Child Marriage – Politics Plus

Open Thread March 9 2026

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:00 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Mar 092026

Yesterday, I saw Virgil and we played cribbage. There’s been a change in visiting hours, part of which is having visitation every day of the week, so I’m not surprised (nor aggrieved) that it includes shortening the Sunday hours, which has been 8:00-3:30 and is now 8:30 to 3:00. I had, during DST in previous years, been getting there at 11:00 and staying to 3:30 – I got there at 11:00 today and stayed till 3:00 when it closed. I didn’t have to sorry at all about sunset, but driving down, the morning sun was kind of punishing. So I’ll have to think about that. Anyway, we had a good time with a wide range of hands. The drive home was easier then the morning drive – but I still got home pretty tired. I didn’t watch Malcolm Nance’s Iran update Saturday, because it was only available to paid subscribers, but I did yesterday. Speaking of cruelty – I think I would rather die fast being hit by a bomb than by being deprived of potable water (and this virtually everything one can drink) for up to sixty days. The amount of Iran which uses between 40% and 80% desalinized water is jaw-dropping. Also, between Mercator projections and general lack of attention, I don’t think may Americans realize that Iran is is close to the size of the United States’ entire midwest region.

At 80, I am old enough to remember when having a baby out of wedlock would brand a girl (or a grown-ass woman) for life. So I do get it that, then, parents were willing to allow their daughters to marry the men responsible, even though divorce was also tougher then. But that was then – this is now. Haven’t we outgrown this yet?

This is what happens when enough voters decide that “come people” don’t deserve rights and refuse to spend tax money on protecting those rights. Not all of these states are red. Oregon is blue, essentially because the coastal part has cities, culture, and higher education, but its rural eastern half is garnet red.

These “Five ways” are pretty much more in practice than just in theory. None of them, for example, involves litigation which he would ignore. But I’m not convinced that any of them is a certainty. Let me know your thoughts on this.

Open Thread July 7, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:01 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jul 072023

Yesterday, I came across a post about “Moms for Liberty,” specifically about what they should really be called, since they are anything but “for Liberty.” Nameless found the name “Klanned Kaernhood,” which is one of the terms in this post – but there are several more. Many more – this post only lists the “Top Ten.” (I kind of like “Crackpots with Crockpots” myself, but they are all clever.) Also, the shoulder continued to feel better

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The 19th Explains: Why child marriage is still legal in 80% of U.S. states
Quote – “For some reason, most Americans do not realize that these abuses are happening,” [Fraidy] Reiss [the founder of Unchained at Last] said. “Most Americans agree that forced marriage and child marriage are terrible and heartbreaking. They imagine this happening on the other side of the world, and I wish there was something we could do to show them it’s happening here, too, largely because we have outdated, archaic and dangerous laws that need to be updated.” Nearly 300,000 minors — the vast majority of them girls — were legally married in the United States between 2000 and 2018, according to a 2021 study. Child marriage is defined as any marriage where at least one of the parties is under the age of 18. It was legal in all 50 states until 2018. Ten states have since passed bans to end the practice.
Click through for details. She’s right – most people don’t know. 300,000 may be a huge number, but compared to 300 milliom, it’s a tenth of a percent, and what’s more, spread out over 18 years, the chances of any given person being aware of one incident are not high. But that doesn’t make it unimportant. It shouldn’t happen to anyone.

Democratic Underground – Today in Gay History: Thank a gay man for your freedom!
Quote – Washington knew of a great general, the Baron von Steuben. Europe knew about this guy too: he’d been run out of every decent country on the Continent for being very gay, and he was about to be executed for it. The colonists cut a deal with them: let him go, give him to us and you’ll never see him again. They were okay with that. Von Steuben came to the United States and freaked out about how bad Washington’s army was. They were even doing stupid shit like putting latrines next to the mess hall. Von Steuben wrote “Regulations for the Order and Discipline of the Troops of the United States,” which became known as the Blue Book and was used until 1812. He organized a company of 100 men to serve as trainers for the rest of the Army. And he fixed the latrine situation right away. Under his guidance the Army turned itself around.
Click through for the history. Obviously this essay is 7 years old plus a few days late, but

I feel it should be better known.

Food For Thought

PHP is a programming language used to build websites. We have it at all through our hosting partner, BlueHost. In order to update it, we have to go through Bluehost. During his life, TomCat was the only one who had access to our account there. I (JD) am now the only one. I have been to BlueHost and investigated updating our PHP to 8.3 or even to 8.1. I found instructions to do so - in fact, I found two conflicting sets of instructions. I went through one set of the steps and got the message that Our site could not handle 8.3, but that it had successfully updated to 8.1. I then went back here to see what it looked like. But I couldn't get in - either as an administrator or as a reader. It was just gone. I had to reach BlueHost by phone. It was determined that Politics Plus is in fact not compatible with any version of PHP newer than the one we have. BlueHost therefore uninstalled it for me, and the site came back to normal. Of course, like everyone else, I care about security. But I also am aware that TomCat elected to use different providers for several of the services that BlueHost provides, for instance backups. We are backed up daily - but not by BlueHost. However, out PHP is through Bluehost. I feel that if they are not worried about the older version, I am not going to worry about it. I believe that our security here is all or mostly through WordFence, whom I trust.