Five for Smoking but not for Breastfeeding

According to the Dayton Daily News, the Ohio State Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in a case in which a woman claims she was fired for taking extraand unscheduled restroom breaks to pump breast milk. The company claims that breastfeeding (or pumping) is not a medical condition or an illness.

The woman in question claims that her firing is gender discrimination as she was fired as she attempted to "relieve discomfort due to lactation, a condition exclusive to women." Further, the woman claims that others at her work take extra breaks "to relieve discomfort from menstrual symptoms or the need for frequent urination."

It is not known whether or not the woman spoke to her employer and made arrangements with the company to stay later or arrive earlier to make accommodations for extra time to pump while working.

According to the report:

Totes, which prevailed against Allen in a 2008 trial and a subsequent appeal, argues that the company didn't discriminate because breastfeeding doesn't legally constitute an illness or medical condition. The company says there is legal precedent showing that employers don't have to give extra breaks to breastfeeding women.

Allen, who was hired as a temporary worker through an employment agency, said she began taking the extra breaks at 10 a.m. after she found her 10-minute scheduled break at 8 a.m. was too short and she couldn't stand to wait until her 11 a.m. lunch break.

This should lead to a lively conversation.

Watchmen: A matter of form

This video does not make me comfortable with the big budget translation of Alan Moore's Watchmen from its shadow-throwing domination over the history of graphic literature to its mass-public-appealing new form. Look and see:

I posted this 35 minutes ago

2 funk E, I'm just

http://www.ronwinter.tv/drums.html

Wednesday Musical Tribute, and an Important New Label wherein Harrogate Hopes Readers Will Not Confuse "Country" with "Nation"

A new musical hero emerges in Harrogate's ever burgeoning pantheon. Pieta Brown. The song is "West Monroe." All Harrogate can say to this is Yes.

West Monroe - Pieta Brown

Academic Mothering and Fathering

I just wrote a post at Separation of Spheres about Academic Mothering and Fathering that I wanted to bring to the attention of the Situationers, as I feel it has some relevance to Paperweight's post on "Life as a Prof." I am interested to know what everyone thinks of my musings, as many of us who blog here are either academic mothers and fathers and all of us are part of an academic family.

Life as a prof

So I briefly saw Supa's non-TRS post referencing an essay on the Chronicle of Higher Ed and was curious about the subsequent conversation that followed in some email exchanges that I was not privy to. Part of my interest here is tied into my own experiences moving from a 4/4 load while writing to my dissertation to my current position teaching a 2/2. Although I'm in my first year at the new gig, I feel that I actually wrote more with the heavier course load (excpet of last year, after I finished and was on the market, and said f**k it I'm not writing--for the good or bad on that). There are many reasons why I feel this has happened but before I delve into a such a long diatrade I would be curious to know my fellow situationers perspectives on teaching, research, and even family in this respect??

Quote of the Day

I should be writing but instead I am reading Rush's speech CPAC. As of right now, this is all I have to say: Oh Rush:

"We want every American to be the best he or she chooses to be. We recognize that we are all individuals. We love and revere our founding documents, the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. [Applause] We believe that the preamble to the Constitution contains an inarguable truth that we are all endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights, among them life. [Applause] Liberty, Freedom. [Applause] And the pursuit of happiness. [Applause] Those of you watching at home may wonder why this is being applauded. We conservatives think all three are under assault."

I wonder: is this a deliberate mistake or does he not know the difference between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution?

But Rush, please know that it is hard for you to make the argument that other people are bastardizing the Constitution if you have no idea what the Preamble of the Constitution actually states. (Hint: "We the people.") This argument seems like you yourself do not know what is in the Constitution, which may explain why you never challenged the Bush Administration when they violated the Constitution.

Regarding the Rush Limbaugh Bruhaha

As everyone knows Rush Limbaugh has been much in the news recently--particularly following his appearance at CPAC this past Saturday. Television and print newspeople as well as boggers have bee intensely arguing ever since, over the merits of Rush, and even over whether or not he is currently the true leader of the Republican Party.


Certainly Rush's galvanizing impact opens myriad issues for consideration. Just recently Harrogate went to the Townhall bloggers to see just how deep up Rush's ass they have crawled at this point. The answer: pretty far.

Here is a clip one of the bloggers showed, wherein CNN's Bill Schneider lampoons Rush's tactics. But what Harrogate most wants to draw your attention to here, Readers, is less the clip, or even Townhall's Green-Blooded Bloggers. Nay. What Harrogate wants ye to see is this comment by one who calls herself (?) "lilly":

It is About Anger
I notice that the most popular Republican speakers on the right are those most gifted at turning a crowd into an angry mob. They get the most appreciation from the crowd by ridiculing, mocking, sneering, jeering, exaggerating, and misrepresenting. I heard Rush Limbaugh the other day pretending to lisp as he mimicked a certain person on the left; try to translate that fake lisp into words and see what the message is and answer the question, Why did the crowd love this? What is there about mocking that so delights them?

I remember at the Republican Convention 2004, Band-Aids were handed out that mocked John Kerry's Purple Heart. Sarah Palin mocked community organizers and all Americans who don't live in small towns or the countryside (not "the Real America"). Last week a Republican mayor entertained his friends by sending out an email showing the White House lawn planted as a watermelon patch. There seems to be something about Republicans that they can't get enough of mocking and sneering---they love it. And sneery mocking doesn't come from love, but from anger.

Are conservatives angry? Judging from what they say on townhall, I would say so: shoot Democrats, stockpile guns, go armed all the time, get ready for armed insurrection, hanging a noose isn't racist, send your kids to a school where they get beaten, load immigrants into trucks and dump them at the border, don't permit foreign languages to be spoken, pass laws to marginalize those you disapprove of. And be sure to make fun of those different from yourself.

This is one of the cleanest, most poignant articulations of what has happened to this nation's Republican Party, that Harrogate has ever seen. And so Harrogate wanted y'all to see it too.

Since Visual Rhetoric Recently Came Up In Another Thread

Presenting the Album cover for Led Zepplin's Houses of the Holy (1973).

Why Marriage Matters

I found this earlier today on Andrew Sullivan and I am still amazed: Annie Leibovitz took out a loan against her life's work to pay off her mortgage debt, not because she made poor economic decisions, but because she needs to pay up to 50% of what she inherited from her long time partner, Susan Sontag.

Meg's first response was, "Holy Sh!t... it is almost not fair that they were together as they are too talented." (As Meg's just pointed out, I am paraphrasing her as this sounds like something I would say, not her.) And, that is true.

Yet, this certainly is a profound argument as to why marriage equality needs to be granted for same-sex couples. Without protection, there will not be economic freedom and economic advancement for couples. Certainly individuals could still live alone; however, without protection, it is not rational to be in a same-sex couple. This perpetuates the problem: why would anyone want to be in a same-sex couple? In fact, it could be a major detriment to be in a same-sex couple. Instead, economically speaking, it would be much more viable to the financial benefit of the individual to remain single, which may perpetuate the of the promiscuous life-style.

Torso Apparel of the Week: 2 March 2009: The Roof Almighty's Even Awesomer TRS Contribution

Tee Shirt of the Week®: Monday, March 2nd: Harrogate's Newest TRS Contribution

A Lament

Harrogate tonight laments the disparate geography of TRS. And it will only get more disparate as time passes.

A statement from Harrogate

Kathleen Sebelius as the new Secertary of HHS. Harrogate is a big fan of this choice. He prefers her much to Daschle.

For what it is worth.

Sunday Night Musical Tribute

Harrogate, like a lot of Situationers, has not had much to give TRS, or much of anything else, these days. But onward we press even when low on fuel.

The record for which this song is the title track, Harrogate has now listened to every day for the last week and a half. Before the record arrived in the mail he posted another wonderful song off it, "Wreck."

Here is "Good Night San Francisco." This band is capturing Harrogate's mood right now, and so now he shares it with ye.

"Spontaneous" Propaganda

A few weeks back on CNBC, a non-descript reporter by the name of Rick Santelli called for a Chicago Tea Party to protest the economic legislation from our current Democratic Congress and the Obama administration. According to The Chicago Tribune, Santelli, who must be oblivious to the past eight years, stated:

"The government is promoting bad behavior," he said, insisting the public should vote "to see if we really want to subsidize the losers' mortgages." This plan, Santelli ranted, reminded him of Cuba, which "used to have mansions and a relatively decent economy" until it "moved from the individual to the collective."

After Santelli rallied against the machine, other conservatives picked up on the "Chicago Tea Party" trope, hoping to start an uber-patriotic grass roots movement.

There is only one problem: the "Chicago Tea Party" grass roots campaign may be nothing more than a top-down movement started by corporate conservative operatives. Showing that people may read the site for the article, the Playboy blog Backstabbers has an interesting take on the situation:

Let’s go back to February 19th: Rick Santelli, live on CNBC, standing in the middle of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, launches into an attack on the just-announced $300 billion slated to stem rate of home foreclosures: “The government is promoting bad behavior! Do we really want to subsidize the losers’ mortgages?! This is America! We're thinking of having a Chicago tea party in July, all you capitalists who want to come down to Lake Michigan, I'm gonna start organizing."

Almost immediately, the clip and the unlikely "Chicago tea party" quote buried in the middle of the segment, zoomed across a well-worn path to headline fame in the Republican echo chamber, including red-alert headlines on Drudge.

Within hours of Santelli's rant, a website called ChicagoTeaParty.com sprang to life. Essentially inactive until that day, it now featured a YouTube video of Santelli’s “tea party” rant and billed itself as the official home of the Chicago Tea Party. The domain was registered in August, 2008 by Zack Christenson, a dweeby Twitter Republican and producer for a popular Chicago rightwing radio host Milt Rosenberg—a familiar name to Obama campaign people. Last August, Rosenberg, who looks like Martin Short's Irving Cohen character, caused an outcry when he interviewed Stanley Kurtz, the conservative writer who first "exposed" a personal link between Obama and former Weather Undergound leader Bill Ayers. As a result of Rosenberg’s radio interview, the Ayers story was given a major push through the Republican media echo chamber, culminating in Sarah Palin’s accusation that Obama was “palling around with terrorists.” That Rosenberg’s producer owns the “chicagoteaparty.com” site is already weird—but what’s even stranger is that he first bought the domain last August, right around the time of Rosenburg’s launch of the “Obama is a terrorist” campaign. It’s as if they held this “Chicago tea party” campaign in reserve, like a sleeper-site. Which is exactly what it was.

ChicagoTeaParty.com was just one part of a larger network of Republican sleeper-cell-blogs set up over the course of the past few months, all of them tied to a shady rightwing advocacy group coincidentally named the “Sam Adams Alliance,” whose backers have until now been kept hidden from public. Cached google records that we discovered show that the Sam Adams Alliance took pains to scrub its deep links to the Koch family money as well as the fake-grassroots “tea party” protests going on today. All of these roads ultimately lead back to a more notorious rightwing advocacy group, FreedomWorks, a powerful PR organization headed by former Republican House Majority leader Dick Armey and funded by Koch money.

And the war came.