I’m not alone in saying it, but this is a problem.

From November 2009's Save Our State training in Davidson County.

(That’s seven months, and many “Chip Forrester is Outraged on a Friday” pressers ago.)

We know you know better. How about acting on it?

Is it too much to ask that a press release from the state party be relevant, well-timed, and inform me about what Tennessee Democrats are up to?

Chairman Forrester, you seem to be a nice guy, but what has two thumbs and doesn’t care what you think, feel, or want to know? The average Tennessean.

In short, can you stop sending this out?

As you might be able to tell, this was made during Session.

Here’s the breakdown of how your state Democrats voted.

And a handy map, for your further edification:

Blue denotes Democrats voting against the resolution, pink denotes Democrats voting in favor, dark gray denotes Democrats who abstained from voting, and the rest of the map is Republicans voting yes.

Also, I didn’t hear what Rep. Odom said. I was too busy politely squabbling with the LeftWingCracker over who should take the last remaining seat. He said, “You’re a lady,” and I said, “You’re older than I am,” and then there was a kind of “Oooooo” noise out of the peanut gallery, as if facts were fighting words. The Cracker acquiesced and took the seat, which must have been when Rep. Odom said that bloggers appeared to be as hard on each other as we are on politicians.

Sir, I beg to differ. In the last six weeks alone I’ve called politicians “jackasses,” and accused them of being lazy and cowardly and out of touch.

And I photoshopped Rep. Casada’s face onto a painting of Marie Antoinette.

Just because I always crack up at this.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say I’m tougher on politicians than I am on the Cracker.

So many legislators took time out of their day – moments between meetings or before session – to come by and say hello to us. Bloggers are strange creatures: not quite media, louder and more persistent than the average constituent, usually writing as a labor of love from varied backgrounds. Meanwhile, print and broadcast journalism are evolving and, for the most part, reporters don’t have beats anymore. What filters out of the Capitol does so in new and different ways, through new and different people, and it would be easy to be defensive toward and distrustful of political bloggers. Instead, I walked away with the impression that, as B. said, at least the Democratic legislators we met with “now have a sense of the online world as more than just a place where kooks gather to complain about them.”

Although, it is sort of still that, too.

Here are some photos I took while we rested between truckloads of sandbags.

Liberadio co-host Freddie O'Connell talking with Sean Braisted

Jeff Yarbro

Mike McWherter

Unphotographed people I knew included my and LadyLib’s college buddy Jeremy Elrod, @walrusoct9, @missbethd, @polerin, @kateo and @morganplex.

Anyone else I forgot – it was hardly intentional, so let me know!

Glen “Marie Antoinette” Casada strikes again!

Pre-K education works. Casada and the rest of the GOP in Nashville can quote whatever surveys and studies they want, but if you talk to educators and administrators, they will tell you how invaluable getting underprivileged children into a classroom early can be.

Tennesee ranks 41st in education. Why, you ask? I’ve come to believe it is because the legislature in this state fears future generations being smarter than they are. Heaven forbid someone in this state get an education that no one in their immediate family was able to have and better themselves and their families. Upward mobility? Say it ain’t so!

I spent some time last week observing teachers at a local high school. Appalling is the only word to describe the standards in this state. Sophomores in high school are just now reading books people who graduated ten years ago were required to read in middle school.

Shorter Casada: “let’s cut pre-K so maybe this generation will be dumber than the last and we can stay in power.”

Senate Bill 2686, HB 2681‘s companion bill, passed 27-3 this evening.

You saw that right: 27-3. One Democrat, Sen. Andy Berke, and two Republicans were absent. Three Democrats – Sen. Beverly Marrero and Sen. Ophelia Ford of Memphis, and Sen. Thelma Harper of Nashville – voted no.

Beginning of life and end of life issues are thorny and intensely personal, and I’m willing to cede a lot more ground than many progressives. If the vast majority of residents of a given state or country are opposed to their tax dollars even touching the money that pays for abortions, I’m fine with that.

What I am not fine with is redundant legislation. What I am not fine with is funding campaign talking points on the taxpayer dime.

Most of all, what I am not fine with is overly-broad language that may rob men and women of the means to avoid unintended pregnancies – and ten Democrats afraid to be Democrats and at the very least, before voting for this bill, demand clarification on the language defining “abortion services” to ensure that they do not include contraceptives.

To borrow Aunt B’s apt phrasing, here’s tonight’s Democratic jackasses:

Sen. Tim Barnes
Sen. Charlotte Burks
Sen. Lowe Finney
Sen. Joe Haynes
Sen. Doug Henry
Sen. Roy Herron
Sen. Doug Jackson
Sen. Jim Kyle
Sen. Eric Stewart
Sen. Reginald Tate

Of the ten Democrats voting yes, only one woman voted yes. The Democrats listed above are, on average, 57.3 years old. I suppose it’s easy to vote that way when the consequences, intended or unintended, are unlikely to touch your life personally.

HB 2681 reads:

BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF TENNESSEE: SECTION 1. Tennessee Code Annotated, Title 56, is amended by adding the following language as a new, appropriately designated section: No health care plan required to be established in this state through an exchange pursuant to federal health care reform legislation enacted by the 111th Congress shall offer coverage for abortion services. For purposes of this section, “abortion” has the same meaning as defined in § 39-15-201.

Sounds fairly innocuous and possibly redundant – a little more grandstanding, a little more red meat for the base – until you actually read TCA § 39-15-201.

You see, according to the Tennessee Code Annotated, the law governing this little slice of creation, “abortion” is defined as

the administration to any woman pregnant with child, whether the child be quick or not, of any medicine, drug, or substance whatever, or the use or employment of any instrument, or other means whatever, with the intent to destroy the child, thereby destroying the child before the child’s birth

As Rep. Richardson points out in this video, the language is ambiguous enough that this bill could eliminate health insurance coverage for contraceptives.

Maybe access to affordable contraception is irrelevant or unimportant to the folks in power – the forced-birthers on the other side of the aisle, or the increasingly gray and overwhelmingly male Democrats on the Hill – but to me and to my husband, twenty-somethings trying to build our careers and pay down student loan debt before we grow our family? To thousands of Tennessee mothers and fathers trying to weather this recession and provide for the children already here? It is important to us and to them.

I’m keeping my eye on the Democrats who were willing to vote for this bill in hopes of scoring a few cheap points with the sorts of people who don’t vote for anyone with a D after their names, anyway — and you can count on other young voters doing so too.

Our lives, our futures, and our families are not political capital to be spent wantonly.

(h/t to Speak to Power)

Democrats Who Voted for HB 2681*

Rep. Judy Barker
Rep. Eddie Bass
Rep. Ty Cobb
Rep. Charles Curtiss
Rep. John DeBerry
Rep. Dennis Ferguson
Rep. Henry Fincher
Rep. Craig Fitzhugh
Rep. George Fraley
Rep. Jim Hackworth
Rep. John Litz
Rep. Mark Maddox
Rep. Michael McDonald
Speaker Emeritus Jimmy Naifeh
Rep. Joe Pitts
Rep. David Shepard
Rep. Ben West
Rep. Les Winningham
Rep. Eddie Yokley

* Note that Rep. Judy Barker of Union City is the only woman, and Reps. Cobb, Ferguson, Fincher, and Litz are the only representatives voting yes who are under the age of 50.