Senate US Election 2012: Down the ballot

Well porn is done for the benefit of the viewers not the actors, so I guess feeling good isn't that important? >_>

 

Some performers/companies do use condoms, so it's not like it's a complete no show for that in the industry. Let the industry handle this.

 

One more day!

 

No no no, everything is genuine!

Yeah, I'm sure they don't pressure performers to forego condoms. Nope. Never.

 

No industry is perfect. Obviously is a more "sleazy" industry than most, but still.

 

That is far from the lowliest of professions, imo. And the issue with that analogy is you're comparing it to black lung. You don't CATCH black lung, it's something that you develop over time. It's not like porn actors gradually get chlamydia. I'd think a better example would be how Tuberculosis is a disease that the city of LA worries about its employees getting and spreading. So, as a worker for the city of LA, I need to have a TB test every 2 years. I had to do the same thing teaching. Porn has been working under the same fashion, but on a different timescale. With the increased risk of transmission, the testing happens every couple of weeks.

 

For the record, I don't think porn is "sleazy" in and of itself-- though the industry is largely misogynistic, racist, and other things that shouldn't be inherent to the medium. That's beside the point. STD's can and often do have serious consequences for a person. Condoms, when properly used, are literal barriers which prevent the vast majority of these diseases. It is wrong to think that simply because someone "chooses" to become a sex worker means that they should have to put themselves at risk for something that is easily preventable.

 

From what you've heard?

 

An indication of how sick I've been: I read the title of this post as US Election 2012: Down the toilet, despite having posted here several times. Clearly I need medication and sleep.

To make this on topic, There's a Eminent Domain Amendment on Va's ballot, I don't know how I feel about that, since it's gotten so very little coverage here to the point that I didn't find out about it up until the last few days.

Edit: What I'll say about the condom issue is this: If I, as a Nurse's aide, have to wear gloves (most often latex, but not always) as required at work in order to keep myself from getting infected, or potentially spreading any decisions diseases to the residents I work with, especially when cleaning them up from any number of things, then a porn star should have to wear a condom to prevent their co - workers from potentially getting infectious diseases while on their jobs. Simple as that for me.

 

Then why isn't there already more condom use in porn (there's little that I've seen over the years)? Yes, there's strong arming by various production outfits & whatnot (how could there not be?), but do you think that really constitutes the majority of the business M.O. in the industry or do most just prefer not to use them (whether it's their own personal belief or if they're thinking it's better for the product)? Wouldn't county resources be better used on helping educate & combat STD issues within the entire county, rather the focus (despite as large as the business is) on a specific section of it? This county (and the city of L.A.) is going down a financial sewer, lead by a cabal of uninspiring hacks who seem either too beholden to their special interests (which for many include the public employee unions) or too stupid & self absorbed (ie: L.A. mayor, Tony Villar, aka Antonia Villarigosa) to do much of anything that will get this city & county back on track. They ought not to be rewarded with another bureaucratic mechanism that will solve no problems.

 

That would be a great example if the nature of each line of work weren't so vastly different... there's a component to not using a condom in sexual activity, especially in the porn industry, where it's abundantly clear that most would rather not use a condom in performance of their jobs.

Arawn_Fenn: Yeah, you read that correctly. I've got as much experience in carnal pleasures with a partner as Chicago Cub baseball fans have experienced their team winning a championship.

 

Huh. So proposition 30 failed in California. I wonder what that means now?

And 34 failed...I was kinda on the fence on this one, but ended up voting yes. Eh.

 

Light Rail passed in my city.

So did the Eminent Domain measure.

All incumbent reps in Va were relected. Kaine beat Allen.

 

It did? Uh-oh. Well, for one thing it means even higher college tuition.

 

Same sex marriage and marijuana passed in Washington...neither a surprise, actually.

 

Oh wait I could be wrong. I was looking at the site for the ballot measures and it said 30 was behind with 48.7% of the votes...though maybe not all the votes are counted yet? I'm googling news for "prop 30" and there doesn't seem to be any result declared yet.

 

One thing it means is that community colleges are cutting classes. Santa Monica college is cutting 1/3 of its classes if it 30 fails.

 

Prop 30 is passing. It was behind by about four points at the worst, when there were still a very small number of votes counted. Starting at about the 15% counted mark it began narrowing the gap and took the lead at about 25% counted. It's now at about 75% counted and leading by about 6 points. It will win. 38 lost handily, but we knew that would happen going in.

34 won't. It also started out failing, but unlike with 30 which was in a dead heat it was losing by about 15 points. It has since closed that gap to roughly 7 points, but it won't change the result. It's been steadily gaining ground, but slowly enough that it will still lose. Still, the closer it is to actually passing in the end the more hopeful I'll be that such a measure has a shot in the future, so I'll keep following it.

Prop 37 is currently losing by about 8 points (but it's neck and neck in L.A. county, which is interesting to watch). Like 34 it has been slowly and steadily gaining ground from a severely disadvantaged position, but too slowly for it to pass. On that one I've flip-flopped on the issue a few times, but ultimately decided to vote yes, not because I'm against GMOs (I'm ambivalent about them), but because I'm for consumer labeling. I'm not that upset that it didn't pass.

All of the statewide propositions are pretty much decided at this point. 34 is the only result that differs from my vote that I actually care about to a significant degree. That said, it was also the proposition I cared about more than any other, and one that I personally invested time campaigning on. Because of this I have mixed feelings tonight. Most of what I wanted to happen happened (Obama was re-elected- or, rather, since I voted for Stein, Romney wasn't elected-, Dems gained seats in the House and ousted the likes of Akin and co., more states legalized same-sex marriage, the first openly gay U.S. senator was elected, marijuana was legalized and taxed in two states, Props 30, 36, and 39 passed while Props 31-33 and 38 didn't, etc.) but aside from this and the less important to me but still disappointing but predictable loss of Howard Berman in the House Prop 34 was the one thing I was putting the most of my time in, and the one thing I was most passionate about. I was hopeful that it would at least be neck and neck and there would be a fighting chance, and all of the more recent polls corroborated this, but it looks like they were wrong. So I'm kind of happy-sad.

 

So, a bit of an attempt at a summary of what happened....

Senate: Toss-ups were almost fully a Democratic sweep, including a surprising lead in North Dakota, with the exception of Nevada, which isn't called yet, but the Republican incumbent is barely holding now. The one exception being Maine going to an independent, and as this was a Republican (moderate) in that seat before, but he's expected to caucus with the Democrats so that's another effective loss, unless King does something surprising (has anyone seen him specify who he'll caucus with more recently?)

House: A few notable House losses. Bachmann had a very, very near miss (was losing when in the 90s had reported in). In terms of scale, the losses to the Republicans in Illinois may be the most painful, where 4 incumbents were defeated. One of the incoming Representatives lost in 2010. In Florida, Republican Allan West lost (not seeing it officially called yet at NYT), and Democrat Alan Grayson is back in unrelated elections. And in California, Pete Stark, the only publicly admitted atheist in Congress, lost to another Democrat that apparently attacked Stark on his atheism, among other charges.

Initiatives/Measures:
Marijuana -
Colorado passed an amendment to their constitution to legalize and regulate marijuana
Washington passed a similar measure
Massachusetts decriminalized marijuana

Same-Sex Marriage -
Currently leading in Washington, but not called, is a measure approving of a law allowing same-sex marriage
Maryland passed a similar measure approving a law for same-sex marriage
In Minnesota, a Constitutional amendment to define marriage as one man and one woman was defeated
Maine passed a ballot measure to allow same-sex couples to marry, and as this is the proposal itself, rather than affirming it, I believe this is the first time that a state has actually implemented same-sex marriage by direct vote

Health Care/etc:
Florida rejected Constitutional amendments to prohibit laws that require people or employers to buy insurance, and to prohibit the use of state funds for abortions
Alabama passed an amendment to prohibit anyone from being forced to participate in any health care system
Montana passed measures requiring parental notification for minors under 16 having abortions, and prohibiting people being forced to have health insurance
Wyoming passed an amendment saying that people have right to make health care decisions

Other:
Florida also didn't pass an amendment that would've repealed the ban on public funds for religious organizations
Michigan didn't pass an amendment that would've added bargaining rights to the constitution
Puerto Rico has voted that they want a change from the status quo with ~54%, and just over 60% voting for statehood. Imo, this is by far the biggest result out of the election today. At almost 4 million people, Puerto Rico would be the 29th largest state if/when it becomes one.

California: (Because I feel it)
The end of the death penalty didn't pass by a few percent
The attempt to label food with 'GMO' in California lost, and Vivec and I are pleased

 

Lowbacca_1977 May I ask why you're against Prop 37?

 

I'm considering doing a GMO thread here, as I've a write up i did for facebook. Basically, it's a pointless label. GMOs don't have any higher risk just for being a GMO, and so the term isn't useful at all. I could understand if there was a move to label what pesticides people use, or what proteins a food contains (although this may be overkill still), or even label terminator seeds or the company that makes the seeds if someone just doesn't want to support those companies, but the term GMO doesn't give any of that useful information, and it's more a fear tactic than anything else. If we're going to require labels (and that's something I'm generally for) it should be a label that informs consumers. In a nutshell.

 

I actually agree with that, Lowie. I think there's still a lot of research to be done to find out how GMOs could be harmful, but it is being used as a fear tactic. GMOs are in almost everything, and some companies have found it to be profitable simply to advertise that they don't have GMOs. So requiring all food to be labeled GMO is not going to change anything in the way foods are produced or consumed, but it is placing an unfair burden on some segments of the industry, IMO.

 

The problem, though, is that while we don't know definitively that they're harmful, there's also no definitive evidence that they're not harmful either. Consumers should at least have the right to know what they're being fed. Of course, if, they're gullible enough to buy the line sold to them by Monsanto et al and vote against the proposition, they have no one to blame but themselves.

 

The way I see it, GMOs are already everywhere, and people have a fear of GMOs like they have a fear of nuclear power. If GMOs had to be labeled then we'd suddenly see them everywhere and genetically enhanced crops would be wiped off the market in a fortnight. I think it's just more sensible to tell people to assume that everything is genetically modified and that if you want to avoid it, buy organic stuff.

Oh yeah, and it looks like I was indeed wrong about prop 30 last night.