Tom Schaller's objections to Dixie pandering do not come out of thin air -- they are a reaction equivalent in force to the efforts of the DLC and James Carville in particular along with a few others to, in fact, pander to Dixie by ditching socially progressive positions and maintaining the corporatist status quo. Do we need any more proof of this fact than Carville's hamfisted efforts to fire Howard Dean and replace him with Harold Ford? The concept that mobilizing voters in the Mountain States or the Pacific Nortwhest could stabilize the fortunes of a progressive party, and perhaps even reverse its declines, is one that they evidently never thought of or actively disdain. These latter voters are not likely to be won by a Democratic party trying to outdo Republicans in courting mostly Southern evangelical voters.

Career minded self-importance and continuing the spigot of money from the national party and big donors who pay Carville and company for their unique insight into Southern sensibilities, of course, never entered into their thinking. So what if the rest of the country leaves the South behind? Here's what: the South will catch on and moderate its views, either because trends are well underway to that effect in border states, or because it's simply in their interests to do so. But if they don't, well, at least there are two parties that present the country with meaningful choices. Nobody said that we all have to think alike.

A woman who has multiple abortions might have them under very different circumstances. Since the average age of a woman undergoing abortion is lower than what appears to be the average age of the "repeat offenders" (that's how I read the article) I infer that many of these later abortions occur among very fertile women falling on the wrong side of the statistics. Some women really are very fertile for a long period of time and even reliable contraception, like the pill or an IUD, is far from perfect. No one deserves to be stigmatized because they were unlucky. And even if bad luck was not the operative cause of their pregnancy, neither they nor anyone else deserves an unwanted pregnancy as punishment for not learning their lesson the first time around.

I agree with Cary's advice. It's time to leave. But I add the following insight, whatever it's worth, on the difference between abuse as a manifestation of behavior and abuse as a manifestation of identity.

I used to work with mostly female victims of domestic violence. One program offered more thorough than average training, including the presentation of psychologists who work with batterers. According to a lot of studies that have looked at how to treat abusers in order to prevent abuse, abusers come in two broad categories. The first, and more typical, are men with poor impulse control and poor expressive ability, especially as it pertains to emotion. Abuse at the hands of these men is usually triggered by a clear precipitating event, trivial (dirty dishes) or not (being fired from a job), and is also often associated with alcohol abuse (e.g., someone who keeps it together while sober is triggered by any number of events to abuse while drunk). With a lot of effort, counseling and peer support, an abuser in this category might learn to control his behavior, since abusing often makes him miserable and ashamed.

This doesn't sound like LW's husband, who appears to fall in the second category: the abuser who abuses as a means of controlling his relationship with his wife or girlfriend (and often others, though usually using more subtle, socially acceptable techniques, like lying). I don't know that I would call it abusing for pleasure, as Cary has, but whatever you call it, abusing satisfies a psychological need and provides the abuser with some kind of positive reinforcement about himself or his position in life. These types of abusers are not amenable to therapy and are unlikely to change, because abusing is or becomes an important means to maintaining their self-image. It's part of who the abuser is, it's not just something that he does. LW needs to leave.