So, if you look at the top of the Rec list at the moment you'll see my earlier diary about Lisa Brown, the courageous Michigan Democratic State Representative who (metaphorically) poked her finger in the eye of the state Republican Party, which passed a horrifically draconian anti-abortion/female chattel bill yesterday:
What you can't see in this video is her fellow Democratic colleague, Barb Byrum, being shut down by the GOP when she tried to add an amendment to the bill requiring men to go through similar humiliation if they want to get a Vascectomy.
The diary was followed by a bunch of updates, including the news that the state House GOP leadership, getting the Vapors at the thought of someone uttering the "V" words, Vagina and Vascectomy, and deciding that the best course of action would be to simply censor these women for using (gasp!) medically accurate terminology about body parts and medical procedures (and possibly censor the entire female Democratic caucus, though that's uncertain at the moment; the GOP claims that they "only" slapped duct tape on Brown and Byrum, as if that's supposed to be OK).
Yes, that's right: The Michigan GOP effectively just told these two female State Representatives to shut their pie holes, go to the kitchen and bake them a cake.
It's gotten a great response, but one action item seems to have been added a bit too late, so I wanted to bring additional attention to it here: You can help Lisa Brown directly by donating to her ActBlue page. She's actually not running for State House again this year, but she is running for Oakland County Clerk to replace the incumbent Republican, and I've been assured that her State Representative campaign funds can be legally transferred over to the County Clerk campaign fund.
So, show your support for Lisa by ponying up some cash for what I'm calling her "V for Victory!" fund:
(Also, I'm sure that some enterprising Photoshop expert can do wonders with this one):
Update: Thanks to Scarce in the comments for bringing the following video by Rep. Brown & Byrum's colleagues in the state Senate, Gretchen Whitmer and Rebecah Warren, about this bill, this incident and the overall war on women being waged by the Republican Party: