In a recent article in Slatest Dahlia Lithwick connects the dots on the movement to increase the definition of person hood.
At one end we have Far right attempts to declare fetuses and even zygotes persons. At the other end is Hobby Lobby's attempt to increase the definition of corporate person hood in order to force its religious beliefs on its employees.
In both cases this extension of person hood diminishes the rights and person hood of actual people.
Lithwick sums it up very effectively: "If the far right succeeds in stretching these two legal fictions to their illogical extremes, American “person hood” will begin at conception, diminish somewhat at birth, and regain its force upon incorporation?"
Read the full article.

She Walks The Walk

We should all be very proud of our Senator, Kirsten Gillibrand. She doesn't just talk about ending sexual harassment in the military. She walks the walk. She is willing to cross other Democrats, when necessary, to do what is right. The following is an excerpt from a NY Times article.
New York's Junior Senator, Doggedly Refusing to Play the Part by Jennifer Steinhauer The New York Times
If there were a chutzpah caucus in the United States Senate, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York would be its natural leader.
On a fund-raising swing through Chicago this fall, she told donors to pressure their hometown senator — Richard J. Durbin, a Democrat who is one of the most powerful men in the Senate — because he had yet to sign on to her bill to address sexual assault in the military. Mr. Durbin fumed when he heard about the move, an unusual breach in the protocol-conscious Senate.
She defies her party in smaller ways: After a bipartisan farm bill was cobbled together with great effort by her colleague Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, Ms. Gillibrand tried to block cuts to food stamps that other Democrats said were needed to retain Republican support and brought in high-profile foodies from New York, including the celebrity chef Tom Colicchio, to fight it.