Tuesday evening roundup

I am aware that just yesterday, I said that activism is cheap when it's but a click away. Nonetheless, if you are so inclined, it can't hurt to shoot your representative a pre-written letter urging him or her to fight global hunger and/or support small farmers. Unsustainable agriculture really is unsustainable; that's not just a catchword.

How about we turn these deranged people's own tactics against them and make them regret their "calling"? How sick is this:

"We want them tormented," Terry said, describing how he recently advised an activist to disrupt a presentation on abortion at a Kentucky medical school. "If they become a child killer, we will make their lives miserable. It will be so costly for them socially and emotionally."

"What young person is going to want that lifestyle?" he asked.

Meanwhile,

Most doctors have never seen the results of botched back-alley abortions that typically wound up in hospital emergency rooms before 1973, when the Supreme Court legalized abortion... Grimes recalled taking care of a woman with a red rubber catheter protruding from her cervix and a fever of 106 degrees. "You see something like that as a young doctor, you don't forget it."

Let's discuss this and the comments it generated, point by point:
-I agree that cost of living adjustments (COLAs) are questionable when there is no inflation. Even my property taxes went down this year. And even though I live in a very expensive city, inflation or no inflation, I agree with the federal employees who, in a time of national fiscal crisis, are willing to sacrifice by forgoing a COLA this year.
-I agree that employees of the military risk their lives, and that is not something to be dismissed. In fact, see two profiles of the recently fallen.
-However, the COLA is not danger pay; it is a cost of living adjustment. It is not meant to compensate servicemembers for the risks they take.
-And servicemembers, for the most part, are the first to eschew victimization, or the pedestal.
--So, if we're going to slam civilian employees--who, by the way, do not get a housing allowance--for being a bunch of slackers who would do well to "get a real job," attacking their right to the same COLA as the military is not the way to do it. Does my roommate deserve more of a COLA than I do?
-And why is it so fashionable to slam civilian federal employees? This is about as intelligent as telling the government to stay out of your medicare. You might be amazed that civilian employees perform some pretty important functions, like directing air traffic and protecting the nation's borders.
-If you're concerned about unwise federal spending, maybe direct your efforts to convincing the government to quit firing gay soldiers.

This got me wondering whether I'd rather sit next to an obese, but quiet, naked guy or a screaming child. It's a toss-up. Children can punch, too.