill with monkeypox also came
down with the disease. Gay men
have complained about CDC guidance suggesting that they might have fewer sexual
partners to reduce Monkeypox contagion. Some women and some gay men seem to tout
the “right” to have sex as often as and with whomever they like with no consequences
whatsoever, calling on the government to guarantee that right and alleging discrimination
otherwise. Gay men want to be free to seek out a variety of sexual partners without
fear of getting sick. Women also want to have sex freely without risking either
illness or pregnancy. Does the government or the universe owe everyone a
guaranteed right to sexual pleasure and sexual freedom without any repercussions? Wash. Post, Carolyn
Hax: Their marriage is ‘a B.’ Do they stay in it for the kids? A married
women with kids rates her marriage as a “B” and wonders if she should stay in
it? Given the normal ups and downs of human existence, she is lucky to have a “B”
relationship. Just as some folks feel that life owes them sexual pleasure without
any strings attached, some may also expect too much of marriage. Marriage, parenthood,
or any human relationship is never a guarantee of perpetual happiness, only of continuing
challenges and responses. Sometimes those challenges can be overwhelming, but often
they are a spur to productive action. Life is always a series highs, lows, and
in-betweens. Your honeymoon won’t last forever. Sorry about that. I once went
out (only once) with a middle-aged man who said he was looking for “the one.” I
was not “the one” for him nor vice versa. Some people seem to have fixated on
the idea that there is a single romantic partner “out there” destined by fate just
for them, if only they can find him or her. I don’t know how this notion ever got
started, but this guy was not the only person who has believed it. It’s nice to
imagine a perfect relationship where all our desires are fulfilled, filling in all
the gaps our mother missed when we were a child. Real life simply has no guarantees, often throwing us curve balls, and
then, to mix metaphors, we may either sink or swim. In my own life, I could not
have imagined being able to survive the death of a child, but I did survive my
older son’s death at age 27 after a 1994 work accident, as well as my Cuban
foster son’s death from AIDS one year later, though without stoicism or calm acceptance.
I fully realize they are gone forever, but still can’t help considering their
deaths unfair to them, as well as to me, that each deserved to live a full, normal
life. I recognize that this did not happen and is a useless feeling, but am
unable to totally shake it. Perhaps if I lived somewhere where premature deaths
were more common, I would be more resigned.
Decades before my boys’ deaths,
I never imagined that my very ambitious and politically strategic husband of 24
years, whom I’d married at age 21 against my parents’ wishes, a man who was totally
blind and had never held a job before our marriage, would ever leave me. In an
era when men were expected to support their wives and families, I was, at first,
the only breadwinner. I utterly believed in my husband’s potential and devoted
myself to helping him realize it, all the while staying quietly in the
background. He always depended on my assistance in both his work and home life
and he became a high achiever. Yet he did leave me when he found another
helpmate not encumbered by 4 kids.
My ex-husband, a lifelong
chain-smoker, died of lung cancer at age 63 in 1999. Until he left our home, the
children and I had been breathing secondhand smoke for a number of years. I
still live in the house we bought together in 1969 and no longer allow smoking
in my house.
My ex’s abrupt departure
in 1980, 11 years after we had moved to Washington, DC, and 22 years into our
marriage, then after our final divorce after 24 years, actually turned out not
to be a total calamity for me, though I’d resisted until the very end. Afterwards,
I had another serious marriage offer, but was reluctant to make that commitment
ever again.
Having my husband file for
divorce against me certainly was a shock and felt like a betrayal, but it freed
me to revive my Latin American side. It also enabled me to embark on a new career
in occupational therapy and to join the Peace Corps in Honduras in 2000 at age
62, and, thereafter, to become a part-time Spanish interpreter, which I
continued doing for 20 years until the pandemic.
Post-Peace Corps, I also
started making annual medical/humanitarian trips to Honduras, except in 2021, forging
an ongoing connection that was revived with my recent Honduras trip just now. I
find I really have missed folks there and they seem to have missed me! None of all
that would have happened had I stayed married to my late former husband. He and
I had been a productive team for quite a number of years and I had been totally
devoted to him and his success and to the furtherance of disability rights. So
it was admittedly very hurtful when he turned against me as if to punish me and
our children and he spoke with me only once (by phone in 1984) after leaving.
But after being my husband’s unseen sidekick for so many years, it was also satisfying
to be able to forge ahead on my own and to revive the Latin America side I’d abandoned
after getting married. While it was hard to be rejected at the time, in retrospect,
I now feel that I actually benefited from our split. And I’m not done living yet.
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
Relojes inteligentes, “intelligent
watches” is how “smart watches” appear in Spanish-language ads. Some phrases really
have no good translation.
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