More War on Women News

I don’t know how I missed this — Katha Pollitt describes a bill currently in the Wisconsin legislature:

Co-sponsored by two GOP state legislators, Senator Glenn Grothman and Representative Don Pridemore, it directs the state to prepare educational materials that blame “nonmarital parenthood” for child abuse and neglect and “emphasize the role of fathers in the primary prevention” of same. Don’t be fooled by that gender-neutral abstraction “parenthood.” This bill is clearly aimed at shaming and blaming single mothers. “Fathers” after all prevent harm to children, so logically the only parents left to cause it are… yes, those unmentionable women who have the babies without a wedding ring to show for it. You might think that even in Wisconsin it takes two to tango down the aisle, but not according to Senator Grothman, who says, “There’s been a huge change over the last 30 years, and a lot of that change has been the choice of the women.”

Today’s Must Reads

Krugman, “The Gullible Center.” All hail Krugman.

Motoko Rich, “Federal Funds to Train the Jobless Are Drying Up.” It begins:

With the economy slowly reviving, an executive from Atlas Van Lines recently visited Louisville, Ky., with good news: the company wanted to hire more than 100 truck drivers ahead of the summer moving season.

But a usually reliable source of workers, the local government-financed job center, could offer little help, because the federal money that local officials had designated to help train drivers was already exhausted. Without the government assistance, many of the people who would be interested in applying for the driving jobs could not afford the $4,000 classes to obtain commercial driver’s licenses. Now Atlas is struggling to find eligible drivers.

I want some libertarian to tell me why the glorious Free Market (blessings upon It) isn’t finding a way to train workers. However, I’m sure we’ll be told that as soon as government is “out of the way” with its dependency-creating job training programs, the free markets will take over and everything will be fine. Sigh. See also Zandar.

Alex Pareene, “The Coming War on Mormon Jokes.” Now that Mittens is almost certainly the nominee, righties are closing ranks in support of Mormonism and accusing lefties of anti-Mormon bigotry. Next headline news: “Sun to Set in the West.”