This is so enraging. And these same people shrug at gun violence and the death penalty and disapprove of any aid to the mothers and children they claim to care about.
3.
oatler
ABC TV on the spot, reporting in the present tense that both sides are angry. “Now here’s Chris Christie at Antietem…”
4.
Percysowner
I’ve never seen The Pelican Brief. I do remember when one reviewer called it The Pelican Much Too Long.
As much as I want to burn it all down now, I’ll start by increasing my donations to Democrats and knocking on doors and phone banking from here on out
5.
Dangerman
So, November is price of gas vs. USSC gasbags; gonna be an interesting midterm.
@Sis: Gotta say, the “I’m against abortion but in favor of the death penalty” stance is always…interesting. SAVE THE FETUSES SO WE CAN HOPEFULLY EXECUTE THEM LATER.
7.
Rob
Mood: black
KEXP in Seattle (kexp.org) is playing songs requested by listeners to help us deal with this horrible decision.
8.
dlwchico
Went to buy a pitchfork at Lowes the other day and they cost nearly $60!
Probably not a coincidence.
9.
trollhattan
Ladies and germs, your modern moderate* Republican governor:
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) said he will seek to ban most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, moving quickly following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision Friday overturning the constitutional right to an abortion, the Washington Post reports.
*Or so he said. IDK what Virginia recall laws are but maybe time to giddyup.
10.
scav
@Alison Rose : They want to keep those babies alive long enough so they can stand on their bloodied corpses and shriek “FREEDOM!!!” while waving their holy Ak-47s.
11.
Tony Jay
I finished watching Obi-Wan Kenobi last night.
Middle-aged man stunned by the rise of tyranny learns to hope again and face the demons of his past failures, while an angry young woman learns that her strategy of victim blaming doesn’t actually achieve anything.
And the Far Right Culture War Wingnuts will not stop now.
Clarence Thomas made it abundantly clear that gay marriage, bedroom privacy, birth control, and even interracial marriage (hypocrite!) are on the chopping block.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s what the Supreme Court just did.
14.
Elizabelle
@trollhattan: Oh good. Youngkin is reminding Virginia voters what is at stake in the 2022 and 2023 elections. Dick, meet Youngkin.
And: tweet from Michael Beschloss, pretty much calling this Supreme Court illegitimate (and it is):·. Also: might need to find out just why “Justice” Kennedy, with the Deutsche Bank son, retired when he did. Trump fucked with the Justice Department. Did he overtly get a justice to retire, too?
This is how three of these Supreme Court Justices got there: One appointment was stolen from Obama. Another vacancy occurred after Trump worked to entice a sitting Justice to leave. Trump rushed third appointment onto Supreme Court exactly eight days before 2020 election he lost.
The Large Hadron Collider will be starting up again next month and there’s always the chance it could suck the world into a man-made black hole. Though some days if feels like we’re already there.
19.
Timurid
Even the Pelican Brief solution wouldn’t work.
If someone took out a single conservative justice, the overwhelming bipartisan solution would be to either leave the seat vacant for the next Republican president (however long that took) or immediately select a replacement who was, ideologically, a clone of the victim.
If somebody flew a plane into SCOTUS, both parties would be honor bound to recruit and confirm a new court that was, as close as humanly possible, an exact replica of the old one. Then the new justices would continue on the same course as their predecessors.
There’s the obvious desire to avoid a precedent of murdering government officials in pursuit of more desirable replacements, but the response would be the same if all the justices died in some horrific accident. Fairness, norms and all that. The idea that courts are sacred. At this point the courts are a virus that has taken control of its host.
20.
JPL
This is what a peaceful protest looks like.. nsfw link
@Tom Levenson: I have been reading William Shirer for months now. And a lot of books about the rise of the Nazis. And one about Franco.
And you are not wrong at all.
Citizens United helped bring us to this moment. Money always thinks it can control evil and stupid. It cannot.
27.
Betty Cracker
Reposting comment from below:
MSNBC’s Chris Jansing just had a smug fuckface from an anti-choice group on — Mallory something or another. Ugh. But the extremist was right to note that her forced-birth organization and other anti-choice groups worked toward this moment for decades. There’s a lesson there
ETA: Jansing is pretty good, IMO. I hope she replaces Andrea Mitchell, who really does need to go.
28.
Elizabelle
Our WW2 generation has pretty much died off. They knew what they were fighting.
And yet too many Americans … cannot see the wolf for the fleece. Or turn, like sheep, to rightwing media. Which is all too happy to destroy the actual America. Make us ungovernable. Stop progress and science.
ETA: I don’t know about burning it all down; I do know I’ll cue up some Rage Against The Machine here in a moment.
32.
dm
@Tom Levenson: Maybe not NSDAP, but no one in the US knows about a comparison like Peron besides maybe being able to hum the chorus of that song from Evita.
As with the night of the 2016 election, I’m on court with a bunch of pre-teen girls who probably have no idea what just happened to their rights. It’s very hard to focus. As Rev. Wright appropriately noted “God damn America” indeed.
37.
TheTruffle
@p.a.: I’d love it if that would happen. Because I admit I’m a doomer right now. I’m sick of these RWNJs and suspect the blue-red state split is coming within a decade. I’m in NY, and would be happy to help people relocate if that happens.
38.
Anyway
All I feel like saying is fuck fuck fuckitall…
To be precise, FTFNYT for their vendetta against Gore and Hillary, fuck Susan Collins, fuck NPR and totebaggers, fuck Rethugs, fuck Gorsuch, FUCK ALITO, fuck Kavanaugh, fuck Clarence Thomas, fuck TFG
… fuck the AMA and TX doctors. I kept expecting them to make strong statement about how the TX law would impact their ability to treat all women and how it puts the lives of women in danger but nothing. This is the same group that had no qualms waging all out war against the ACA. Fuck’em.
39.
gene108
Two things really frighten me and scare me about the future.
1. Democrats have to keep control of Congress and the White House until Thomas, Alito, Roberts. Gorsuck, Kavanaugh, and/or Barrett start dropping dead and can be replaced; which I don’t see happening for 10-20 years in a row that it’d be necessary; and
2. Republican policies are not just out of step with what the country wants, but out of step with where the rest of the developed and developing world is on issues like gun control, abortion, and the death penalty. Not only do Republicans do a poor job of governing, but they cry all the time about “America’s standing in the world”, as their policies and leaders do more to erode it than they can possibly imagine. Since they cannot ever accept they do anything wrong, they will need to find scapegoats to blame as the economy worsens and other countries ignore us. The white supremacists that are now welcomed into the Republican Party have been craving a race war for decades. Republicans poor governance and desire to find scapegoats will give the white supremacists the cover they need to start one.
40.
Chris Johnson
I feel ya on the ‘burn it all down’, John.
I can’t help but also remember that our intelligence folks are still worried about Russian ‘active measures’, and that we’ve documented in various ways that Russia has been working here for DECADES in all sorts of organizations (right and left) just to get to a position where they can plunge us into bloody civil war and stop us being a first world anything.
I can’t help but feel this is very much part of that attempt, and it makes me not want to give in to it. I say, overreach is a mistake, and this can and should be the death of the Republican PARTY, not a reason to define a solid third of Americans as ‘them as should be put in concentration camps because they’re just evil’.
That ain’t civilization, not when they do it, not if we do it. I’m just as alarmed at their race toward that goal as anybody, but the answer is not to beat them to the concentration camps. The answer is democracy, electoralism, fighting to cling to civilization and justice. Just because a hostile foreign power took over and corrupted the top of our justice system doesn’t mean those jurists ARE the justice system. They are flying in the face of it, on purpose.
I remember Chris Jansing when she was a local anchor in the Albany NY NBC affiliate, early 1990s. She was Chris Kapostasy then. I was glad to see her promoted to a national network.
According to that documentary filmmaker (the one who’ll be questioned by the Jan. 6 committee) Trump was on the phone with Putin on the eve of the 2020 election.
@Percysowner: The first thing that happens in The Pelican Brief is two Supreme Court justices get assassinated.
47.
MisterDancer
As a note, since I’ve seen a couple of these kinds of comments:
I’m going to ask once, nicely. Stop othering your home grown fascists and fundamentalists. These people have been here doing this long before the Taliban existed. Keep my country and its problems out of your mouth.
When you call them Taliban or Isis or whatever you distance them from you and who they are – white Christian men and women exerting control through recognized and legitimate means. Your President appoints them. Your citizens elect them.
Also, abortion is allowed in Islam.
48.
MazeDancer
Here is where to donate to a fund of funds to support local Abortion Orgs:
If someone took out a single conservative justice, the overwhelming bipartisan solution would be to either leave the seat vacant for the next Republican president (however long that took) or immediately select a replacement who was, ideologically, a clone of the victim.
TWO Supreme Court justices get simultaneously taken out in The Pelican Brief.
51.
JPL
Cheney and Kinzerger both voted for the gun bill. I did not see that coming.
52.
germy shoemangler
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland today released the following statement following the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs, State Health Officer of the Mississippi Department of Health, et al. v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization et al.:
“Today, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey and held that the right to abortion is no longer protected by the Constitution.
“The Supreme Court has eliminated an established right that has been an essential component of women’s liberty for half a century – a right that has safeguarded women’s ability to participate fully and equally in society. And in renouncing this fundamental right, which it had repeatedly recognized and reaffirmed, the Court has upended the doctrine of stare decisis, a key pillar of the rule of law.
“The Justice Department strongly disagrees with the Court’s decision. This decision deals a devastating blow to reproductive freedom in the United States. It will have an immediate and irreversible impact on the lives of people across the country. And it will be greatly disproportionate in its effect – with the greatest burdens felt by people of color and those of limited financial means.
In 1993, the Pelican Brief came out — at least in paperback? And that Spring it was all the rage and a movie was coming and it was definitely THE summer read. That year, from the end of June through July, I was teaching in Innsbruck, AU and our guest lecturer in the program was Justice Stevens. One of my colleagues asked him if he had read The Pelican Brief, and he said “No,” adding, “I generally don’t read books that include the assassination of Supreme Court Justices.*
Stevens was a real mensch.
*For those who might emember, the book starts with a huge anti-Roe demonstration on the steps of the Court.
56.
Timurid
The foundations of political power, in no particular order:
-Popular support
-Territory
-Money/material resources
-Control of military/security forces/police
-Control over the treasury/budget
-Control of the press
-Elite networks/patronage
The Supreme Court has somehow become the most powerful political actor in this country, by a wide margin, with access to almost none of these. They have, to a degree, the last item on the list, but the connections any justice might have pale in comparison to those available to someone like Biden or McConnell. I honestly can’t think of a historical precedent for this.
You normally win political conflicts by denying or limiting your opponent’s access to the above resources. How do you defeat an enemy that needs none of them?
No, it’s just the lighting and professional makeup people at the national networks.
When she was on our local TV she looked like a regular person. She’s a good reporter and interviewer. But the major networks want every on-air talent to look like a star. So they get the full makeover treatment.
60.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Elizabelle: I have been reading William Shirer for months now. And a lot of books about the rise of the Nazis. And one about Franco.
Both Germany and Spain were absolute monarchies before the Wiermer and Second Spanish Republics. Context matters.
This SCOTUS nonsense is more like an attempt to turn the clock back to 1850.
61.
trollhattan
@JPL: At this point I think Cheney is literally and enthusiastically trolling her own party. What else are they going to do to her?
62.
gvg
@Anyway: Now that is one angle. Insurance can raise the rates on healthcare and medical malpractice in the states with these dangerous laws.If medical practices and hospitals close and say why it might get through to some thick sculls how things really work.
I just wish we could get insurance to go up in permissive gun states.
63.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Timurid: Obama was commenting it’s because Congress gave up it’s own power because the last thing a Republican wants to do is be caught in a room when a decision is being made.
64.
JPL
@trollhattan: Earlier she put out a statement in support of the overturn of Roe, so Cheney is not quite there.
Most families support birth control, and that IMO is the issue that dems should drive home this fall. Do you want a legislator or your doctor to decide which birth control is best for you?
I thought Youngkin ran as a moderate conservative, not a moderate. He won despite his “pro-life” positions, by successfully keeping abortion and gun control issues in the background.
The 15 week ban will never pass the Democrat controlled State Senate anyway. Regardless, Youngkin is now setting his party up to be trounced in next year’s legislative elections. I don’t think he really cares because he cannot stand for reelection himself. He already has his eyes on higher office.
@germy shoemangler: When broadcast switched to digitial hi-def it killed a LOT of teevee careers because the old “smoothing” effect of 525 lines interlaced was suddenly gone, revealing every pore and line.
Makeup and digital image processing have softened the effect considerably, since then. Your Trumps and Giulianis are doubtless even scarier in person–something horrifying to ponder.
I had to mute her. Though I appreciated Jansing pointing out that Americans actually support Roe.
77.
MisterDancer
@Baud: Nope. Base only cares if you yank back the football. Otherwise, they’ve been playing the incremental gains game for far too long to give it up now.
If medical practices and hospitals close and say why it might get through to some thick sculls how things really work.
It sure as fuck didn’t get through those thick skulls when all their rural hospitals shutdown because their redstate rulers wouldn’t allow Medicare Expansion and in other ways limited ACA opportunities.
82.
janesays
@JPL: It’s a pretty tame bill. McConnell fucking voted for it.
To be clear – it’s good that it passed. But I don’t think the word “groundbreaking” could be applied to it.
83.
MisterDancer
@Baud: All Jerk-kin has to say is that he couldn’t get even 15 weeks past the extremist Democrats in the VA State Senate.
84.
trollhattan
California acts.
California lawmakers are racing to pass a measure that would ask voters to enshrine abortion rights in state law “now and for generations to come” in response to the U.S. Supreme Court decision stripping away federal protections. The court on Friday issued its long-awaited 6-3 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health which overturned Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling that guaranteed the right to abortion services. Legislators have been preparing for this moment by rapidly advancing a bill that would add an abortion rights amendment to the state constitution.
In early June, Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, and Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, D-Lakewood, introduced Senate Constitutional Amendment 10, which would guarantee Californians’ “fundamental right to choose to have an abortion and their fundamental right to choose or refuse contraceptives.” The amendment would require approval from two-thirds of legislators before appearing on the general election ballot in November. Lawmakers must pass SCA 10 by June 30 to ensure voters can consider it in November, and the bill has been moving briskly through the legislative process.
On Monday, the Senate passed SCA 10 by a 29-7 vote, less than two weeks after its introduction on June 8. Last week, the bill passed two committees in a single day. The Assembly Judiciary Committee advanced the bill during a special meeting on Thursday, clearing it for consideration on the Assembly floor next week. While presenting the bill, Atkins said California leaders “cannot stand by as women and families are left vulnerable as our highest court moves to strip away our rights and put countless people in harm’s way.”
@Timurid: in the interests of High Broderism, pure bothsiderism, you neglect to point out that if that Justice were liberal, there would be no bipartisan consensus at all and the right would instantly demand to have a conservative justice appointed.
87.
Betty Cracker
@TheTruffle: I keep hearing this red-blue state split idea, but no one ever explains how it would work. Blue city-states surrounded by red hinterlands? Forcible partitioning, e.g., red counties in CA, OR, WA annexed to Idaho? Not trying to pick on you; I just wish someone who brings this up would show their work…
I thought The Pelican Brief (1993) was pretty good, although I haven’t seen it in years. Good cast—Julia Roberts, Denzel Washington, Sam Shepard, John Heard—and written (from a John Grisham novel) and directed by Alan J. Pakula. Nice bookend to his earlier movie The Parallax View.
About that cast: holy shnikeys, what a pedigreed list of actors in supporting roles—Tony Goldwyn, James B. Sikking, William Atherton, Robert Culp, Stanley Tucci, Hume Cronyn, John Lithgow, Cynthia Nixon.
@Baud: Youngkin is concerned with what the political climate in the national Republican party will be in 2028. I don’t think this will hurt him then. He’s a slick guy who will find a way to make it sound good.
Right now, in 2022, the bible thumpers in Virginia may not like this half measure, but Democrats have crushed them for a decade and I think they will settle for half a loaf, which they won’t get anyway because Louise Lucas and the other Democratic Senators will drop kick this legislation into the Dismal Swamp.
You normally win political conflicts by denying or limiting your opponent’s access to the above resources. How do you defeat an enemy that needs none of them?
@Timurid: Congress gave them that power by doing nothing. Congress can take that power back by legislating. If at any point a Dem Congress and President had taken up and passed an abortion legalization law, as people were demanding that they do back in the 1960s, the Supreme Court wouldn’t have a fucking thing to say about it.
95.
D
The spousal unit says now that we’re reverting to the 18th century wrt women’s rights, he’s looking forward to taking control of my life’s savings. He wants a pimped out new pickup. He should sleep with one eye open
@Betty Cracker: The idea is patently ridiculous. And those advocating for it are not serious people
One only has to look at Ireland and India in how helpful partition has been in solving contentious problems
97.
JPL
@EmbraceYourInnerCrone: I gave to Warnock. Endangered Senators are your best bet. Roe is gone but gay marriage and birth control aren’t. Mitch can’t have the reins of the Senate again. He’s already done immense damage.
This is a job for journalists. Not law enforcement, because it’s essentially a fishing expedition. But some hungry young investigator yearning to become a household name, the 21st century Woodstein and Bernward.
We all have dark suspicions. What DID cause Justice Kennedy to retire? Who DID pay Kavanaugh’s really extensive debts? Find out, and find the evidence. Find out about Kavanaugh’s other issues, particularly abuse of women. Guys who abuse women don’t tend to just stop. There are other victims out there, probably a lot more recent than the ones we know about.
Then do Barrett, then do Gorsuch. Start with one premise, proved over and over for five years. Every Trump appointee, every one of them, has something deeply wrong with them. They are corrupt or crazy or incompetent or some combination of the three. Find out what it is, get the details, and prove it.
Then do Thomas. Not a Trump appointee, but guy’s going crazy. You don’t put in a SC opinion ‘and hey, let’s overturn these other things too’ – you just don’t.
Thomas and his wife should also be investigated by the House, if not the Justice Department. They’re so far down the rabbit hole, they’ve forgotten what sunlight looks like.
99.
Immanentize
In this country, we all seem to be mentally preparing/have been prepped for an age of assassination rather than an age of activism. It’s in the language. It is of revenge and murders and shootings. It’s in our stand your ground laws, etc. One of my colleagues (ex volunteer fireman) in Texas was tiresome about fires — the three legs necessary for the stool of fire, he would intone (frequently) -+ fuel, oxygen and ignition. It seems the Court has supplied all three this week alone.
I will work on the age of activism, but expect fire.
100.
Starfish
@Dorothy A. Winsor: They already have some of the highest malpractice insurance.
We need to make this not “dog catches car” but “dog catches TGV train”.
Not enough Americans pay attention for people to realize what’s at stake this November, and which side wants to move America forward and which wants to take us back to the 19th century. Most people really do not appreciate how much the conservatives want to undo the major Supreme Court decisions that have been pissing off conservatives ever since Brown v. Board of Education.
Once they undo all the decisions favorable to liberals from Brown onwards, they are going to set their sights on decisions from the 1930’s and 1940’s that enabled the New Deal, labor unions, minimum wage, etc.
Too many people take too much for granted to have the necessary level of urgency needed for this moment to effectively pushback.
But the extremist was right to note that her forced-birth organization and other anti-choice groups worked toward this moment for decades. There’s a lesson there
I think there are two lessons.
The first is a narrowly focused determined
minority can impose its will on the less focused majority. Communist revolutions throughout the 20th century bear this out, starting with the 1917 October Revolution in Russia. This focus enabled and emboldened Republicans to shred norms to get them here from Orrin Hatch holding up Republican judicial nominations under President Clinton, to Republicans taking it to a far more extreme level under President Obama, to finally denying President Obama his Constitutional right to appoint Scalia’s successor.
Second, they’ve had 68 years of major failures starting with Brown that they are trying to undo all of them in a hurry. They have an unpopular agenda that will cause enough suffering that people will want to undo what they’ve done.
I just hope our side can become as singularly focused on a few issues, like conservatives have become and maintain that focus for decades to not only undo the damage the Roberts Court has done, but to make sure it never happens again.
109.
Starfish
@JPL: They can because their careers are likely over. Meijer is also a wealthy person who does not have to hold onto this job.
110.
sab
@dlwchico: Laugh out loud. I used to have one and threw it away because rarely used it. Those were innocent times.
Kavanaugh’s debts were paid by his wealthy (well-off) parents.
So they say. Did we see the receipts? Remember when Loudermilk said with great emphasis that no-way no-how did he give any tours of the Capitol? Claiming is easy. Denying is easy. I want proof.
I keep hearing this red-blue state split idea, but no one ever explains how it would work. Blue city-states surrounded by red hinterlands? Forcible partitioning, e.g., red counties in CA, OR, WA annexed to Idaho? Not trying to pick on you; I just wish someone who brings this up would show their work…
@Betty Cracker: I’ll pick on ’em. It is utterly unworkable. Take the West Coast. You have a blue line from San Diego to Vancouver that is 1400 miles long and about twenty miles wide, plus Portland. Cannot be defended by force. Add to that, liberals won’t even arm themselves.
I won’t even get into the sheer idiocy that would impel a commenter here to demand that we place nukes along that border. Pop one off to keep out the rabble. Now what? You’ve still got 1400 miles of border to defend.
And speaking of nukes, I’ll ask the “split” contingent this: who gets them? They are the property of the federal government, not the states.
The current SCOTUS has access to unlimited funds via conservative donor networks, and patronage.
Second, because Republicans no longer are capable of actually governing and obstructing anyone that tried to we can no longer pass the laws needed to make changes. We are stuck with the Courts being the only branch of government able to make decisions.
I saw it on the Internet! Srsly, I can’t remember where but read that his family is well-off and they paid his debts around the time he was nominated. I too was looking into conspiracy theories about this.
We all have dark suspicions. What DID cause Justice Kennedy to retire? Who DID pay Kavanaugh’s really extensive debts? Find out, and find the evidence.
Yup. And … What was it, exactly, that TFG said to Kennedy to make him stop dead in his tracks with an expression of pure shock and horror? I’ll never not wonder about that moment.
121.
Martin
So, I think Adam, if he feels qualified to answer this, should write a post on the triggers for and rise of political violence, because my family is asking once again if we should get a gun, and I’m running a little low on answers in opposition to it.
They feel that violence is coming.
122.
sab
@Elizabelle: My mom got pregnant at age 40, pre Row, and never forgave the resulting child, who never knew what hit her.
Mom was Republican, and passionate about Planned Parenthood.
The unexpected child has long been my favorite sister.
@Anyway: It was not signed into law. I’m not even sure it was passed by the House. Again, had it been signed into law, the Supreme Court loses their jurisdiction over it.
And family donations don’t have to be reported, apparently.
I think he wanted it kept quiet because it makes him look like a ne’er-do-well; a grown man who still needs to be bailed out by his rich parents many years after his teens.
I’d LOVE for a different story to be revealed, that he was bailed out by donors looking for influence on the court, a story controversial enough to lead to his impeachment, but I think his parents were the ones who rescued him. They’re rich as hell.
128.
sab
@Immanentize: I am older than you. I remember the 1960s.
@JPL: Gay marriage is on the table that means all existing relationships could be terminated in red states – or if you are a couple going from one state to another could be jailed.
It’s states rights unless it is guns.
131.
Villago Delenda Est
The medievalists of the Federalist Society need to be removed from public life in this country. Let them practice their anti-Enlightenment ways outside the government, in their own homes.
Kavanaugh’s debts were paid by his wealthy (well-off) parents.
As an Ockham’s Razorist, I’m gonna go with this until I see some evidence. And Kennedy retired cause he’s an old Right Winger who wanted Mitch McConnell and Leo Whosits of the Federalist Society to pick his replacement.
133.
persistentillusion
@Immanentize: Imm, John Paul Stevens was indeed a wonderful person. His niece was my BBF when I was much younger and my family rented his vacation home several summers. Nice nice man. Weak backhand playing tennis though.
134.
Damned at Random
@cain: Or they can leave gay marriage and overturn Lawrence. Gays can marry, but none of their yucky sex.
135.
JPL
@sab: In some ways this ruling is worse than it was in the sixties. In the sixties, doctors would ask if you were Catholic, if they could save the mother. You had to sign a document stating that you wanted the mother to survive. Now they just listen for a baby heartbeat, not the mothers.
136.
sab
Interesting that these nutcase rightwing Catholics have devoted their whole lives to dismantling the protections that let them exist. Our Founding Fathers hated Catholics. Freedom of religion, but that was Episcopalian, Congregational ( UCC) and Quakers.
ETA I am married to a Catholic. My mom hated Catholics as much as the next guy, even though her grandparents were Catholics from Ireland. Of course, those Catholics from Ireland hated their Protestant in-laws from Scotland and Canada. America is such a welcoming place.
137.
TheTruffle
@Betty Cracker: There were people talking about Blexit years ago. Or making California its own country. I’m guessing the people behind it see it this way: The coastal areas become their own countries and Flyover Country becomes its own country. Who knows? Red America wants it. That is for sure.
It’s not hyperbole at all. Based on Trump’s mishandling of COVID alone, his presidency was a crime against humanity. Electing Trump in 2024 would be a greater crime against humanity because if he gets back in, he’ll make certain to only hire people who are 100% loyal and will carry out every order he gives them without question.
@cain: When that happens, I do think it’s time to divide into separate nations.
Comment 125 I explained how it could work.
What is interesting is that most of the country has no idea how much those states support our government.
141.
Chris Johnson
@germy shoemangler:
No shit he was. I continue to think very poorly of the HUGELY extensive efforts by Russia, using known and predictable techniques, to overthrow, co-opt, or break up our country. None of this would be happening if not for them, they’ve been in the thick of it all this time.
And their goal is NEVER to give Republicans power, their goal is to give us civil war and break us. They are just using the Republicans (and bernieorbusters) to do it. None of it is ever about making our wingnuts actually powerful. They are sacrificial terrorists.
Red America doesn’t want it. They don’t want a piece. They want the whole country, and they’re closer to getting it than ever before. 2020 was a temporary setback, but unless there’s a sustained effort to beat them back every election from now on, they will keep trying to seize every level of government and get their permanent control that’s immune to any democratic effort.
145.
sab
@TheTruffle: Coastal California hasn’t much water. Just saying.
146.
Martin
@The Moar You Know: Again, had it been signed into law, the Supreme Court loses their jurisdiction over it.
Did the court strike down Marbury when I wasn’t looking?
@Starfish: Meijar certainly will land on his feet. I think he would like to keep his current job, though. Last I saw he had a good lead on his primary challenger, so Meijar may be looking towards his rematch with Democrat Hilary Scholten in the fall. That is one of the more flippable Republican seats this cycle, I think.
149.
Mike in NC
After Obama was elected president, Mitch McConnell pledged to derail his agenda and make him a one-termer. In 2010 the Republicans motivated their racist base of evangelical “Christians” to turn out and vote and we’ve been paying ever since. In 2016 we got a couple of far-right wing extremists in Trump and Pence. (Pence refused to answer when asked if homosexuals should be imprisoned.)
Today we’re just a little bit closer to the 1950s vision that the GOP has wanted for decades: a country owned and operated by and for straight white men. Anybody else is officially a second-class citizen.
150.
TheTruffle
@JPL: I didn’t see this coming. So not all Republicans are good Germans.
151.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@TheTruffle: Cheney and Kinzinger, her especially, are both the kind of Republican who has always despised their own base (trump does too, if for different reasons). They don’t have to pretend anymore.
Thinking about it, my impression is Kinzinger is more a roll-your-eyes-at-your-crazy-uncle (but hold on to his vote!) type. Cheney probably makes Selena Meyer look like Fiorello LaGuardia when she gets back in the car after campaigning amongst the Unwashed.
152.
sab
@JPL: I agree. In the 1960s nobody much noticed. We had a local doctor ( Jewish) who did quiet abortions for decades before he realized nobody else was doing them, so he stopped. About two years before Roe. He only did abortions for married women. Rich girls went to Japan.
153.
trollhattan
@sab: My water nerd self will simply note that Coastal California is served by the State Water Project, which gets its supply from the Feather River Watershed, tucked away in the red portion of California so in a real sense not severable. Dreams of chunking up the west into smaller bits have floated around since the 19th century to no avail.
Households with no landscaping require scant amounts of water. Ag is where water is used here.
154.
cain
This has been truly a SHIT day:
one of our cat went missing and it’s been 24 hours
one of my wife’s good friend is planning on leaving her position from a school because of racism
Roe vs Wade
It’s just been a shit fucking day. Hug your kitties and fur babies.
I dated a local news anchorwoman. It was amazing how strange the on-air makeup looked in person. And how different she looked without it. I’ve been told by people working in moves/TV that this is true of everyone we see on our screens.
156.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@sab: Joan Rivers, from Larchmont and (IIRC) Barnard, used to do jokes about girls going to stay with their aunt, or take a last minute vacation to Puerto Rico. Everybody knew what that meant.
157.
Matt McIrvin
@Martin: They should ask themselves what purpose the gun will serve, and what they’d plan to do with it if they had one.
I’m never going to own a gun, and it’s because I know exactly what thoughts go through my head when I think about political violence and guns. They are thoughts that mean I should not have a gun.
158.
JPL
@sab: The Romper Room lady was the person who changed the way folks looked at abortion.
159.
Geminid
@TheTruffle: These really are modest measures with broad public support, even among a majority of gun owners I think. Cheney probably won’t lose anyone in Wyoming who wasn’t already going to vote against her. She has an uphill battle though.
Yes, I remember seeing a trailer for a Katy Perry documentary. A bunch of quick shots of her looking like a star, just ravishing and gorgeous. And then there was a quick cut of a rather ordinary girl staring quietly. I didn’t recognize her. I thought maybe it was the president of Katy’s fan club or something. Just a plain but nice girl. No. It was just a brief shot of Katy without makeup.
161.
Martin
Ok, can we please for the love of god stop the secession talk?
The only way a state leaves the country is via revolution, and I think Cole (rightly) banned that kind of talk a bit ago. If Texas wants to secede, they are welcome to try, and the US military will roll in and force them back, as was done a century and a half ago. If the people want to leave, they are always welcome to leave. Go cross the fucking border, learn Spanish, and don’t look back.
Plus, the despair is unwarranted in the long term. A truism of democratic nations is that laws are always trailing indicators of public opinion, and when they are not then conflict results (hence my concern about political violence). You saw gay marriage bans overturned because the public got ahead of the courts. The public wanted them overturned, and then a bit later the courts or legislature agreed. Pot laws are in that category now, it’s just that the feds haven’t caught up yet.
The gun ruling, the abortion ruling, and a bunch of other are running counter to public opinion. That’s dangerous in a ‘democracies are self-determinative by the citizenry’ sense, but they don’t portend a darker future. They are desperate attempts to claw back public opinion that are guaranteed to fail. The public will push back. The issue is how. Does the public view the existing institutional mechanism for protest, election of lawmakers, and so on as functional and valid, or not. Jan 6 was an example of the ‘not’.
I think we’re seeing a series of voter turnout wins for Democrats, and in time that may be enough to right the ship. But really what we have are two factions of the public viewing different parts of the institutions of the country as being foundationally corrupt.
Put another way, don’t leave, fight.
162.
JPL
@cain: This sounds cruel, but some days there aren’t enough hugs to go around.
It’s awful. It’s not just this right, but all rights that assumed to be part of the equal rights amendment.
Thomas pretty much defined that amendment meant him and Ginni. Tough to be the rest of you.
@JPL: How do we defend California? Hell, 90-plus percent of California’s land area is more blood red than anywhere in the Deep South. Again: how do we defend that? Keep the red rabble from just walking in here with their AR15s and just taking all our shit and setting up shop here? Can’t be done. We have the Sierras as a land border at the top of the state, but SoCal is wide open for hundreds of miles. Anyone with a decent truck can get in here. We can’t stop that even at the southern border of our state, only 120 or so miles. Couldn’t do it even with the full night of the Feds. How are we supposed to do it for 800 miles?
164.
Damned at Random
Running afoul of the moderators today. I don’t feel like this is a day for moderation
@The Moar You Know: The reauthorization was voted on in 2006 and signed by Bush. This extended the pre-clearances for another 25 years. The lawsuits started the year after that. Don’t know what you mean by unsigned. Was there something in 2012 that I’m missing?
This is a rogue and corrupt court. It is just making up sht to justify the unconstitutional rulings it wants to make. Pretending that passing new laws will affect the situation is charming, but I don’t see how it will move things forward. I support the passage of these laws, but understand why that isn’t the direction others want to take.
167.
Betty Cracker
@Damned at Random: It shouldn’t happen more than once when you first post, but the blog has been squirrely.
Americans support a lot of things up to the point where they have to vote for Dems to obtain them. We’ll see how this plays out.
Agree. And I don’t want to be doom posting, but I do not expect this to be a major factor in the midterms with one reservation. It might make it easier for Ds to hold the senate, which is no small thing.
169.
Martin
@Matt McIrvin: They’re worried about political violence from the right. So they see it as deterrence.
Some of that is projection of their own anger and recognition that if gun owners feel as angry as they do, that political violence seems likely.
170.
frosty
@Betty Cracker: Or in my little borough: Republicans in one neighborhood, Democrats in another (much smaller) one. On the side of the tracks with no running water or sewer, right? And unrepaired streets.
171.
piratedan
well this news certainly has kicked the fact that the House currently holds at least six seditionists currently in place in our government.
I kind of feel like the GOP has “won” this round and the costs are going to be high in human misery, yet, I also kind of feel like all of this shit, rescinding human rights, and plainly speaking that they hope to go after more, plus the attempted overthrow of the government and who knows how far those tendrils reach (i.e. was 2016 legit?).
I know that most of the Dems can walk and chew gum at the time and I wonder if the GOP is aware that they have awakened a fearsome and terrible giant.
They want your daughter to carry her rapist’s child is a winning message
173.
NotMax
Don’t just get angry, get busy.
174.
trollhattan
@The Moar You Know: I probably played too much RISK! as a kid but you form a pact with Nevada and Oregon then your only border is that little bit of Arizona, plus the ocean and Mexico and that’s already handled.
Anyhoo, it’s just stoopid talk but was a popular topic back when we were dealing with Bundys stealing public things by calling it theirs while brandishing guns.
175.
sab
@sab: My sister was born in Florida. If Mom had been pregant in Ohio Dr Sedar would have taken care of it.
It has always made me iffy on abortion. My Mom was furious. On the other hand she sent us all off to boarding school, some of them horrible. Mine was. But my youngest sister is the best of us. Her being aborted is shocking to even think about.
176.
livewyre
There’s a definite parallel between the Republican Party and the Russian government on this. Sounds obvious, but I mean not just in terms of sentiment, but strategy.
Brazenness has a lot going for it, or seems to. It’s easy – just don’t flinch. Double down. Fake it ’til you make it. Act like you’ve already won. Feign inevitability. It’s surprisingly effective and scary as hell – but fragile.
Like the gerrymander, it’s overwhelming until it breaks. I seem to remember some Soviet general catching heat for ordering a ‘dialectical advance’ to the rear. The effects are real, but the advantage is a mirage. In the big picture it wins only by sapping morale. It can’t even sustain itself without extracting from everything around it.
So, in the face of this heavy blow, we have to choose. Do we take it as spoken that our rights don’t exist? Do we rely on being told what we’re allowed to do with ourselves? Or are we ready to decide that facts and law are tools that the rest of us can carry?
177.
Feathers
@James E Powell: Worked at a shop where a big time movie cinematographer was one of our customers. Something he said that stuck with me was that movie stars were rarely the “pretty” sister in their families. Being photogenic is all about bone structure, which isn’t nearly as important when meeting someone in person.
Kavanaugh’s dad is pretty damn rich. Dropping a couple million to keep his son in an acceptable lifestyle and not have to slum it is probably the most likely reason.
179.
JPL
@The Moar You Know: California is supporting the government, and once that stops, the blood red area would pay less in taxes. You would have to pay money to Canada to support you in case of attack, but that is still less.
ha I’m just making this up as I go along.
I do know that the coastal areas support the government now, and should have a bigger say in what is happening.
It’s set up now to give the few more say, and we see the result today.
180.
Matt McIrvin
@Martin: It seems to me as if even liberals who claimed to be pro-choice were much more apologetic about it back in the 90s (attitudes had moved right from the 70s). We’re paying for that now though it’s not true any more. There are these huge lags in the system.
181.
PJ
@Martin: People seriously talking about secession are either high, despairing, malicious, or just plain stupid, or some combination thereof. Breaking up the US would only lead to more misery for the most vulnerable, and much, much, much more violence for everyone. And it would only give more power to Republicans, and you can be sure they would use it.
182.
JPL
@Damned at Random: I think that they drop the abortion term and highlight the result.
@Martin: I agree secession talk is pointless, but despairing about the long-term health of our democracy is NOT unwarranted. I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know, but the federal constitutional structure (and the constitutions in many states) has always put a thumb on the scale for rural interests.
Unfortunately the overrepresented states/counties are embracing a Chrsto-fascist outlook that is incompatible with democracy. They’re setting up to institute permanent minority rule, and I wouldn’t bet the house they won’t win. They’ve already captured an institution that can “legitimize” their tactics, and they’ve got half of one chamber, are making inroads into another and have a 50-50 chance of winning the presidency every four years.
Yes, we have to fight them every step of the way. I’m not going anywhere nor backing down a goddamn inch. But it’s also important to be realistic about the situation, and I think it’s accurate to say American democracy is on a knife’s edge.
185.
Omnes Omnibus
@PJ: I will echo what I said in an earlier thread: Give people room to grieve and rage today. I am one of the first to jump on doomerism, but today is not the day. I am not going lecture people who just lost a fundamental right on how to react.
186.
DougL
@Elizabelle: “Money always thinks it can control evil and stupid. It cannot.”
What a great line and oh so true. The wealthy are killing the goose that gave them all the golden eggs.
That’s the whole thing with abortion. At best it is a personal choice. At worst it is a medical emergency protecting the life and the fertility of the mother. I don’t see a place for the legislature in any of this.
191.
The Moar You Know
People seriously talking about secession are either high, despairing, malicious, or just plain stupid, or some combination thereof. Breaking up the US would only lead to more misery for the most vulnerable, and much, much, much more violence for everyone. And it would only give more power to Republicans, and you can be sure they would use it.
@PJ: I try to say it nicer, but yes. It not only can’t be done, but would unleash hell and misery on everyone. California would be Ukraine, and the rest of the US Russia, except the whole thing would be a lot bloodier and would quickly escalate to nuclear weapons
The last “Calexit” movement, about ten years ago, was shown to have received some serious Russian funding. I look askance at anyone these days who even brings it up as an idea.
192.
livewyre
@PJ: It’s kind of terrifying (but not entirely surprising) how easy it is to get others to chant, “build that wall!” There’s no chance this has gone unnoticed as a strategy.
193.
JPL
@Omnes Omnibus: The hate the gays, the dirty water, the carry your dead fetus to term, might not be an one day issue for me.
194.
frosty
@JPL: The goobers in the T of PA, upstate NY, and the Eastern Shore of MD aren’t going to go along with a new nation of the Northeast Corridor. This whole splitting discussion is bullshit.
195.
PJ
@schrodingers_cat: Agree 100%. Every case is different, but partitioning just tends to mean underlying problems are ignored until they fester and explode. Conflict is inevitable in every society, and we have to actively work to make sure they resolve themselves in the best way (i.e. without violence and without sacrificing minority rights.)
196.
The Truffle
@frosty: Offer them money to relocate. Do the same for people in red states who want to leave.
197.
Feathers
@sab: When abortion was illegal in Germany, they would stop young women at the border and haul them to a gynecologist for a pelvic exam to make sure they hadn’t had an abortion on their vacation.
Does anyone think red state police will pass up this opportunity to harass women? This is why abortion and birth control fall under the unreasonable search and seizure clauses. Because the law can’t be enforced without extreme invasions of privacy. But the Christian Nationalists want the right to intrude into people’s bodies and bedrooms more than they actually are interested in ended abortion and birth control.
198.
Martin
So, I will draw everyone’s attention to California SB24 that requires UC and CSU campuses to provide chemical abortion services for free to students.
Anyone with a child or grandchild considering where to go to college, CA is open and we’re looking out for your daughters and granddaughters. By law. And that’s not lip service by the state. UCSF is driving this, and they basically lead the nation on this stuff – by a LOT.
@JPL: It shouldn’t be a one day issue. But I am not going to “Well, actually….” the people who are rage posting today. That’s all I am saying.
201.
Immanentize
Neal Katyal in a jackass. That is my comment. I know I’m in trouble when I come here to calm down.
202.
PJ
@frosty:
40% of New York State voted for Trump, as did 40% of the voters in Delaware. Those fuckers aren’t going to decamp to the Confederate States of Southern Bumfuck. They’re going to see that their tactics worked on a national scale and will make sure they work on these stupid successor states.
203.
The Truffle
@Baud: naaaah. It will be sooner. This will hopefully be like Prohibition and be scotched within a decade. Too much outrage against it.
Hopefully sooner. I worry that our side doesn’t have the patience for long term projects.
208.
Martin
@Feathers: Right. The pandoras box this just opened is huge, and the hole the court just dug for itself is going to get a LOT bigger.
The simple question is: how do you enforce a complete abortion ban? How do you know a woman is pregnant and then not pregnant, unless you are creating registries of women menstrual cycles, mandating that school nurses report that information to the state, and so on. A policy obligates an enforcement mechanism, and a lot of the reasoning behind Griswold and Roe was that the enforcement mechanisms were odious.
States are going to test that, because they are now obligated to do so. How do the local police collect evidence to arrest a doctor or patient? That has to exist – the police are now *obligated* to do that to enforce state law.
USSC is going to have to field a shitton of new cases that they do not want to have to answer.
209.
JPL
@Immanentize: ha Not going to judge since I thought listening to the chant fk you Alito, fk you Thomas, fk you Gorsuch, etc
over and over was calming.
Maybe not for me because I’m thinking that parts of the country should secede, and I live in GA
that’s where we are though
210.
Martin
Digging the MSNBC producer energy split screening the ‘Fuck you Clarence Thomas’ sign against Kamala.
211.
sab
I hear these guys on NPR/BBC young twenties, who might have been aborted. But the huge part they miss is the choice. Their mom could have aborted them but didn’t. What would their lives have been if mom didn’t have a choice. The offspring are all male, so lacking imagination.
212.
trollhattan
@The Truffle: Would certainly put a different twist on the term speakeasy.
I know I’m in trouble when I come here to calm down.
LOL.
And agreed about Katyal.
217.
The Truffle
@Baud: maybe it has more patience than people think. See Georgia and Texas. Just someone please tell me the dog caught the car and the GOP finally overreached and a backlash is on the way.
218.
Martin
@PJ: Sometimes I wonder how many of the people who voted for Hitler to be chancellor survived to the start of WWII, and how many survived to the end.
219.
JPL
@The Truffle: In GA we need to keep Warnock, and I hope he has an ad out saying they want you to carry your rapist child.
Later he needs to mention protecting a women’s right to confer with her doctor about birth control.
What was it, exactly, that TFG said to Kennedy to make him stop dead in his tracks with an expression of pure shock and horror? I’ll never not wonder about that moment.
Same here. I’m surprised that someone skilled in lip-reading hasn’t analyzed the video.
221.
Feathers
@Martin: And Romania had workplaces keeping track of female employees menstrual cycles.
Just think of the electronic records that could be seized to find out if someone had been pregnant. Internet searches, phone location information, email, text messages, credit card records for purchases (did they stop buying tampons?), the list goes on. And it will all become public records, following women for the rest of their lives.
It’s going to get very ugly. This is what all the guns for everyone laws, police don’t have to care about your stinking rights, and elections don’t count if conservatives don’t like the outcomes shenanigans have been leading up to.
222.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Martin: the police are now *obligated* to do that to enforce state law.
Apparently The Plan is to duck that with the bounty laws like in Texas, but that still gets back to selective enforcement and turning the law into joke like with the drug laws.
The irony of American women having to go to Ireland to get an abortion is frying my brain. WTF.
227.
Martin
@The Truffle: Dem turnout ticked up in 2018 and 2020. I think electing Trump was the overreach. The GOP has lost nationally ever since. They’re only succeeding through regional strategies – places where representation is disproportionate like the Senate, state legislatures, etc. That’s really what this ruling reinforces. In CA it has only served to put more protections on abortion.
It’s an effective strategy short-term, but it’ll fail long-term. In time, the majority view will prevail. That doesn’t make the short-term any easier.
@Martin: hey, I’m always in the camp of urging liberals to arm up, and I’ve trained quite a few in how to shoot, but having one in the house means that you do have to acknowledge a few things:
It’s there to kill someone. There is no such thing as “shoot to wound”. You pick it up, you’re gonna either put it in a case and take it to the range or your are going to commit a homicide. It may be justifiable, but you are going to take another human being’s life.
Your odds of becoming a victim of gun violence go up. Criminals tend to be better at hurting people than non-criminals. See #1. There is no threatening. There is no negotiation. There is no “drop it” or “freeze, fucker”. They’ll kill you right then and there. You have to do it first.
Training is key, everyone in the house has to do it, and it has to be at least several times a year. Which means going to a gun range full of gun humpers and Trump supporters and keeping your mouth shut for a few hours. That’s gotten harder these days, I confess.
I don’t know where one gets situational awareness training but it’s needful. My house, it’s just me, the wife, and the dog, and we all sleep in the same room. Every week I read about some dad who’s just put his teenage daughter or son in a grave because they were sneaking back in the house after some teenager type activities.
There’s a lot more to it, but those are the biggies. I wish you and yours luck, and hopefully we can all avoid the need for a gun, but I have a bad feeling that’s just not in the cards anymore.
We’ll find out. I don’t put it past us to talk tweet ourselves out of a backlash though.
230.
JPL
@HeleninEire: Unlike Susan Collins, Ireland did learn their lesson when females were dying in order to save a dead fetus.
231.
Skepticat
I know perfectly well it will make no difference, but I needed to vent. I emailed “my” senator, Collins, only “Women now will reap what you have sown.” I’m getting my Bluetooth and phone and will take a walk on a beautiful day turned bleak and painful.
232.
raven
@The Moar You Know: You’re talking about having a gun for home defense. Mine are not for that, I have the ammo and weapons separated and the guns locked. I have them in case the shit comes down.
233.
Leto
Why in the absolute fuck does MSNBC have on at this minute the President of the Susan B Anthony list; literal wtf. JFC.
234.
frosty
@The Truffle: Haha that’s not how this works. They shoot me and take my stuff. No relocation needed.
235.
Martin
@The Moar You Know: Yeah, I understand all of that. I’m much more inclined to do the training but not own the gun for the reasons you state. If shit goes down, I’m pretty confident I know how to ‘find’ a gun pretty quickly.
Part of this too is that I’m actively considering a second ‘career’ as an election volunteer so they’re worried about that drawing attention to us.
The Romper Room lady was the person who changed the way folks looked at abortion.
Sherri Finkbine and thalidomide. I remember it vividly (had forgotten that she was a Romper Room hostess, though).
237.
JPL
this is good
Patagonia told employees this morning that it’ll bail out workers arrested at abortion protests. The benefit covers full- and part-time staff who “peacefully protest for reproductive justice.”
238.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Martin: It was a One Man, One Vote system and that One Man was Hindenburg, who died soon after.
The Communist International described all moderate left-wing parties as “social fascists” and urged the Communists to devote their energies to the destruction of the moderate left. As a result, the KPD, following orders from Moscow, rejected overtures from the Social Democrats to form a political alliance against the NSDAP.[83][84]
After Chancellor Papen left office, he secretly told Hitler that he still held considerable sway with President Hindenburg and that he would make Hitler chancellor as long as he, Papen, could be the vice chancellor. Another notable event was the publication of the Industrielleneingabe, a letter signed by 22 important representatives of industry, finance and agriculture, asking Hindenburg to appoint Hitler as chancellor. Hindenburg reluctantly agreed to appoint Hitler as chancellor after the parliamentary elections of July and November 1932 had not resulted in the formation of a majority government—despite the fact that Hitler had been Hindenburg’s opponent in the presidential election only 9 months earlier. Hitler headed a short-lived coalition government formed by the NSDAP and the German National People’s Party (DNVP).
239.
Elizabelle
I hope that these conservative “Justices” — and Anthony Kennedy — do not have another day of peace in their lives. I hope they are scorned. Booed in restaurants.
They already live in a bubble. I hope they are the objects of derision every time they step out of it.
I hope their families start whining about what a hell their life has become. I hope their neighbors treat them glacially.
They will deserve it all.
240.
Baud
I would like to see “Death by Alito” become a thing for women who are killed.
@Elizabelle: Many decades ago, a neighbor and I walked every day. She lost a baby at birth due to several genetic defects and was never allowed to see that baby. She decided to have another child but only with sonograms and the right to abort.
OMG she had more sonograms than a dozen moms, but did deliver a healthy baby. That baby would not be here with the overturn of Roe. It was only because she could abort if the baby could not survive outside the womb that she decided to try.
When my little one and I ran across the street to congrat the dad, he was thrilled because the baby had ten fingers and toes. My little one was confused, but that told me the importance of Roe. It’s not just used for birth control.
Hopefully sooner. I worry that our side doesn’t have the patience for long term projects.
I look at healthcare and see almost every successive Democratic President from FDR has tried to make healthcare more affordable and more accessible. There are a lot of failures, but Democrats keep working on this issue.
I think this perseverance can extend to other issues, but there will be set backs and half-measures that’d be better than nothing.
250.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Huh, post about Weimar Germany gets one into moderation heck. I bet the naughty word is H*nd*nb*rgh
Gets one’s post deleted too, Jesus fucking Christ.
251.
raven
@Martin: My buddy in Berkeley bought a 12 gauge and he’s having a hell of a time getting ammo.
Yes, when Dems control the government, things move forward. But how often does that occur in recent history? Solving abortion is easy. We could do it today, but we’re two backstabbing Senators short.
253.
JPL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It sounds like if you need health care out of state, they will pay. Maybe the Mayo clinic, maybe MD Anderson, or whatever. It’s open enough that you don’t have to say I need an abortion.
It’s complete bullshit, and it drives me nuts. You can take the bluest state in the Union—California, New York?—and there are still huge areas of deep red MAGAts. And the deep red states all have their blue islands. “Partition” or whatever is not the answer. It’s an “I don’t want to deal with this problem” pipe dream.
My knowledge of partition in India is second hand but I can assure anyone from personal experience* that the partition of Ireland** has not created universal sweetness and light
* I was once evacuated from a building shortly before it was bombed.
** Thanks to the idiocy that is Brexit Ireland will probably be reunited very soon
No, further. I contend they want to go back before the Enlightenment. A Theocracy. Maybe Feudalism w/TFG as King. Or at least, restrict voting to only white male landowners. No more of this “all men are created equal” stuff.
260.
MisterDancer
So, this is fascinating given the Conservative manufactured backlash around kid stuff:
Emily Seife, Senior Editor at Scholastic Press[…] tweeted; “I’ll mention now that my colleagues and I absolutely do want your YA books with or about abortions. There aren’t enough of them and these stories need to be told and normalized, and that’s not going to change.”
I think — and I insist it’s just my gut — the difference this time is that there’s just no “deep” social appetite for these rollbacks [ETA: on top of, yes, the decades of Abortion rights, and 50-10 years of the other rights under threat]. That makes it different than, say, what I understand what occurred during the Wiemar Republic era, or the run-up to Jim Crow, to take examples of some culturals I have done/am doing some reading on.
I don’t know how it impacts the moment, yet I think there’s something here that’s worth considering when we talk about a march to an authoritarian system in America.
Just think of the electronic records that could be seized to find out if someone had been pregnant. Internet searches, phone location information, email, text messages, credit card records for purchases (did they stop buying tampons?), the list goes on. And it will all become public records, following women for the rest of their lives.
A solution would be to limit the information Google, Facebook, etc. can sell, but I doubt Congressional leadership in either party really understands computers. They are old.
262.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@VOR: Oh, yes, Alto telegraph that with him quoting Witch Hunter General Sir Matthew Hale.
Admit to being initially confoozled about what an area in an entire different hemisphere has to do with it. Google to the rescue; another in a long, long line of brands of which possess no inkling.
Not sure anyone but a lip-reader with X-ray vision could do that. IIRC, both men’s backs were to the camera. Then they turned a corner and you could see that Kennedy was aghast at whatever TFG had just said. But I live in hope that somebody, somewhere, has a pretty good idea of the exchange, and will leak it.
265.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@MisterDancer: That makes it different than, say, what I understand what occurred during the Wiemar Republic era, or the run-up to Jim Crow, to take some spaces I have done/am doing some reading on.
Yes, Emancipation was imposed on the South by the victorious North and democracy was imposed on Germany by the Allies after WWI, Both cases the reactionaries saw themselves as the resistance.
266.
The Thin Black Duke
Thing is, if the GOP manages to overthrow the government, what’s left of the USA will go to shit not long afterwards because They Don’t Know How To Fix Things. What happens during the next pandemic? Or when the power grid goes down? Or when there’s a supply chain issue? Republicans won’t know what the fuck to do because they will surround themselves with idiots who will have no idea how anything works. It’ll be the sequel to the Dark Ages, except not as long since the repucussions of climate change will kill everyone by then.
267.
Elizabelle
@DougL: It’s just so apparent, in all the books about the rise of Hitler. The powers that be thought he was controllable.
‘@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I’m very curious as to what is going on in c-suites today with Thomas signaling the end of legal birth control and gay marriage/relationships. Is it worth the low taxes? How does the everybody can have all the guns, all the time, everywhere (except near the homes of Supreme Court Justices) fit into all of this?
These bounty laws are specifically designed to not only give church ladies of all genders a secret thrill, but to wreck havoc in corporate HR departments. What happens when somebody in HR starts dropping dimes on employees who have traveled to have abortions? What will you do about the outrage and boycotts when that happens? Oh, that’s right. The Supreme Court just ruled that boycotts are economic activity, not protected free speech. Convenient to drop that on just before killing Roe, eh?
Much of corporate America would go along with the Nationalists just fine. But the Nationalists had to promise their base the end of Roe, birth control, and gay marriage to get to this point. What happens now?
276.
StringOnAStick
@Martin: Thank you for this. I see a “Move the Oregon Border” sign every time I drive north from my blue central Oregon city, right next to a “VOTE REPUBLICAN!” sign. Both sentiments show a shocking lack of understanding how things work, The funny thing is their proposed map excludes my town (too blue), the one with the most money and the most dynamic economy in all of Central Oregon.
277.
Martin
@raven: I’d be inclined toward a KSG-25. I don’t believe in half-assing decisions. If I really feel like I need something, then I go all in. If that feels like it’s ‘too much’, then I must not need it, which is why I’m still in the ‘no, we don’t need one’ category.
Ammo wouldn’t be a problem. If I ‘need’ it, then money can solve it. I spent $12K on a solar system because I believe that climate change is an existential threat. If I really thought I needed a gun, then $12K wouldn’t be a problem to get one and some ammo. You look for bargains on the things you want, not the things you need.
Hell, JPMorgan announced they’d help employees who had to travel to another state for an abortion.
281.
MisterDancer
@brendancalling: There’s already such networks. In fact, the website of one of the major ones, the National Network of Abortion Funds, is down today due to a deluge of donations and redirecting to their ActBlue page. There are others, like the Brigid Alliance, that work nationwide to get people to Abortions.
There is also the Auntie Network, but I’ve read some criticism of their approach from people who’ve been working Reproductive Justice for a while, so I’ll hold on linking them.
But: suffice to say a serious number of such efforts exist, both nationally and locally. I posted on this back when the Draft decision was posted, and I’m working on an update for the front Page, hopefully soon.
282.
Feathers
@gene108: Presumably the legislators who will be around when all of this is righted will understand and we will get EU style data protection. If only to cut back on the power currently held by the ”I’m a libertarian, but fascist will work, too” crowd.
Once you have been born, you are a nuisance, and, possibly, a woman.
284.
The Thin Black Duke
@gene108: Of course. But what happens when they kill all the Others? Italians won’t be “white” anymore? This shit isn’t substainable. Then again, long-term planning really isn’t their thing.
285.
Tazj
I just heard an interview with Phil Bryant the former governor of Mississippi whose administration brought the case to the Supreme Court that was fundamental in overturning Roe. I expected the interview to be bad but to hear the total disdain for women in his words was enraging.
Of course he was thrilled, we all knew he would be. He hoped it would make WOMEN become more responsible. Then the reporter asked what he would say to the women protesting, he said to pray and to ask God for the realization that this is a life and you just can’t take away for your convenience. He kept repeating that women do it because it’s inconvenient for them. The reporter did press him about it and said many women would say it’s not just an inconvenience and he said I understand we have compassion for people here in Mississippi. Now you might think he would offer platitudes about helping women with diapers and formula but he didn’t even do that. He said we’re compassionate about making it easier for people to ADOPT. That’s it.
@debbie: I’m wondering how much of a demographic shift this will cause. I think quite a few companies are going to be rethinking their presence in many of these states because it’s just untenable to lose employees that have a trans kid and don’t want to be prosecuted.
And if your kid is scoping out colleges, send them to a blue state. It’s not realistic to tell all of the liberals in red states to up and move their families, but college is effectively a free migration. There’s almost no sunk costs. Send them off to a place that will respect their rights because odds are pretty good they’ll stay in the state they go to college in.
I look at every one of these rulings as economic anchors on red states. Mississippi will just get poorer because of this. Get your kids out.
I had a court appearance in downtown Los Angeles this morning. Not surprisingly, the only subject discussed while waiting for calendar call – after we complained about the Judge always being late, and her clerk being a power-drunk martinet – was the Dobbs decision.
Everyone was appalled, but there was a gender divide in the discussion. The men were all on Team “Thank God We’re In California.” And the women were adamant that they are coming after Blue State women too – through Legislation or packing the 9th Circuit with Coney-Clones, or in ways we haven’t yet imagined. And they’re right.
290.
JPL
@debbie: Nice. My niece works for Morgan Stanley and I assume they will follow suit. Since I’m the MIL, she’s going to talk to my DIL to make sure she doesn’t have the app to track periods.
291.
MisterDancer
@Feathers: the Nationalists had to promise their base the end of Roe, birth control, and gay marriage to get to this point. What happens now?
Well, honestly, that’s up to us citizens. Or, rather, it can be.
There’s already a range of major corporations who’ve given an explicit middle finger to the idea that these bounty laws are valid. No corpo’s legal team would have approved the “we’ll pay for you to travel to get an abortion” if they thought there was a chance in Hell of serious lawsuits for doing that.
And they’re doing this because they judge the goodwill and attaboys will outweigh the Conservative backlash. They’re betting we’ll respond positively to their actions, and that the citizenry will push back hard on this, both in the streets and in the voting booths.
If we — all of us — do not make that pushback real? They’ll cut the programs as too risky.
292.
Elizabelle
I think the USSC decisions this week badly destabilized the country. We might even see some more market turmoil.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin: tweets today:
The Department is examining this decision closely and evaluating our policies to ensure we continue to provide seamless access to reproductive health care as permitted by federal law.
Nothing is more important to me or to this Department than the health and well-being of our Service members, the civilian workforce, and DOD families. I am committed to taking care of our people and ensuring the readiness and resilience of our Force.
Can you imagine being a pregnant service member in a location where abortion is inaccessible? Like all other employees, you no longer have the ability to take care of this privately, with just a day or two off.
Further, too many servicewomen are raped by other service members, even those in their chain of command. If you’re serving on an installation in Oklahoma or Ohio: you get to bear your rapist’s child? And he gets parental rights?
293.
Calouste
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Dick’s sells guns. You can buy your shoes from a different place that supports abortion rights and doesn’t sell guns. There are many, like Patagonia.
294.
kalakal
I am hoping the backlash to this ruling and the way the red states are going to overreach with it is going to be huge at the midterms. Add in the J6 hearings. The downside to gerrymandering ( for the gerrymanderers) is that get a big enough swing against you and you lose really, really big. It’s like leverage/gearage in financial speculation, great when it goes up, Wall St Crash when it goes down. As a plus Senate elections can’t be gerrymanderd.
This is a bloody awful day but it doesn’t end with today
295.
MisterDancer
@Martin: I look at every one of these rulings as economic anchors on red states. Mississippi will just get poorer because of this.
One of the things I wish I could find more study on, is the economic impact of Jim Crow and similar regimes. I think we really underestimate how willing people were to cut their economies off at the knees, to inflict harm. Much less understand why.
I think if some of these Libertarian Fellow Travelers really understood the impacts of monochromatic/monogender businesses on their bottom line, they’d change some of their tunes. I don’t like basically bribing people to do good, though.
Jansing is pretty good, IMO. I hope she replaces Andrea Mitchell, who really does need to go.
Are you insane? I’d rather watch Mrs. Greenspan than Chris Jansing. She’s horrible. I don’t want to watch either of these hags and will change the channel when either comes on, but if forced to choose, it’s Greenspan for me. At least with Greenspan, you know the stupid may just be a symptom of senility.
They will continue to focus on social issues but once climate change continues and our food supply gets disrupted – no social or tax cut policy is going to fix starving people .. explaining to entitled people about why there is no food will lead to violence.. probably against non white and females.
Thanks for finding that! It’s the clip I was remembering, but I had forgotten that their lips were visible, at least from the side. I’ll bet a skilled LR could make a plausible guess as to what was said.
all the Others? Italians won’t be “white” anymore? This shit isn’t substainable. Then again, long-term planning really isn’t their thing.
Invade and subjugate Canada. EDIT: Or some other type of war of conquest somewhere else on the planet.
Their universal healthcare, more affordable universities, access to abortion, lack of mass shootings, etc. makes America look bad.
Then they’ll turn on the Catholics, and non-Fundamentalist Protestants.
Though, they might be able to do both at the same time.
Long term planning or sustainability isn’t really an issue. If they can repress opposition savagely enough, and not let the standard of living go totally to shit for their supporters, they can hang on for decades.
300.
A Man for All Seasonings (formerly Geeno)
May I be the first to welcome John to Team Meteor. Humans had their chance, and look at what they did. Erase the slate and start over.
I think we really underestimate how willing people were to cut their economies off at the knees, to inflict harm. Much less understand why.
They never actually join the dots. It can’t be their fault, their beliefs and actions can’t be in error. No, any economic/social harm is the fault of others, the specific others vary in time and place, but the sick, tired, evil song is eternal
Everyone was appalled, but there was a gender divide in the discussion. The men were all on Team “Thank God We’re In California.” And the women were adamant that they are coming after Blue State women too – through Legislation or packing the 9th Circuit with Coney-Clones, or in ways we haven’t yet imagined. And they’re right.
The women are right, but are there enough of them to out vote the conservative women, who are all for this?
I think that’s a big issue in electoral politics. (No offense intended), but a majority of white men nationally will vote Republican no matter what. The best we can do there is to drop there support for Republicans from 2/3’s to 3/5’s, in any given election.
Where things get decided is how white women vote. Will this peal off some non-college educated white women, who would be impacted by this ruling? I think this will cost Republicans among college educated women more than they expect.
304.
The Thin Black Duke
@gene108: It won’t be decades. Mind you, I’m not advocating violence, but if things go to shit, marginalized people aren’t going to go quietly into that good night. Do you think the POC in the military are meekly going to march into the camps?
305.
Martin
@Almost Retired: Oh, yeah, the women are 100% right here. But in the short term, thank God we’re in California. Whether they come for the blue states is much more of a function of whether people get off their asses and vote. There’s time to prevent that.
@kalakal: As you point out, gerrymanders can fail, especially when there is political shift on top of demographic change. Ten years ago Republicans drew a map in Virginia that put them up 65-35 in the House of Delegates going into the 2017 elections. They came out of them up only 51-49, with one victory decided on a coin flip after a tie.
After the 2019 elections Republicans were down 55-45 in the House of Delegates. They came back to a 52-48 lead last year on that same map but two of their seats were decided by less than 200 votes and a couple more were within 500.
Next year’s elections will be held on a more neutral, court-drawn map and I expect Republicans will pay a real price for their minority position on abortion rights.
308.
Dan B
@MisterDancer: I realized I’m not feeling as despondent as many (most?) Jackals. It dawned on me that I’ve felt despondent since living in Arkansas during Jim Crow and then figuring out I was “homosexual”* at age 14. That was followed by Brown, busing, Loving, Lawrence, ’68, AIDS, Obergefell, etc. Up and down, being jerked around. Maintaining a steady level of unease and looking for motivation to resist and to push for a better future has been my North Star. Our neighbors have Barbeques when the weather is good. I’ll be doing some fierce gardening with the understanding that the climate may burn everything to a crisp. Each disastrous setback is part of our journey of life and I’m reminded that there must be joy and peace so we can keep going. Your words resonated because all minorities in this country hear the steady drumbeat of tyranny that is constantly in the background. It’s not a surprise to us when it surfaces.
*homosexual was: pervert, predator, unstable, not trustworthy, mentally ill, etc. I’ve lived with that most of my life. Not nice or surprising for those labels to make a comeback.
309.
syphonblue
People in blue states are absolutely not safe. All it will take is one person living in a blue state to sue over its pro-abortion rights laws, and the Supreme Court will gleefully rule those laws unconstitutional and we will have NO abortion in the states ANYWHERE.
And that is absolutely what is coming next. I’d say within this year, we get that lawsuit(s).
310.
Matt McIrvin
@syphonblue: They can’t force the states to enforce an abortion ban– there has to actually be a law. A future Congress could, of course, pass that and send the FBI or some federal police agency after people. But that would be the way absent state legislative action.
311.
Matt McIrvin
@gene108: Some of the most floridly, insanely anti-abortion people I know are white women. Religion is a powerful thing.
312.
Matt McIrvin
@Suzanne: Germany broke up because it got invaded by an unlikely team of rival powers bound to stop it. I don’t see any force like that coming for us.
I saw Michael B on the other night. He was almost as loose as I was in the moment. It surprised me to see him start to fly. Thanks for your post. And his tweet. Edibles. Just a quarter.
And thanks to the OP for the info on a good place to contribute. Much appreciated.
Plouffe was on earlier. Thank Hera he didnt offer the lady people any thoughts and prayers cuz he’s not a heartless idiot. He looked like he’d been crying.
I kinda dig that it came down to the respective self hating crazy of Alito and Thomas. These people are obviously insane. Let it play out.
315.
EarthWindFire
@sab: My grandmother was the same. The resulting child was my mother. She’s been damaged ever since.
I hate these reactionaries with every fiber of my being.
Just think of the electronic records that could be seized to find out if someone had been pregnant. Internet searches, phone location information, email, text messages, credit card records for purchases (did they stop buying tampons?), the list goes on.
Don’t need to be seized, they’re offered for sale, widely, as databases. That’s where the money for period-tracking apps comes from. Not particularly expensive and available to any interested party.
Generally speaking, that’s why we have apps. Targeted advertising means surveillance advertising based on aggregating datasets.
317.
SoCalKaren
@jnfr: I don’t care for her either. She’s always a little too gleeful when reporting on some shit Republicans are pulling, like she’s secretly on their side.
There’s a piece sneering about evil leftists at MoJo that talks about it:
As it turned out, there were rather simple answers to most of those questions. Kavanaugh explained to the Senate Judiciary Committee that much of his credit card debt stemmed from either work on his fixer-upper mansion or buying Nats season and playoff tickets for himself and a handful of dudes who’d been going to the games together for years. They had paid him back in full, the White House said at the time. As for the rest, while he was maddeningly obtuse in admitting it, Kavanaugh seems to have gotten lots of money from his parents.
As I explained back in 2018, gifts from family don’t have to be reported on federal judicial disclosure forms, and Kavanaugh’s family had deep pockets. He’s the only child of a “swamp creature,” Ed Kavanaugh, a longtime lobbyist for the cosmetics industry who spent his career schmoozing with Beltway insiders to fend off health and safety regulations and dueling with activists who wanted to ban cosmetic testing on animals. When the elder Kavanaugh retired in 2005, his compensation package that year from the Cosmetic, Toiletry and Fragrance Association totaled $13 million, according to the nonprofit group’s IRS filing.
Kavanaugh’s parents ensured he had a privileged upbringing—high school at Georgetown Prep in suburban Washington and an Ivy League education that seems to have left him without a whiff of student loan debt. Their largesse seems to have followed him into adulthood. As Kavanaugh explained in his written answers to Whitehouse: “We have not received financial gifts other than from our family, which are excluded from disclosure in judicial financial disclosure reports.” Rather than reveal any useful details that might have put an end to all the armchair speculation, he deployed opaque lawyerly language and wrote, “[I]t bears repeating that financial disclosure reports are not meant to provide one’s overall net worth or overall financial situation. They are meant to identify conflicts of interest. Therefore, they are not good tools for assessing one’s net worth or financial situation.”
It’s plausible that his parents bailed him out.
But that argues, yet again, for the courts (especially the SCOTUS) to have strict ethics and financial disclosure rules (that they don’t have now). What’s to keep his parents from funneling money from nefarious actors to his bank account??
Grr…,
Scott.
320.
glc
@Another Scott: The concept of Mother Jones sneering at evil leftists seems like an odd one to me. I don’t think I’ve encountered that.
My recollection was that the piece gave a view of the facts, and acknowledged both the lack of clarity and the fact that Kavanaugh chose not to clarify.
321.
Jt
@Timurid: no offense. If there is an opening, you fill it. No matter what, just pick good qualified candidates, no games.
322.
Spc
@trollhattan: Since VA gov term limit is one term, reverting to true colors can happen quickly, especially when one has aspirations.
323.
Taxesmycredulity
@Percysowner: If you haven’t seen the movie, you many have missed Cole’s point. Plot: a Supreme Court justice is murdered to ensure that an environmental case loses in court.
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schrodingers_cat
Yeah that has worked so well before.
Sis
This is so enraging. And these same people shrug at gun violence and the death penalty and disapprove of any aid to the mothers and children they claim to care about.
oatler
ABC TV on the spot, reporting in the present tense that both sides are angry. “Now here’s Chris Christie at Antietem…”
Percysowner
I’ve never seen The Pelican Brief. I do remember when one reviewer called it The Pelican Much Too Long.
As much as I want to burn it all down now, I’ll start by increasing my donations to Democrats and knocking on doors and phone banking from here on out
Dangerman
So, November is price of gas vs. USSC gasbags; gonna be an interesting midterm.
Alison Rose
@Sis: Gotta say, the “I’m against abortion but in favor of the death penalty” stance is always…interesting. SAVE THE FETUSES SO WE CAN HOPEFULLY EXECUTE THEM LATER.
Rob
Mood: black
KEXP in Seattle (kexp.org) is playing songs requested by listeners to help us deal with this horrible decision.
dlwchico
Went to buy a pitchfork at Lowes the other day and they cost nearly $60!
Probably not a coincidence.
trollhattan
Ladies and germs, your modern moderate* Republican governor:
*Or so he said. IDK what Virginia recall laws are but maybe time to giddyup.
scav
@Alison Rose : They want to keep those babies alive long enough so they can stand on their bloodied corpses and shriek “FREEDOM!!!” while waving their holy Ak-47s.
Tony Jay
I finished watching Obi-Wan Kenobi last night.
Middle-aged man stunned by the rise of tyranny learns to hope again and face the demons of his past failures, while an angry young woman learns that her strategy of victim blaming doesn’t actually achieve anything.
In SPAAAAAAACCCCCCCCCCCE!
PaulWartenberg
And the Far Right Culture War Wingnuts will not stop now.
Clarence Thomas made it abundantly clear that gay marriage, bedroom privacy, birth control, and even interracial marriage (hypocrite!) are on the chopping block.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s what the Supreme Court just did.
Elizabelle
@trollhattan: Oh good. Youngkin is reminding Virginia voters what is at stake in the 2022 and 2023 elections. Dick, meet Youngkin.
And: tweet from Michael Beschloss, pretty much calling this Supreme Court illegitimate (and it is):·. Also: might need to find out just why “Justice” Kennedy, with the Deutsche Bank son, retired when he did. Trump fucked with the Justice Department. Did he overtly get a justice to retire, too?
Baud
@trollhattan:
No recall in VA, I believe.
ellie
Nice!
Elizabelle
Virginia is also a bluer state than Youngkin thinks. He is the anomaly.
J.
The Large Hadron Collider will be starting up again next month and there’s always the chance it could suck the world into a man-made black hole. Though some days if feels like we’re already there.
Timurid
Even the Pelican Brief solution wouldn’t work.
If someone took out a single conservative justice, the overwhelming bipartisan solution would be to either leave the seat vacant for the next Republican president (however long that took) or immediately select a replacement who was, ideologically, a clone of the victim.
If somebody flew a plane into SCOTUS, both parties would be honor bound to recruit and confirm a new court that was, as close as humanly possible, an exact replica of the old one. Then the new justices would continue on the same course as their predecessors.
There’s the obvious desire to avoid a precedent of murdering government officials in pursuit of more desirable replacements, but the response would be the same if all the justices died in some horrific accident. Fairness, norms and all that. The idea that courts are sacred. At this point the courts are a virus that has taken control of its host.
JPL
This is what a peaceful protest looks like.. nsfw link
Tom Levenson
Anyone voting Republican at any level this fall is pretty much voting NSDAP in 1932.
I know that seems like hyperbole, and I hope it is. But I’m not confident at all
MisterDancer
Pretty much this. And in the meantime, he and the rest of the GOP’ll cause as much havoc and pain to people who can reproduce, as they can manage.
And they’ll be as sincere about it, as George Wallace was about hurting my Parents and Grandparent’s generation.
p.a.
We need to make this not “dog catches car” but “dog catches TGV train”.
Dorothy A. Winsor
My brother is an obstetrician, retired, thank god. Who’d be an obstetrician in the US right now?
TaMara
@Tom Levenson: No, it’s not. I think that’s a
Elizabelle
@Tom Levenson: I have been reading William Shirer for months now. And a lot of books about the rise of the Nazis. And one about Franco.
And you are not wrong at all.
Citizens United helped bring us to this moment. Money always thinks it can control evil and stupid. It cannot.
Betty Cracker
Reposting comment from below:
MSNBC’s Chris Jansing just had a smug fuckface from an anti-choice group on — Mallory something or another. Ugh. But the extremist was right to note that her forced-birth organization and other anti-choice groups worked toward this moment for decades. There’s a lesson there
ETA: Jansing is pretty good, IMO. I hope she replaces Andrea Mitchell, who really does need to go.
Elizabelle
Our WW2 generation has pretty much died off. They knew what they were fighting.
And yet too many Americans … cannot see the wolf for the fleece. Or turn, like sheep, to rightwing media. Which is all too happy to destroy the actual America. Make us ungovernable. Stop progress and science.
Betty Cracker
@Tony Jay: LOL!
germy shoemangler
To Kavanaugh:
“What go around come around kid, what go around come around”
Drunk ass fool
Just a punk ass
Gonna cause trouble
Yeah let me burst that bubble
In a hurry
I ain’t happy
So worry
What’s a judge
And a punk ass jury
Dangerman
I think this was Nanci Griffith’s most pissed off song (she had a few) but it seems especially apropos today (go to about 1:30 in).
RIP Nanci.
ETA: I don’t know about burning it all down; I do know I’ll cue up some Rage Against The Machine here in a moment.
dm
@Tom Levenson: Maybe not NSDAP, but no one in the US knows about a comparison like Peron besides maybe being able to hum the chorus of that song from Evita.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
That comment could have been made a decade ago.
Alison Rose
@scav: To quote the philosopher George Carlin, “Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers.”
oatler
@JPL:
Love it.
@JPL:
UncleEbeneezer
As with the night of the 2016 election, I’m on court with a bunch of pre-teen girls who probably have no idea what just happened to their rights. It’s very hard to focus. As Rev. Wright appropriately noted “God damn America” indeed.
TheTruffle
@p.a.: I’d love it if that would happen. Because I admit I’m a doomer right now. I’m sick of these RWNJs and suspect the blue-red state split is coming within a decade. I’m in NY, and would be happy to help people relocate if that happens.
Anyway
All I feel like saying is fuck fuck fuckitall…
To be precise, FTFNYT for their vendetta against Gore and Hillary, fuck Susan Collins, fuck NPR and totebaggers, fuck Rethugs, fuck Gorsuch, FUCK ALITO, fuck Kavanaugh, fuck Clarence Thomas, fuck TFG
… fuck the AMA and TX doctors. I kept expecting them to make strong statement about how the TX law would impact their ability to treat all women and how it puts the lives of women in danger but nothing. This is the same group that had no qualms waging all out war against the ACA. Fuck’em.
gene108
Two things really frighten me and scare me about the future.
1. Democrats have to keep control of Congress and the White House until Thomas, Alito, Roberts. Gorsuck, Kavanaugh, and/or Barrett start dropping dead and can be replaced; which I don’t see happening for 10-20 years in a row that it’d be necessary; and
2. Republican policies are not just out of step with what the country wants, but out of step with where the rest of the developed and developing world is on issues like gun control, abortion, and the death penalty. Not only do Republicans do a poor job of governing, but they cry all the time about “America’s standing in the world”, as their policies and leaders do more to erode it than they can possibly imagine. Since they cannot ever accept they do anything wrong, they will need to find scapegoats to blame as the economy worsens and other countries ignore us. The white supremacists that are now welcomed into the Republican Party have been craving a race war for decades. Republicans poor governance and desire to find scapegoats will give the white supremacists the cover they need to start one.
Chris Johnson
I feel ya on the ‘burn it all down’, John.
I can’t help but also remember that our intelligence folks are still worried about Russian ‘active measures’, and that we’ve documented in various ways that Russia has been working here for DECADES in all sorts of organizations (right and left) just to get to a position where they can plunge us into bloody civil war and stop us being a first world anything.
I can’t help but feel this is very much part of that attempt, and it makes me not want to give in to it. I say, overreach is a mistake, and this can and should be the death of the Republican PARTY, not a reason to define a solid third of Americans as ‘them as should be put in concentration camps because they’re just evil’.
That ain’t civilization, not when they do it, not if we do it. I’m just as alarmed at their race toward that goal as anybody, but the answer is not to beat them to the concentration camps. The answer is democracy, electoralism, fighting to cling to civilization and justice. Just because a hostile foreign power took over and corrupted the top of our justice system doesn’t mean those jurists ARE the justice system. They are flying in the face of it, on purpose.
germy shoemangler
@Betty Cracker:
I remember Chris Jansing when she was a local anchor in the Albany NY NBC affiliate, early 1990s. She was Chris Kapostasy then. I was glad to see her promoted to a national network.
germy shoemangler
@Chris Johnson:
According to that documentary filmmaker (the one who’ll be questioned by the Jan. 6 committee) Trump was on the phone with Putin on the eve of the 2020 election.
Baud
@germy shoemangler:
Did he record it?
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Let’s see how well this turns out for the Republicans.
germy shoemangler
@Baud:
the date and time of the call coincided with Putin publicly criticizing Trump for making unfounded claims about Hunter Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine, although it’s unclear what the two leaders discussed.
janesays
@Percysowner: The first thing that happens in The Pelican Brief is two Supreme Court justices get assassinated.
MisterDancer
As a note, since I’ve seen a couple of these kinds of comments:
MazeDancer
Here is where to donate to a fund of funds to support local Abortion Orgs:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/supportabortionfunds?refcode=nnafwebsite
John Cole
Chris Jansing is 65. I am pretty sure she drinks the blood of virgins or something. She looks 35.
janesays
TWO Supreme Court justices get simultaneously taken out in The Pelican Brief.
JPL
Cheney and Kinzerger both voted for the gun bill. I did not see that coming.
germy shoemangler
Baud
@JPL:
It’s too bad that bill will get overshadowed.
gvg
@Timurid: You are silly.
Immanentize
In 1993, the Pelican Brief came out — at least in paperback? And that Spring it was all the rage and a movie was coming and it was definitely THE summer read. That year, from the end of June through July, I was teaching in Innsbruck, AU and our guest lecturer in the program was Justice Stevens. One of my colleagues asked him if he had read The Pelican Brief, and he said “No,” adding, “I generally don’t read books that include the assassination of Supreme Court Justices.*
Stevens was a real mensch.
*For those who might emember, the book starts with a huge anti-Roe demonstration on the steps of the Court.
Timurid
The foundations of political power, in no particular order:
-Popular support
-Territory
-Money/material resources
-Control of military/security forces/police
-Control over the treasury/budget
-Control of the press
-Elite networks/patronage
The Supreme Court has somehow become the most powerful political actor in this country, by a wide margin, with access to almost none of these. They have, to a degree, the last item on the list, but the connections any justice might have pale in comparison to those available to someone like Biden or McConnell. I honestly can’t think of a historical precedent for this.
You normally win political conflicts by denying or limiting your opponent’s access to the above resources. How do you defeat an enemy that needs none of them?
Dorothy A. Winsor
@JPL: That’s fascinating. It’s like being part of the fact-based community for a large chunk of time affected them
trollhattan
This fell off the radar inappropriately, methinks. I too would like to learn much more about it all. But nooooo, Hunter Biden, yo!
germy shoemangler
@John Cole:
No, it’s just the lighting and professional makeup people at the national networks.
When she was on our local TV she looked like a regular person. She’s a good reporter and interviewer. But the major networks want every on-air talent to look like a star. So they get the full makeover treatment.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Both Germany and Spain were absolute monarchies before the Wiermer and Second Spanish Republics. Context matters.
This SCOTUS nonsense is more like an attempt to turn the clock back to 1850.
trollhattan
@JPL: At this point I think Cheney is literally and enthusiastically trolling her own party. What else are they going to do to her?
gvg
@Anyway: Now that is one angle. Insurance can raise the rates on healthcare and medical malpractice in the states with these dangerous laws.If medical practices and hospitals close and say why it might get through to some thick sculls how things really work.
I just wish we could get insurance to go up in permissive gun states.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Timurid: Obama was commenting it’s because Congress gave up it’s own power because the last thing a Republican wants to do is be caught in a room when a decision is being made.
JPL
@trollhattan: Earlier she put out a statement in support of the overturn of Roe, so Cheney is not quite there.
Tony Jay
@Betty Cracker:
It’s like they knew!
JPL
Most families support birth control, and that IMO is the issue that dems should drive home this fall. Do you want a legislator or your doctor to decide which birth control is best for you?
Geminid
@trollhattan: No recall in Virginia.
I thought Youngkin ran as a moderate conservative, not a moderate. He won despite his “pro-life” positions, by successfully keeping abortion and gun control issues in the background.
The 15 week ban will never pass the Democrat controlled State Senate anyway. Regardless, Youngkin is now setting his party up to be trounced in next year’s legislative elections. I don’t think he really cares because he cannot stand for reelection himself. He already has his eyes on higher office.
The Moar You Know
@germy shoemangler: A brief play.
PUTIN: So, Donald, is it true, as they say on “The Wire”, that you are taking written notes on a criminal conspiracy?
DUMP: Nah, just got some film crew here that wants to show me being awesome.
PUTIN: (hangs up)
jnfr
Pelican Brief, one of my favorite movies.
This year not one of my favorite anythings.
trollhattan
@germy shoemangler: When broadcast switched to digitial hi-def it killed a LOT of teevee careers because the old “smoothing” effect of 525 lines interlaced was suddenly gone, revealing every pore and line.
Makeup and digital image processing have softened the effect considerably, since then. Your Trumps and Giulianis are doubtless even scarier in person–something horrifying to ponder.
Baud
@JPL:
Yes, Thomas gave us the opening.
Baud
@Geminid:
Do you think his not pushing for a complete ban will piss off his base?
trollhattan
@JPL: Interesting–leopard not changing all her spots. I presume the neocon bonafides are all intact, dear old dad and all.
Elizabelle
@The Moar You Know: You got me to laugh. Thank you.
Steeplejack
Succinct and sobering:
jnfr
@Betty Cracker:
I had to mute her. Though I appreciated Jansing pointing out that Americans actually support Roe.
MisterDancer
@Baud: Nope. Base only cares if you yank back the football. Otherwise, they’ve been playing the incremental gains game for far too long to give it up now.
Baud
@MisterDancer:
It’s the smart play, but they are so nuts now.
germy shoemangler
Baud
@jnfr:
Americans support a lot of things up to the point where they have to vote for Dems to obtain them. We’ll see how this plays out.
Chief Oshkosh
@gvg:
It sure as fuck didn’t get through those thick skulls when all their rural hospitals shutdown because their redstate rulers wouldn’t allow Medicare Expansion and in other ways limited ACA opportunities.
janesays
@JPL: It’s a pretty tame bill. McConnell fucking voted for it.
To be clear – it’s good that it passed. But I don’t think the word “groundbreaking” could be applied to it.
MisterDancer
@Baud: All Jerk-kin has to say is that he couldn’t get even 15 weeks past the extremist Democrats in the VA State Senate.
trollhattan
California acts.
States rights.
Baud
@MisterDancer:
Hopefully, that’s all the Dems have to say too.
The Moar You Know
@Timurid: in the interests of High Broderism, pure bothsiderism, you neglect to point out that if that Justice were liberal, there would be no bipartisan consensus at all and the right would instantly demand to have a conservative justice appointed.
Betty Cracker
@TheTruffle: I keep hearing this red-blue state split idea, but no one ever explains how it would work. Blue city-states surrounded by red hinterlands? Forcible partitioning, e.g., red counties in CA, OR, WA annexed to Idaho? Not trying to pick on you; I just wish someone who brings this up would show their work…
Elizabelle
@Timurid: Oh bullshit.
Steeplejack
@Percysowner:
I thought The Pelican Brief (1993) was pretty good, although I haven’t seen it in years. Good cast—Julia Roberts, Denzel Washington, Sam Shepard, John Heard—and written (from a John Grisham novel) and directed by Alan J. Pakula. Nice bookend to his earlier movie The Parallax View.
About that cast: holy shnikeys, what a pedigreed list of actors in supporting roles—Tony Goldwyn, James B. Sikking, William Atherton, Robert Culp, Stanley Tucci, Hume Cronyn, John Lithgow, Cynthia Nixon.
Tony Jay
@Betty Cracker:
It’s easy.
First, erect a National mezzanine level…
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
Just gave to the combined Abortion fund at ActBlue. As something I can do while I rage…https://secure.actblue.com/donate/supportabortionfunds?refcode=nnafwebsite
Geminid
@Baud: Youngkin is concerned with what the political climate in the national Republican party will be in 2028. I don’t think this will hurt him then. He’s a slick guy who will find a way to make it sound good.
Right now, in 2022, the bible thumpers in Virginia may not like this half measure, but Democrats have crushed them for a decade and I think they will settle for half a loaf, which they won’t get anyway because Louise Lucas and the other Democratic Senators will drop kick this legislation into the Dismal Swamp.
Irishweaver
@germy shoemangler: I remember her too. Great move for her!
The Moar You Know
@Timurid: Congress gave them that power by doing nothing. Congress can take that power back by legislating. If at any point a Dem Congress and President had taken up and passed an abortion legalization law, as people were demanding that they do back in the 1960s, the Supreme Court wouldn’t have a fucking thing to say about it.
D
The spousal unit says now that we’re reverting to the 18th century wrt women’s rights, he’s looking forward to taking control of my life’s savings. He wants a pimped out new pickup. He should sleep with one eye open
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: The idea is patently ridiculous. And those advocating for it are not serious people
One only has to look at Ireland and India in how helpful partition has been in solving contentious problems
JPL
@EmbraceYourInnerCrone: I gave to Warnock. Endangered Senators are your best bet. Roe is gone but gay marriage and birth control aren’t. Mitch can’t have the reins of the Senate again. He’s already done immense damage.
Okay why not both
JoyceH
@trollhattan:
This is a job for journalists. Not law enforcement, because it’s essentially a fishing expedition. But some hungry young investigator yearning to become a household name, the 21st century Woodstein and Bernward.
We all have dark suspicions. What DID cause Justice Kennedy to retire? Who DID pay Kavanaugh’s really extensive debts? Find out, and find the evidence. Find out about Kavanaugh’s other issues, particularly abuse of women. Guys who abuse women don’t tend to just stop. There are other victims out there, probably a lot more recent than the ones we know about.
Then do Barrett, then do Gorsuch. Start with one premise, proved over and over for five years. Every Trump appointee, every one of them, has something deeply wrong with them. They are corrupt or crazy or incompetent or some combination of the three. Find out what it is, get the details, and prove it.
Then do Thomas. Not a Trump appointee, but guy’s going crazy. You don’t put in a SC opinion ‘and hey, let’s overturn these other things too’ – you just don’t.
Thomas and his wife should also be investigated by the House, if not the Justice Department. They’re so far down the rabbit hole, they’ve forgotten what sunlight looks like.
Immanentize
In this country, we all seem to be mentally preparing/have been prepped for an age of assassination rather than an age of activism. It’s in the language. It is of revenge and murders and shootings. It’s in our stand your ground laws, etc. One of my colleagues (ex volunteer fireman) in Texas was tiresome about fires — the three legs necessary for the stool of fire, he would intone (frequently) -+ fuel, oxygen and ignition. It seems the Court has supplied all three this week alone.
I will work on the age of activism, but expect fire.
Starfish
@Dorothy A. Winsor: They already have some of the highest malpractice insurance.
Anyway
@The Moar You Know:
Supremes under Roberts gutted VRA a year after 90+ senators voted to reauthorize it.
Sister Golden Bear
@Alison Rose : The sanctity of life is only between conception and birth, doncha know.
Layer8Problem
@The Moar You Know: “A brief play.”
Well played!
jnfr
@Baud:
Always. Alas.
Anyway
@JoyceH:
Kavanaugh’s debts were paid by his wealthy (well-off) parents.
JPL
@jnfr: I think they want to control your birth control is a winning issue.
I think they want you to carry your rapist child is a winning issue.
I think that Thomas wants to marry the one he loves but prevent gays from doing the same is not a bad issue.
we can do this.
Immanentize
@Anyway: why do you believe what you just wrote is a true fact?
gene108
@p.a.:
Not enough Americans pay attention for people to realize what’s at stake this November, and which side wants to move America forward and which wants to take us back to the 19th century. Most people really do not appreciate how much the conservatives want to undo the major Supreme Court decisions that have been pissing off conservatives ever since Brown v. Board of Education.
Once they undo all the decisions favorable to liberals from Brown onwards, they are going to set their sights on decisions from the 1930’s and 1940’s that enabled the New Deal, labor unions, minimum wage, etc.
Too many people take too much for granted to have the necessary level of urgency needed for this moment to effectively pushback.
@Betty Cracker:
I think there are two lessons.
The first is a narrowly focused determined
minority can impose its will on the less focused majority. Communist revolutions throughout the 20th century bear this out, starting with the 1917 October Revolution in Russia. This focus enabled and emboldened Republicans to shred norms to get them here from Orrin Hatch holding up Republican judicial nominations under President Clinton, to Republicans taking it to a far more extreme level under President Obama, to finally denying President Obama his Constitutional right to appoint Scalia’s successor.
Second, they’ve had 68 years of major failures starting with Brown that they are trying to undo all of them in a hurry. They have an unpopular agenda that will cause enough suffering that people will want to undo what they’ve done.
I just hope our side can become as singularly focused on a few issues, like conservatives have become and maintain that focus for decades to not only undo the damage the Roberts Court has done, but to make sure it never happens again.
Starfish
@JPL: They can because their careers are likely over. Meijer is also a wealthy person who does not have to hold onto this job.
sab
@dlwchico: Laugh out loud. I used to have one and threw it away because rarely used it. Those were innocent times.
Antonius
@J.: Here’s hoping.
Damned at Random
@Elizabelle:
I read his diary from Germany during the ’30’s, but it was years ago. I remember the feeling of dread, but not enough specifics.
Maybe time for a reread
JoyceH
@Anyway:
So they say. Did we see the receipts? Remember when Loudermilk said with great emphasis that no-way no-how did he give any tours of the Capitol? Claiming is easy. Denying is easy. I want proof.
MomSense
@Tony Jay:
That made me laugh – which is hard to do today.
The Moar You Know
@Betty Cracker: I’ll pick on ’em. It is utterly unworkable. Take the West Coast. You have a blue line from San Diego to Vancouver that is 1400 miles long and about twenty miles wide, plus Portland. Cannot be defended by force. Add to that, liberals won’t even arm themselves.
I won’t even get into the sheer idiocy that would impel a commenter here to demand that we place nukes along that border. Pop one off to keep out the rabble. Now what? You’ve still got 1400 miles of border to defend.
And speaking of nukes, I’ll ask the “split” contingent this: who gets them? They are the property of the federal government, not the states.
jnfr
@EmbraceYourInnerCrone:
Thanks for that link.
trollhattan
@JoyceH: ”Clarence, a nice young man named Farrow wants to interview us!”
gene108
@Timurid:
The current SCOTUS has access to unlimited funds via conservative donor networks, and patronage.
Second, because Republicans no longer are capable of actually governing and obstructing anyone that tried to we can no longer pass the laws needed to make changes. We are stuck with the Courts being the only branch of government able to make decisions.
Anyway
@Immanentize:
I saw it on the Internet! Srsly, I can’t remember where but read that his family is well-off and they paid his debts around the time he was nominated. I too was looking into conspiracy theories about this.
SiubhanDuinne
@JoyceH:
Yup. And … What was it, exactly, that TFG said to Kennedy to make him stop dead in his tracks with an expression of pure shock and horror? I’ll never not wonder about that moment.
Martin
So, I think Adam, if he feels qualified to answer this, should write a post on the triggers for and rise of political violence, because my family is asking once again if we should get a gun, and I’m running a little low on answers in opposition to it.
They feel that violence is coming.
sab
@Elizabelle: My mom got pregnant at age 40, pre Row, and never forgave the resulting child, who never knew what hit her.
Mom was Republican, and passionate about Planned Parenthood.
The unexpected child has long been my favorite sister.
Immanentize
@sab: I have two! You can have one of mine.
The Moar You Know
@Anyway: It was not signed into law. I’m not even sure it was passed by the House. Again, had it been signed into law, the Supreme Court loses their jurisdiction over it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Timurid:
Jesus, been so long since I grishamed I totally missed the reference
JPL
@The Moar You Know: California is large enough to be a nation.
The northeast corridor is also large enough to be a nation.
The rest of us are in trouble, just sayin
germy shoemangler
@Anyway:
And family donations don’t have to be reported, apparently.
I think he wanted it kept quiet because it makes him look like a ne’er-do-well; a grown man who still needs to be bailed out by his rich parents many years after his teens.
I’d LOVE for a different story to be revealed, that he was bailed out by donors looking for influence on the court, a story controversial enough to lead to his impeachment, but I think his parents were the ones who rescued him. They’re rich as hell.
sab
@Immanentize: I am older than you. I remember the 1960s.
MomSense
@J.:
Well the meteors sure haven’t panned out.
cain
@JPL: Gay marriage is on the table that means all existing relationships could be terminated in red states – or if you are a couple going from one state to another could be jailed.
It’s states rights unless it is guns.
Villago Delenda Est
The medievalists of the Federalist Society need to be removed from public life in this country. Let them practice their anti-Enlightenment ways outside the government, in their own homes.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Anyway:
As an Ockham’s Razorist, I’m gonna go with this until I see some evidence. And Kennedy retired cause he’s an old Right Winger who wanted Mitch McConnell and Leo Whosits of the Federalist Society to pick his replacement.
persistentillusion
@Immanentize: Imm, John Paul Stevens was indeed a wonderful person. His niece was my BBF when I was much younger and my family rented his vacation home several summers. Nice nice man. Weak backhand playing tennis though.
Damned at Random
@cain: Or they can leave gay marriage and overturn Lawrence. Gays can marry, but none of their yucky sex.
JPL
@sab: In some ways this ruling is worse than it was in the sixties. In the sixties, doctors would ask if you were Catholic, if they could save the mother. You had to sign a document stating that you wanted the mother to survive. Now they just listen for a baby heartbeat, not the mothers.
sab
Interesting that these nutcase rightwing Catholics have devoted their whole lives to dismantling the protections that let them exist. Our Founding Fathers hated Catholics. Freedom of religion, but that was Episcopalian, Congregational ( UCC) and Quakers.
ETA I am married to a Catholic. My mom hated Catholics as much as the next guy, even though her grandparents were Catholics from Ireland. Of course, those Catholics from Ireland hated their Protestant in-laws from Scotland and Canada. America is such a welcoming place.
TheTruffle
@Betty Cracker: There were people talking about Blexit years ago. Or making California its own country. I’m guessing the people behind it see it this way: The coastal areas become their own countries and Flyover Country becomes its own country. Who knows? Red America wants it. That is for sure.
Wyatt Salamanca
@Tom Levenson:
It’s not hyperbole at all. Based on Trump’s mishandling of COVID alone, his presidency was a crime against humanity. Electing Trump in 2024 would be a greater crime against humanity because if he gets back in, he’ll make certain to only hire people who are 100% loyal and will carry out every order he gives them without question.
Tony Jay
@MomSense:
That’s basically what I’m here for. 8-)
JPL
@cain: When that happens, I do think it’s time to divide into separate nations.
Comment 125 I explained how it could work.
What is interesting is that most of the country has no idea how much those states support our government.
Chris Johnson
@germy shoemangler:
No shit he was. I continue to think very poorly of the HUGELY extensive efforts by Russia, using known and predictable techniques, to overthrow, co-opt, or break up our country. None of this would be happening if not for them, they’ve been in the thick of it all this time.
And their goal is NEVER to give Republicans power, their goal is to give us civil war and break us. They are just using the Republicans (and bernieorbusters) to do it. None of it is ever about making our wingnuts actually powerful. They are sacrificial terrorists.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@gene108:
We have agency. We can work to change that perception. It’s not set in stone
TerryTime
@TheTruffle: Blexit was the Russians
Joe Falco
@TheTruffle:
Red America doesn’t want it. They don’t want a piece. They want the whole country, and they’re closer to getting it than ever before. 2020 was a temporary setback, but unless there’s a sustained effort to beat them back every election from now on, they will keep trying to seize every level of government and get their permanent control that’s immune to any democratic effort.
sab
@TheTruffle: Coastal California hasn’t much water. Just saying.
Martin
Did the court strike down Marbury when I wasn’t looking?
glc
@Anyway:
One reference to the state of knowledge: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/09/heres-the-truth-about-brett-kavanaughs-finances/
Geminid
@Starfish: Meijar certainly will land on his feet. I think he would like to keep his current job, though. Last I saw he had a good lead on his primary challenger, so Meijar may be looking towards his rematch with Democrat Hilary Scholten in the fall. That is one of the more flippable Republican seats this cycle, I think.
Mike in NC
After Obama was elected president, Mitch McConnell pledged to derail his agenda and make him a one-termer. In 2010 the Republicans motivated their racist base of evangelical “Christians” to turn out and vote and we’ve been paying ever since. In 2016 we got a couple of far-right wing extremists in Trump and Pence. (Pence refused to answer when asked if homosexuals should be imprisoned.)
Today we’re just a little bit closer to the 1950s vision that the GOP has wanted for decades: a country owned and operated by and for straight white men. Anybody else is officially a second-class citizen.
TheTruffle
@JPL: I didn’t see this coming. So not all Republicans are good Germans.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@TheTruffle: Cheney and Kinzinger, her especially, are both the kind of Republican who has always despised their own base (trump does too, if for different reasons). They don’t have to pretend anymore.
Thinking about it, my impression is Kinzinger is more a roll-your-eyes-at-your-crazy-uncle (but hold on to his vote!) type. Cheney probably makes Selena Meyer look like Fiorello LaGuardia when she gets back in the car after campaigning amongst the Unwashed.
sab
@JPL: I agree. In the 1960s nobody much noticed. We had a local doctor ( Jewish) who did quiet abortions for decades before he realized nobody else was doing them, so he stopped. About two years before Roe. He only did abortions for married women. Rich girls went to Japan.
trollhattan
@sab: My water nerd self will simply note that Coastal California is served by the State Water Project, which gets its supply from the Feather River Watershed, tucked away in the red portion of California so in a real sense not severable. Dreams of chunking up the west into smaller bits have floated around since the 19th century to no avail.
Households with no landscaping require scant amounts of water. Ag is where water is used here.
cain
This has been truly a SHIT day:
It’s just been a shit fucking day. Hug your kitties and fur babies.
James E Powell
@germy shoemangler:
I dated a local news anchorwoman. It was amazing how strange the on-air makeup looked in person. And how different she looked without it. I’ve been told by people working in moves/TV that this is true of everyone we see on our screens.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@sab: Joan Rivers, from Larchmont and (IIRC) Barnard, used to do jokes about girls going to stay with their aunt, or take a last minute vacation to Puerto Rico. Everybody knew what that meant.
Matt McIrvin
@Martin: They should ask themselves what purpose the gun will serve, and what they’d plan to do with it if they had one.
I’m never going to own a gun, and it’s because I know exactly what thoughts go through my head when I think about political violence and guns. They are thoughts that mean I should not have a gun.
JPL
@sab: The Romper Room lady was the person who changed the way folks looked at abortion.
Geminid
@TheTruffle: These really are modest measures with broad public support, even among a majority of gun owners I think. Cheney probably won’t lose anyone in Wyoming who wasn’t already going to vote against her. She has an uphill battle though.
germy shoemangler
@James E Powell:
Yes, I remember seeing a trailer for a Katy Perry documentary. A bunch of quick shots of her looking like a star, just ravishing and gorgeous. And then there was a quick cut of a rather ordinary girl staring quietly. I didn’t recognize her. I thought maybe it was the president of Katy’s fan club or something. Just a plain but nice girl. No. It was just a brief shot of Katy without makeup.
Martin
Ok, can we please for the love of god stop the secession talk?
The only way a state leaves the country is via revolution, and I think Cole (rightly) banned that kind of talk a bit ago. If Texas wants to secede, they are welcome to try, and the US military will roll in and force them back, as was done a century and a half ago. If the people want to leave, they are always welcome to leave. Go cross the fucking border, learn Spanish, and don’t look back.
Plus, the despair is unwarranted in the long term. A truism of democratic nations is that laws are always trailing indicators of public opinion, and when they are not then conflict results (hence my concern about political violence). You saw gay marriage bans overturned because the public got ahead of the courts. The public wanted them overturned, and then a bit later the courts or legislature agreed. Pot laws are in that category now, it’s just that the feds haven’t caught up yet.
The gun ruling, the abortion ruling, and a bunch of other are running counter to public opinion. That’s dangerous in a ‘democracies are self-determinative by the citizenry’ sense, but they don’t portend a darker future. They are desperate attempts to claw back public opinion that are guaranteed to fail. The public will push back. The issue is how. Does the public view the existing institutional mechanism for protest, election of lawmakers, and so on as functional and valid, or not. Jan 6 was an example of the ‘not’.
I think we’re seeing a series of voter turnout wins for Democrats, and in time that may be enough to right the ship. But really what we have are two factions of the public viewing different parts of the institutions of the country as being foundationally corrupt.
Put another way, don’t leave, fight.
JPL
@cain: This sounds cruel, but some days there aren’t enough hugs to go around.
It’s awful. It’s not just this right, but all rights that assumed to be part of the equal rights amendment.
Thomas pretty much defined that amendment meant him and Ginni. Tough to be the rest of you.
The Moar You Know
@JPL: How do we defend California? Hell, 90-plus percent of California’s land area is more blood red than anywhere in the Deep South. Again: how do we defend that? Keep the red rabble from just walking in here with their AR15s and just taking all our shit and setting up shop here? Can’t be done. We have the Sierras as a land border at the top of the state, but SoCal is wide open for hundreds of miles. Anyone with a decent truck can get in here. We can’t stop that even at the southern border of our state, only 120 or so miles. Couldn’t do it even with the full night of the Feds. How are we supposed to do it for 800 miles?
Damned at Random
Running afoul of the moderators today. I don’t feel like this is a day for moderation
germy shoemangler
@Martin:
We’d have a refugee crisis, for sure.
Feathers
@The Moar You Know: The reauthorization was voted on in 2006 and signed by Bush. This extended the pre-clearances for another 25 years. The lawsuits started the year after that. Don’t know what you mean by unsigned. Was there something in 2012 that I’m missing?
This is a rogue and corrupt court. It is just making up sht to justify the unconstitutional rulings it wants to make. Pretending that passing new laws will affect the situation is charming, but I don’t see how it will move things forward. I support the passage of these laws, but understand why that isn’t the direction others want to take.
Betty Cracker
@Damned at Random: It shouldn’t happen more than once when you first post, but the blog has been squirrely.
James E Powell
@Baud:
Agree. And I don’t want to be doom posting, but I do not expect this to be a major factor in the midterms with one reservation. It might make it easier for Ds to hold the senate, which is no small thing.
Martin
@Matt McIrvin: They’re worried about political violence from the right. So they see it as deterrence.
Some of that is projection of their own anger and recognition that if gun owners feel as angry as they do, that political violence seems likely.
frosty
@Betty Cracker: Or in my little borough: Republicans in one neighborhood, Democrats in another (much smaller) one. On the side of the tracks with no running water or sewer, right? And unrepaired streets.
piratedan
well this news certainly has kicked the fact that the House currently holds at least six seditionists currently in place in our government.
I kind of feel like the GOP has “won” this round and the costs are going to be high in human misery, yet, I also kind of feel like all of this shit, rescinding human rights, and plainly speaking that they hope to go after more, plus the attempted overthrow of the government and who knows how far those tendrils reach (i.e. was 2016 legit?).
I know that most of the Dems can walk and chew gum at the time and I wonder if the GOP is aware that they have awakened a fearsome and terrible giant.
Damned at Random
@JPL:
They want your daughter to carry her rapist’s child is a winning message
NotMax
Don’t just get angry, get busy.
trollhattan
@The Moar You Know: I probably played too much RISK! as a kid but you form a pact with Nevada and Oregon then your only border is that little bit of Arizona, plus the ocean and Mexico and that’s already handled.
Anyhoo, it’s just stoopid talk but was a popular topic back when we were dealing with Bundys stealing public things by calling it theirs while brandishing guns.
sab
@sab: My sister was born in Florida. If Mom had been pregant in Ohio Dr Sedar would have taken care of it.
It has always made me iffy on abortion. My Mom was furious. On the other hand she sent us all off to boarding school, some of them horrible. Mine was. But my youngest sister is the best of us. Her being aborted is shocking to even think about.
livewyre
There’s a definite parallel between the Republican Party and the Russian government on this. Sounds obvious, but I mean not just in terms of sentiment, but strategy.
Brazenness has a lot going for it, or seems to. It’s easy – just don’t flinch. Double down. Fake it ’til you make it. Act like you’ve already won. Feign inevitability. It’s surprisingly effective and scary as hell – but fragile.
Like the gerrymander, it’s overwhelming until it breaks. I seem to remember some Soviet general catching heat for ordering a ‘dialectical advance’ to the rear. The effects are real, but the advantage is a mirage. In the big picture it wins only by sapping morale. It can’t even sustain itself without extracting from everything around it.
So, in the face of this heavy blow, we have to choose. Do we take it as spoken that our rights don’t exist? Do we rely on being told what we’re allowed to do with ourselves? Or are we ready to decide that facts and law are tools that the rest of us can carry?
Feathers
@James E Powell: Worked at a shop where a big time movie cinematographer was one of our customers. Something he said that stuck with me was that movie stars were rarely the “pretty” sister in their families. Being photogenic is all about bone structure, which isn’t nearly as important when meeting someone in person.
gene108
@JoyceH:
Kavanaugh’s dad is pretty damn rich. Dropping a couple million to keep his son in an acceptable lifestyle and not have to slum it is probably the most likely reason.
JPL
@The Moar You Know: California is supporting the government, and once that stops, the blood red area would pay less in taxes. You would have to pay money to Canada to support you in case of attack, but that is still less.
ha I’m just making this up as I go along.
I do know that the coastal areas support the government now, and should have a bigger say in what is happening.
It’s set up now to give the few more say, and we see the result today.
Matt McIrvin
@Martin: It seems to me as if even liberals who claimed to be pro-choice were much more apologetic about it back in the 90s (attitudes had moved right from the 70s). We’re paying for that now though it’s not true any more. There are these huge lags in the system.
PJ
@Martin: People seriously talking about secession are either high, despairing, malicious, or just plain stupid, or some combination thereof. Breaking up the US would only lead to more misery for the most vulnerable, and much, much, much more violence for everyone. And it would only give more power to Republicans, and you can be sure they would use it.
JPL
@Damned at Random: I think that they drop the abortion term and highlight the result.
It’s a winning message in any state.
jnfr
@cain:
Really sorry to hear that.
Betty Cracker
@Martin: I agree secession talk is pointless, but despairing about the long-term health of our democracy is NOT unwarranted. I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know, but the federal constitutional structure (and the constitutions in many states) has always put a thumb on the scale for rural interests.
Unfortunately the overrepresented states/counties are embracing a Chrsto-fascist outlook that is incompatible with democracy. They’re setting up to institute permanent minority rule, and I wouldn’t bet the house they won’t win. They’ve already captured an institution that can “legitimize” their tactics, and they’ve got half of one chamber, are making inroads into another and have a 50-50 chance of winning the presidency every four years.
Yes, we have to fight them every step of the way. I’m not going anywhere nor backing down a goddamn inch. But it’s also important to be realistic about the situation, and I think it’s accurate to say American democracy is on a knife’s edge.
Omnes Omnibus
@PJ: I will echo what I said in an earlier thread: Give people room to grieve and rage today. I am one of the first to jump on doomerism, but today is not the day. I am not going lecture people who just lost a fundamental right on how to react.
DougL
@Elizabelle: “Money always thinks it can control evil and stupid. It cannot.”
What a great line and oh so true. The wealthy are killing the goose that gave them all the golden eggs.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
America leaps forward in the 60s. 2060s will be when we get even.
Well, some of you. I’ll be long gone.
frosty
@The Moar You Know: I don’t get this. All they have to do is declare that the law is unconstitutional and it’s gone. What am I missing?
Madeleine
@MazeDancer: Thanks for the link. I donated.
sab
@schrodingers_cat:
@sab:
That’s the whole thing with abortion. At best it is a personal choice. At worst it is a medical emergency protecting the life and the fertility of the mother. I don’t see a place for the legislature in any of this.
The Moar You Know
@PJ: I try to say it nicer, but yes. It not only can’t be done, but would unleash hell and misery on everyone. California would be Ukraine, and the rest of the US Russia, except the whole thing would be a lot bloodier and would quickly escalate to nuclear weapons
The last “Calexit” movement, about ten years ago, was shown to have received some serious Russian funding. I look askance at anyone these days who even brings it up as an idea.
livewyre
@PJ: It’s kind of terrifying (but not entirely surprising) how easy it is to get others to chant, “build that wall!” There’s no chance this has gone unnoticed as a strategy.
JPL
@Omnes Omnibus: The hate the gays, the dirty water, the carry your dead fetus to term, might not be an one day issue for me.
frosty
@JPL: The goobers in the T of PA, upstate NY, and the Eastern Shore of MD aren’t going to go along with a new nation of the Northeast Corridor. This whole splitting discussion is bullshit.
PJ
@schrodingers_cat: Agree 100%. Every case is different, but partitioning just tends to mean underlying problems are ignored until they fester and explode. Conflict is inevitable in every society, and we have to actively work to make sure they resolve themselves in the best way (i.e. without violence and without sacrificing minority rights.)
The Truffle
@frosty: Offer them money to relocate. Do the same for people in red states who want to leave.
Feathers
@sab: When abortion was illegal in Germany, they would stop young women at the border and haul them to a gynecologist for a pelvic exam to make sure they hadn’t had an abortion on their vacation.
Does anyone think red state police will pass up this opportunity to harass women? This is why abortion and birth control fall under the unreasonable search and seizure clauses. Because the law can’t be enforced without extreme invasions of privacy. But the Christian Nationalists want the right to intrude into people’s bodies and bedrooms more than they actually are interested in ended abortion and birth control.
Martin
So, I will draw everyone’s attention to California SB24 that requires UC and CSU campuses to provide chemical abortion services for free to students.
Anyone with a child or grandchild considering where to go to college, CA is open and we’re looking out for your daughters and granddaughters. By law. And that’s not lip service by the state. UCSF is driving this, and they basically lead the nation on this stuff – by a LOT.
jnfr
@JPL:
Canada has plenty of red, rural areas as well.
Omnes Omnibus
@JPL: It shouldn’t be a one day issue. But I am not going to “Well, actually….” the people who are rage posting today. That’s all I am saying.
Immanentize
Neal Katyal in a jackass. That is my comment. I know I’m in trouble when I come here to calm down.
PJ
@frosty:
40% of New York State voted for Trump, as did 40% of the voters in Delaware. Those fuckers aren’t going to decamp to the Confederate States of Southern Bumfuck. They’re going to see that their tactics worked on a national scale and will make sure they work on these stupid successor states.
The Truffle
@Baud: naaaah. It will be sooner. This will hopefully be like Prohibition and be scotched within a decade. Too much outrage against it.
O. Felix Culpa
@Geminid:
Channeling zg: MEIJER
Immanentize
@Betty Cracker: Yeah, I had a comment box squirrel episode earlier today, but that seems fixed. Thank you for deploying squirrel-rid.
Baud
Site briefly crashed.
Baud
@The Truffle:
Hopefully sooner. I worry that our side doesn’t have the patience for long term projects.
Martin
@Feathers: Right. The pandoras box this just opened is huge, and the hole the court just dug for itself is going to get a LOT bigger.
The simple question is: how do you enforce a complete abortion ban? How do you know a woman is pregnant and then not pregnant, unless you are creating registries of women menstrual cycles, mandating that school nurses report that information to the state, and so on. A policy obligates an enforcement mechanism, and a lot of the reasoning behind Griswold and Roe was that the enforcement mechanisms were odious.
States are going to test that, because they are now obligated to do so. How do the local police collect evidence to arrest a doctor or patient? That has to exist – the police are now *obligated* to do that to enforce state law.
USSC is going to have to field a shitton of new cases that they do not want to have to answer.
JPL
@Immanentize: ha Not going to judge since I thought listening to the chant fk you Alito, fk you Thomas, fk you Gorsuch, etc
over and over was calming.
Maybe not for me because I’m thinking that parts of the country should secede, and I live in GA
that’s where we are though
Martin
Digging the MSNBC producer energy split screening the ‘Fuck you Clarence Thomas’ sign against Kamala.
sab
I hear these guys on NPR/BBC young twenties, who might have been aborted. But the huge part they miss is the choice. Their mom could have aborted them but didn’t. What would their lives have been if mom didn’t have a choice. The offspring are all male, so lacking imagination.
trollhattan
@The Truffle: Would certainly put a different twist on the term speakeasy.
Geminid
@O. Felix Culpa: Bring on the pedant hoards! I can bare it.
PJ
@Elizabelle:re sheep/wolf:
https://www.newyorker.com/cartoon/a20072
“He tells it like it is.”
JPL
@sab: Well next week they learn that clean air, and water is not a right either. They might change their minds.
O. Felix Culpa
@Immanentize:
LOL.
And agreed about Katyal.
The Truffle
@Baud: maybe it has more patience than people think. See Georgia and Texas. Just someone please tell me the dog caught the car and the GOP finally overreached and a backlash is on the way.
Martin
@PJ: Sometimes I wonder how many of the people who voted for Hitler to be chancellor survived to the start of WWII, and how many survived to the end.
JPL
@The Truffle: In GA we need to keep Warnock, and I hope he has an ad out saying they want you to carry your rapist child.
Later he needs to mention protecting a women’s right to confer with her doctor about birth control.
stinger
@SiubhanDuinne:
Same here. I’m surprised that someone skilled in lip-reading hasn’t analyzed the video.
Feathers
@Martin: And Romania had workplaces keeping track of female employees menstrual cycles.
Just think of the electronic records that could be seized to find out if someone had been pregnant. Internet searches, phone location information, email, text messages, credit card records for purchases (did they stop buying tampons?), the list goes on. And it will all become public records, following women for the rest of their lives.
It’s going to get very ugly. This is what all the guns for everyone laws, police don’t have to care about your stinking rights, and elections don’t count if conservatives don’t like the outcomes shenanigans have been leading up to.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Apparently The Plan is to duck that with the bounty laws like in Texas, but that still gets back to selective enforcement and turning the law into joke like with the drug laws.
Raoul Paste
@Geminid: LOL
Baud
@The Truffle:
We’ll find out. I don’t put it past us to talk ourselves out of a backlash though.
O. Felix Culpa
@Geminid:
We pedants are here to serve. ;)
HeleninEire
The irony of American women having to go to Ireland to get an abortion is frying my brain. WTF.
Martin
@The Truffle: Dem turnout ticked up in 2018 and 2020. I think electing Trump was the overreach. The GOP has lost nationally ever since. They’re only succeeding through regional strategies – places where representation is disproportionate like the Senate, state legislatures, etc. That’s really what this ruling reinforces. In CA it has only served to put more protections on abortion.
It’s an effective strategy short-term, but it’ll fail long-term. In time, the majority view will prevail. That doesn’t make the short-term any easier.
The Moar You Know
@Martin: hey, I’m always in the camp of urging liberals to arm up, and I’ve trained quite a few in how to shoot, but having one in the house means that you do have to acknowledge a few things:
There’s a lot more to it, but those are the biggies. I wish you and yours luck, and hopefully we can all avoid the need for a gun, but I have a bad feeling that’s just not in the cards anymore.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: with your permission….
JPL
@HeleninEire: Unlike Susan Collins, Ireland did learn their lesson when females were dying in order to save a dead fetus.
Skepticat
I know perfectly well it will make no difference, but I needed to vent. I emailed “my” senator, Collins, only “Women now will reap what you have sown.” I’m getting my Bluetooth and phone and will take a walk on a beautiful day turned bleak and painful.
raven
@The Moar You Know: You’re talking about having a gun for home defense. Mine are not for that, I have the ammo and weapons separated and the guns locked. I have them in case the shit comes down.
Leto
Why in the absolute fuck does MSNBC have on at this minute the President of the Susan B Anthony list; literal wtf. JFC.
frosty
@The Truffle: Haha that’s not how this works. They shoot me and take my stuff. No relocation needed.
Martin
@The Moar You Know: Yeah, I understand all of that. I’m much more inclined to do the training but not own the gun for the reasons you state. If shit goes down, I’m pretty confident I know how to ‘find’ a gun pretty quickly.
Part of this too is that I’m actively considering a second ‘career’ as an election volunteer so they’re worried about that drawing attention to us.
SiubhanDuinne
@JPL:
Sherri Finkbine and thalidomide. I remember it vividly (had forgotten that she was a Romper Room hostess, though).
JPL
this is good
Patagonia told employees this morning that it’ll bail out workers arrested at abortion protests. The benefit covers full- and part-time staff who “peacefully protest for reproductive justice.”
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Martin: It was a One Man, One Vote system and that One Man was Hindenburg, who died soon after.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_von_Papen#Bringing_Hitler_to_power
Elizabelle
I hope that these conservative “Justices” — and Anthony Kennedy — do not have another day of peace in their lives. I hope they are scorned. Booed in restaurants.
They already live in a bubble. I hope they are the objects of derision every time they step out of it.
I hope their families start whining about what a hell their life has become. I hope their neighbors treat them glacially.
They will deserve it all.
Baud
I would like to see “Death by Alito” become a thing for women who are killed.
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
I’ll be here, but I’ll be in my 120s.
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
As you should be.
JPL
@Elizabelle: Many decades ago, a neighbor and I walked every day. She lost a baby at birth due to several genetic defects and was never allowed to see that baby. She decided to have another child but only with sonograms and the right to abort.
OMG she had more sonograms than a dozen moms, but did deliver a healthy baby. That baby would not be here with the overturn of Roe. It was only because she could abort if the baby could not survive outside the womb that she decided to try.
When my little one and I ran across the street to congrat the dad, he was thrilled because the baby had ten fingers and toes. My little one was confused, but that told me the importance of Roe. It’s not just used for birth control.
Elizabelle
@PJ: Great cartoon. Thank you.
Central Planning
@James E Powell: They also say that about a camera adding 10 pounds. And then the joke: How many cameras are on you??!?
ksmiami
@Timurid: Eh the Supreme Court has de-legitimized itself… Now backlash time.
hilts
@Immanentize:
Can you cite some evidence for this assertion?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@JPL: Dick’s Sporting Goods is offering $4K to employees who need to travel
I’m not a 100% convinced of the cause and effect there, but I need some new shoes and I just decided where I’m shopping
gene108
@Baud:
I look at healthcare and see almost every successive Democratic President from FDR has tried to make healthcare more affordable and more accessible. There are a lot of failures, but Democrats keep working on this issue.
I think this perseverance can extend to other issues, but there will be set backs and half-measures that’d be better than nothing.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Huh, post about Weimar Germany gets one into moderation heck. I bet the naughty word is H*nd*nb*rgh
Gets one’s post deleted too, Jesus fucking Christ.
raven
@Martin: My buddy in Berkeley bought a 12 gauge and he’s having a hell of a time getting ammo.
Baud
@gene108:
Yes, when Dems control the government, things move forward. But how often does that occur in recent history? Solving abortion is easy. We could do it today, but we’re two backstabbing Senators short.
JPL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It sounds like if you need health care out of state, they will pay. Maybe the Mayo clinic, maybe MD Anderson, or whatever. It’s open enough that you don’t have to say I need an abortion.
It was a good letter.
The Moar You Know
@raven: I have the same setup, but if you’re gonna have them in the house and you’ve never owned one before, you gotta do the basics first.
Steeplejack
@Betty Cracker:
It’s complete bullshit, and it drives me nuts. You can take the bluest state in the Union—California, New York?—and there are still huge areas of deep red MAGAts. And the deep red states all have their blue islands. “Partition” or whatever is not the answer. It’s an “I don’t want to deal with this problem” pipe dream.
raven
@The Moar You Know: Roger that.
JPL
btw They are going to outlaw the IUD soon, so I will admit that I used one. I’m not sure how many cells were lost to that fact.
kalakal
@schrodingers_cat: Couldn’t agree more.
My knowledge of partition in India is second hand but I can assure anyone from personal experience* that the partition of Ireland** has not created universal sweetness and light
* I was once evacuated from a building shortly before it was bombed.
** Thanks to the idiocy that is Brexit Ireland will probably be reunited very soon
VOR
No, further. I contend they want to go back before the Enlightenment. A Theocracy. Maybe Feudalism w/TFG as King. Or at least, restrict voting to only white male landowners. No more of this “all men are created equal” stuff.
MisterDancer
So, this is fascinating given the Conservative manufactured backlash around kid stuff:
I think — and I insist it’s just my gut — the difference this time is that there’s just no “deep” social appetite for these rollbacks [ETA: on top of, yes, the decades of Abortion rights, and 50-10 years of the other rights under threat]. That makes it different than, say, what I understand what occurred during the Wiemar Republic era, or the run-up to Jim Crow, to take examples of some culturals I have done/am doing some reading on.
I don’t know how it impacts the moment, yet I think there’s something here that’s worth considering when we talk about a march to an authoritarian system in America.
gene108
@Feathers:
A solution would be to limit the information Google, Facebook, etc. can sell, but I doubt Congressional leadership in either party really understands computers. They are old.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@VOR: Oh, yes, Alto telegraph that with him quoting Witch Hunter General Sir Matthew Hale.
NotMax
‘@JPL
Admit to being initially confoozled about what an area in an entire different hemisphere has to do with it. Google to the rescue; another in a long, long line of brands of which possess no inkling.
SiubhanDuinne
@stinger:
Not sure anyone but a lip-reader with X-ray vision could do that. IIRC, both men’s backs were to the camera. Then they turned a corner and you could see that Kennedy was aghast at whatever TFG had just said. But I live in hope that somebody, somewhere, has a pretty good idea of the exchange, and will leak it.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Yes, Emancipation was imposed on the South by the victorious North and democracy was imposed on Germany by the Allies after WWI, Both cases the reactionaries saw themselves as the resistance.
The Thin Black Duke
Thing is, if the GOP manages to overthrow the government, what’s left of the USA will go to shit not long afterwards because They Don’t Know How To Fix Things. What happens during the next pandemic? Or when the power grid goes down? Or when there’s a supply chain issue? Republicans won’t know what the fuck to do because they will surround themselves with idiots who will have no idea how anything works. It’ll be the sequel to the Dark Ages, except not as long since the repucussions of climate change will kill everyone by then.
Elizabelle
@DougL: It’s just so apparent, in all the books about the rise of Hitler. The powers that be thought he was controllable.
MisterDancer
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Plus you had a load of links. I pulled you out, though,
TheTruffle
“Codify Roe” should be part of every Dem’s campaign slogan.
stinger
@SiubhanDuinne:
https://twitter.com/eleven_films/status/1049449309790322688?lang=en
I don’t know, I feel like some of this could be analyzed. Caveat: IANALR!
brendancalling
We will need to set up a network of safe houses and tradnportation for traveling women in need of an abortion.
Don’t mourn, organize.
JPL
@TheTruffle: I actually think that legislators rather than doctors want to decide what birth control you use is powerful.
Also they want your daughter to carry her rapist’s child.
Immanentize
@hilts: I certainly can cite lots of evidence and many ways and reasons that Neal Katyal is a jackass. Thanks for asking!
jnfr
@Betty Cracker:
/wild applause!
Feathers
‘@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I’m very curious as to what is going on in c-suites today with Thomas signaling the end of legal birth control and gay marriage/relationships. Is it worth the low taxes? How does the everybody can have all the guns, all the time, everywhere (except near the homes of Supreme Court Justices) fit into all of this?
These bounty laws are specifically designed to not only give church ladies of all genders a secret thrill, but to wreck havoc in corporate HR departments. What happens when somebody in HR starts dropping dimes on employees who have traveled to have abortions? What will you do about the outrage and boycotts when that happens? Oh, that’s right. The Supreme Court just ruled that boycotts are economic activity, not protected free speech. Convenient to drop that on just before killing Roe, eh?
Much of corporate America would go along with the Nationalists just fine. But the Nationalists had to promise their base the end of Roe, birth control, and gay marriage to get to this point. What happens now?
StringOnAStick
@Martin: Thank you for this. I see a “Move the Oregon Border” sign every time I drive north from my blue central Oregon city, right next to a “VOTE REPUBLICAN!” sign. Both sentiments show a shocking lack of understanding how things work, The funny thing is their proposed map excludes my town (too blue), the one with the most money and the most dynamic economy in all of Central Oregon.
Martin
@raven: I’d be inclined toward a KSG-25. I don’t believe in half-assing decisions. If I really feel like I need something, then I go all in. If that feels like it’s ‘too much’, then I must not need it, which is why I’m still in the ‘no, we don’t need one’ category.
Ammo wouldn’t be a problem. If I ‘need’ it, then money can solve it. I spent $12K on a solar system because I believe that climate change is an existential threat. If I really thought I needed a gun, then $12K wouldn’t be a problem to get one and some ammo. You look for bargains on the things you want, not the things you need.
gene108
@The Thin Black Duke:
Like the Dark Ages, they will look for minorities to persecute as the reason for their problems.
debbie
@Leto:
I hear one more smug right-to-lifer, national, state, or local, on my radio and I am hunting him/her down and ripping his/her face off.
debbie
@JPL:
Hell, JPMorgan announced they’d help employees who had to travel to another state for an abortion.
MisterDancer
@brendancalling: There’s already such networks. In fact, the website of one of the major ones, the National Network of Abortion Funds, is down today due to a deluge of donations and redirecting to their ActBlue page. There are others, like the Brigid Alliance, that work nationwide to get people to Abortions.
There is also the Auntie Network, but I’ve read some criticism of their approach from people who’ve been working Reproductive Justice for a while, so I’ll hold on linking them.
But: suffice to say a serious number of such efforts exist, both nationally and locally. I posted on this back when the Draft decision was posted, and I’m working on an update for the front Page, hopefully soon.
Feathers
@gene108: Presumably the legislators who will be around when all of this is righted will understand and we will get EU style data protection. If only to cut back on the power currently held by the ”I’m a libertarian, but fascist will work, too” crowd.
O. Felix Culpa
Alexandra Petri is back for a wan smile (WaPo):
The Thin Black Duke
@gene108: Of course. But what happens when they kill all the Others? Italians won’t be “white” anymore? This shit isn’t substainable. Then again, long-term planning really isn’t their thing.
Tazj
I just heard an interview with Phil Bryant the former governor of Mississippi whose administration brought the case to the Supreme Court that was fundamental in overturning Roe. I expected the interview to be bad but to hear the total disdain for women in his words was enraging.
Of course he was thrilled, we all knew he would be. He hoped it would make WOMEN become more responsible. Then the reporter asked what he would say to the women protesting, he said to pray and to ask God for the realization that this is a life and you just can’t take away for your convenience. He kept repeating that women do it because it’s inconvenient for them. The reporter did press him about it and said many women would say it’s not just an inconvenience and he said I understand we have compassion for people here in Mississippi. Now you might think he would offer platitudes about helping women with diapers and formula but he didn’t even do that. He said we’re compassionate about making it easier for people to ADOPT. That’s it.
raven
@Martin: Drive on!
Martin
@debbie: I’m wondering how much of a demographic shift this will cause. I think quite a few companies are going to be rethinking their presence in many of these states because it’s just untenable to lose employees that have a trans kid and don’t want to be prosecuted.
And if your kid is scoping out colleges, send them to a blue state. It’s not realistic to tell all of the liberals in red states to up and move their families, but college is effectively a free migration. There’s almost no sunk costs. Send them off to a place that will respect their rights because odds are pretty good they’ll stay in the state they go to college in.
I look at every one of these rulings as economic anchors on red states. Mississippi will just get poorer because of this. Get your kids out.
Immanentize
SCOTUS votes 5-4 to throw beer bottle at slut:
Almost Retired
I had a court appearance in downtown Los Angeles this morning. Not surprisingly, the only subject discussed while waiting for calendar call – after we complained about the Judge always being late, and her clerk being a power-drunk martinet – was the Dobbs decision.
Everyone was appalled, but there was a gender divide in the discussion. The men were all on Team “Thank God We’re In California.” And the women were adamant that they are coming after Blue State women too – through Legislation or packing the 9th Circuit with Coney-Clones, or in ways we haven’t yet imagined. And they’re right.
JPL
@debbie: Nice. My niece works for Morgan Stanley and I assume they will follow suit. Since I’m the MIL, she’s going to talk to my DIL to make sure she doesn’t have the app to track periods.
MisterDancer
Well, honestly, that’s up to us citizens. Or, rather, it can be.
There’s already a range of major corporations who’ve given an explicit middle finger to the idea that these bounty laws are valid. No corpo’s legal team would have approved the “we’ll pay for you to travel to get an abortion” if they thought there was a chance in Hell of serious lawsuits for doing that.
And they’re doing this because they judge the goodwill and attaboys will outweigh the Conservative backlash. They’re betting we’ll respond positively to their actions, and that the citizenry will push back hard on this, both in the streets and in the voting booths.
If we — all of us — do not make that pushback real? They’ll cut the programs as too risky.
Elizabelle
I think the USSC decisions this week badly destabilized the country. We might even see some more market turmoil.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin: tweets today:
Can you imagine being a pregnant service member in a location where abortion is inaccessible? Like all other employees, you no longer have the ability to take care of this privately, with just a day or two off.
Further, too many servicewomen are raped by other service members, even those in their chain of command. If you’re serving on an installation in Oklahoma or Ohio: you get to bear your rapist’s child? And he gets parental rights?
Calouste
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Dick’s sells guns. You can buy your shoes from a different place that supports abortion rights and doesn’t sell guns. There are many, like Patagonia.
kalakal
I am hoping the backlash to this ruling and the way the red states are going to overreach with it is going to be huge at the midterms. Add in the J6 hearings. The downside to gerrymandering ( for the gerrymanderers) is that get a big enough swing against you and you lose really, really big. It’s like leverage/gearage in financial speculation, great when it goes up, Wall St Crash when it goes down. As a plus Senate elections can’t be gerrymanderd.
This is a bloody awful day but it doesn’t end with today
MisterDancer
One of the things I wish I could find more study on, is the economic impact of Jim Crow and similar regimes. I think we really underestimate how willing people were to cut their economies off at the knees, to inflict harm. Much less understand why.
I think if some of these Libertarian Fellow Travelers really understood the impacts of monochromatic/monogender businesses on their bottom line, they’d change some of their tunes. I don’t like basically bribing people to do good, though.
geg6
@Betty Cracker:
Are you insane? I’d rather watch Mrs. Greenspan than Chris Jansing. She’s horrible. I don’t want to watch either of these hags and will change the channel when either comes on, but if forced to choose, it’s Greenspan for me. At least with Greenspan, you know the stupid may just be a symptom of senility.
cain
@gene108:
They will continue to focus on social issues but once climate change continues and our food supply gets disrupted – no social or tax cut policy is going to fix starving people .. explaining to entitled people about why there is no food will lead to violence.. probably against non white and females.
SiubhanDuinne
@stinger:
Thanks for finding that! It’s the clip I was remembering, but I had forgotten that their lips were visible, at least from the side. I’ll bet a skilled LR could make a plausible guess as to what was said.
gene108
@The Thin Black Duke:
Invade and subjugate Canada. EDIT: Or some other type of war of conquest somewhere else on the planet.
Their universal healthcare, more affordable universities, access to abortion, lack of mass shootings, etc. makes America look bad.
Then they’ll turn on the Catholics, and non-Fundamentalist Protestants.
Though, they might be able to do both at the same time.
Long term planning or sustainability isn’t really an issue. If they can repress opposition savagely enough, and not let the standard of living go totally to shit for their supporters, they can hang on for decades.
A Man for All Seasonings (formerly Geeno)
May I be the first to welcome John to Team Meteor. Humans had their chance, and look at what they did. Erase the slate and start over.
kalakal
@MisterDancer:
They never actually join the dots. It can’t be their fault, their beliefs and actions can’t be in error. No, any economic/social harm is the fault of others, the specific others vary in time and place, but the sick, tired, evil song is eternal
Suzanne
@Elizabelle:
Yes THIS thank you.
And I will note that Germany broke up anyway.
That’s the thing: I honestly think the country can no longer hang together.
gene108
@Almost Retired:
The women are right, but are there enough of them to out vote the conservative women, who are all for this?
I think that’s a big issue in electoral politics. (No offense intended), but a majority of white men nationally will vote Republican no matter what. The best we can do there is to drop there support for Republicans from 2/3’s to 3/5’s, in any given election.
Where things get decided is how white women vote. Will this peal off some non-college educated white women, who would be impacted by this ruling? I think this will cost Republicans among college educated women more than they expect.
The Thin Black Duke
@gene108: It won’t be decades. Mind you, I’m not advocating violence, but if things go to shit, marginalized people aren’t going to go quietly into that good night. Do you think the POC in the military are meekly going to march into the camps?
Martin
@Almost Retired: Oh, yeah, the women are 100% right here. But in the short term, thank God we’re in California. Whether they come for the blue states is much more of a function of whether people get off their asses and vote. There’s time to prevent that.
Almost Retired
@Martin:
Exactly!
Geminid
@kalakal: As you point out, gerrymanders can fail, especially when there is political shift on top of demographic change. Ten years ago Republicans drew a map in Virginia that put them up 65-35 in the House of Delegates going into the 2017 elections. They came out of them up only 51-49, with one victory decided on a coin flip after a tie.
After the 2019 elections Republicans were down 55-45 in the House of Delegates. They came back to a 52-48 lead last year on that same map but two of their seats were decided by less than 200 votes and a couple more were within 500.
Next year’s elections will be held on a more neutral, court-drawn map and I expect Republicans will pay a real price for their minority position on abortion rights.
Dan B
@MisterDancer: I realized I’m not feeling as despondent as many (most?) Jackals. It dawned on me that I’ve felt despondent since living in Arkansas during Jim Crow and then figuring out I was “homosexual”* at age 14. That was followed by Brown, busing, Loving, Lawrence, ’68, AIDS, Obergefell, etc. Up and down, being jerked around. Maintaining a steady level of unease and looking for motivation to resist and to push for a better future has been my North Star. Our neighbors have Barbeques when the weather is good. I’ll be doing some fierce gardening with the understanding that the climate may burn everything to a crisp. Each disastrous setback is part of our journey of life and I’m reminded that there must be joy and peace so we can keep going. Your words resonated because all minorities in this country hear the steady drumbeat of tyranny that is constantly in the background. It’s not a surprise to us when it surfaces.
*homosexual was: pervert, predator, unstable, not trustworthy, mentally ill, etc. I’ve lived with that most of my life. Not nice or surprising for those labels to make a comeback.
syphonblue
People in blue states are absolutely not safe. All it will take is one person living in a blue state to sue over its pro-abortion rights laws, and the Supreme Court will gleefully rule those laws unconstitutional and we will have NO abortion in the states ANYWHERE.
And that is absolutely what is coming next. I’d say within this year, we get that lawsuit(s).
Matt McIrvin
@syphonblue: They can’t force the states to enforce an abortion ban– there has to actually be a law. A future Congress could, of course, pass that and send the FBI or some federal police agency after people. But that would be the way absent state legislative action.
Matt McIrvin
@gene108: Some of the most floridly, insanely anti-abortion people I know are white women. Religion is a powerful thing.
Matt McIrvin
@Suzanne: Germany broke up because it got invaded by an unlikely team of rival powers bound to stop it. I don’t see any force like that coming for us.
Omnes Omnibus
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Matthew Hale and Matthew Hopkins are, in fact, different people.
bluefish
@Elizabelle:
I saw Michael B on the other night. He was almost as loose as I was in the moment. It surprised me to see him start to fly. Thanks for your post. And his tweet. Edibles. Just a quarter.
And thanks to the OP for the info on a good place to contribute. Much appreciated.
Plouffe was on earlier. Thank Hera he didnt offer the lady people any thoughts and prayers cuz he’s not a heartless idiot. He looked like he’d been crying.
I kinda dig that it came down to the respective self hating crazy of Alito and Thomas. These people are obviously insane. Let it play out.
EarthWindFire
@sab: My grandmother was the same. The resulting child was my mother. She’s been damaged ever since.
I hate these reactionaries with every fiber of my being.
glc
@Feathers:
Don’t need to be seized, they’re offered for sale, widely, as databases. That’s where the money for period-tracking apps comes from. Not particularly expensive and available to any interested party.
Generally speaking, that’s why we have apps. Targeted advertising means surveillance advertising based on aggregating datasets.
SoCalKaren
@jnfr: I don’t care for her either. She’s always a little too gleeful when reporting on some shit Republicans are pulling, like she’s secretly on their side.
Bex
@germy shoemangler: And 1 of them is in a wackjob cult.
Another Scott
@Immanentize:
There’s a piece sneering about evil leftists at MoJo that talks about it:
It’s plausible that his parents bailed him out.
But that argues, yet again, for the courts (especially the SCOTUS) to have strict ethics and financial disclosure rules (that they don’t have now). What’s to keep his parents from funneling money from nefarious actors to his bank account??
Grr…,
Scott.
glc
@Another Scott: The concept of Mother Jones sneering at evil leftists seems like an odd one to me. I don’t think I’ve encountered that.
My recollection was that the piece gave a view of the facts, and acknowledged both the lack of clarity and the fact that Kavanaugh chose not to clarify.
Jt
@Timurid: no offense. If there is an opening, you fill it. No matter what, just pick good qualified candidates, no games.
Spc
@trollhattan: Since VA gov term limit is one term, reverting to true colors can happen quickly, especially when one has aspirations.
Taxesmycredulity
@Percysowner: If you haven’t seen the movie, you many have missed Cole’s point. Plot: a Supreme Court justice is murdered to ensure that an environmental case loses in court.