Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

The new republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

with the Kraken taking a plea, the Cheese stands alone.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

Never give a known liar the benefit of the doubt.

ha ha ha! Nice try weird people.

If West Virginia and San Francisco had a love child.

The lights are all blinking red.

Republicans in disarray!

We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.

Republicans would impeach Biden if he bit into a whole Kit Kat rather than breaking the sections apart.

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

The jury literally has a bell they can ring to force Trump to show up on command. Greatest thing ever!

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you don’t.

Can we lighten up on the doomsday scenarios?

This blog will pay for itself.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

You are here: Home / Civil Rights / Late Night Open Thread: Where Is Ginni Thomas?

Late Night Open Thread: Where Is Ginni Thomas?

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Didn’t happen Friday, there’s always Monday…

Perjurers-in-office:

Mr. Charles P. Pierce, at Esquire, “The Hard Right Has Gotten What It Paid For”:

The two sides were kept apart in front of the Supreme Court by police barriers manned by Capitol Police. The Court itself is completely garrisoned with both barriers and ten-foot fences. This week, the Court ruled that you can carry your concealed Glock anywhere. Except, apparently, down the sidewalk in front of the Supreme Court. Given Friday’s events, this would seem to be a good thing…

You get what you pay for. And, on Friday, they got what they’ve dreamed of. The increasingly useless Chief Justice voted against overturning Roe, which was accomplished by a 5-4 vote, but he voted to uphold the Mississippi law that was the vehicle for doing the former in the first place. Nice work, there, John. And remember when everybody was screaming that Vermont shouldn’t be allowed to dictate marriage law to the whole country? Women’s bodily autonomy is now controlled by the state legislature of Mississippi, a state that has a worse rate for infant mortality than either Kuwait or Lebanon.

You get what you pay for. The decision was delivered by Justice Samuel Alito, who is running those parts of the Court these that Clarence Thomas is not. And here we go…

Two points:

1. The leaked draft opinion was clearly a head-fake to buy some time. For weeks, we’ve heard that Roberts was brokering a Roe-saving compromise, however worthless that would have been. We also heard that the harshest parts of that draft opinion would be scotched during the deliberative process of the Court. That clearly was not the case. Roe was called “egregiously wrong” in the draft opinion and it was called “egregiously wrong” in the Court’s final decision.

2. Alito’s crocodile tears about enflamed debate and deepened division are goddamned insulting. The Court’s decision on Friday was a victory for clinic bombers, for murderous snipers, for the stalkers of doctors and their children, and for vandals of all kinds. Eric Rudolph won on Friday. So did Paul Hill, and John Salvi, and James Kopp. Ask a clinic escort who it was that “inflamed debate” after Casey managed to keep Roe on life-support for the last twenty years. Ask a doctor wearing kevlar who it was that “deepened division.”…

The shade of Ben Franklin’s sister: A theocracy, if you can enforce it…

Reader Interactions

87Comments

  1. 1.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Who was that interrupting on a “point of order” during Hakim Jeffries’ righteous rant?

  2. 2.

    David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch

    Ana Navarro: “States are allowed to regulate my uterus but not guns”.

  4. 4.

    Aussie Sheila

    Hakim Jeffries reminds me of many pollies here in ozland. Plain speaking machine politician. Not criticising, just observing.

    Ginni Thomas is clearly a nut case but has no formal power. Her husband is a reactionary nutcase who has unbelievable power. Now I want someone to tell me if there is anyway Congress can insulate any legislation from SC review? If not, then the road ahead looks terrible for women. If not, then, the ‘heighten the contradictions’ crowd will get worse. They will spend the next decade berating everyone working to reduce harm, while preening about their moral superiority.

    If there is no way to insulate legislation from SC review, the the Dems are in for a bad decade imho. Just sending more emails for money will gradually enrage those who know the truth, and demoralise those who are more fuzzy about the legal and constitutional issues.

    Maybe this issue is the one that revives deep, grassroots organising, of the kind that led to the civil rights amendments after the civil war. And no, I am not recommending civil war. Anyone who contemplates such a thing is a moral and practical cretin.

  5. 5.

    YY_Sima Qian

    Until very recently I never thought Roe vs. Wade was anything but settled. If Roe is not safe, then none of the rulings that secured the foundation for humane modern society in the US are safe. The last few years (& the next 10) may well represent the last crazed reactionary counterrevolution seeking to stop the inexorable human progress (when viewed at the grandest scale), doomed to ultimate failure (like Franco’s Spain), but the darkness could run for decades, it may well take another revolution to overturn. It will be ugly, & possibly bloody, & may not be restricted to w/in US borders.

    More & more I am convinced of Adam L. Silverman’s pessimistic prognosis of US domestic politics.

    My plan was always to take my daughter from China to the US for junior high or high school. I have no wish for her to suffer through the brutally intense & high pressured preparations for standard exams to enter upper middle school or university in China. The last few years have thrown doubts on my plans. The latest developments might make these plans untenable.

    Heaven knows the CCP regime is not known for its humanity, progressivism or respect for individual woman’s bodily autonomy (see the appalling abuses in executing the One Child Policy), but it is not the medieval (in every aspect) monster that the US reactionary right has become.

    There are many worrying signs about China’s future, though none yet that immediately dangerous (to us), & there still are many promising signs. No one knows what China or the US will be like in 10 years. Time for me to explore other options for my family…

  10. 10.

    Aussie Sheila

    @rikyrah:

    Yes, this is exactly what I was trying to get at. ISTM, at the risk of being told to shut up as an outsider, that if no congressional option is available, then the only solution is a vast ‘reform movement’ of the kind that evangelical US has history on. I am concerned for the US left that its political representatives don’t encourage false hope on this, because the results will be terrible, for women first, and the for any progressive left project. Honesty must be the first priority here for politically active people, together with a program, deep organising at every level and hope.

  13. 13.

    sab

    @Aussie Sheila: IANAL but theoretically  Congress can control the Supreme Court. If it has the will to do so. The Court is established in very vague terms by Article III of the Constitution. Article III gives them lifetime tenure. The actual structure of the actual federal judicial branch is established by Congressional legislation. How many SCt justices, how many circuit courts and judges. How many district courts. Also Congress pays the bills. Congress theoretically could block them from considering certain topics as being beyond their jurisdiction.

    ETA Of course that won’t happen in the real world. But the S Ct is only as powerful as Congress lets it be.

  15. 15.

    Emerald

    Ginni Thomas seems to be settling quite nicely into a sort of quasi-Martha Mitchell role, doesn’t she?

  16. 16.

    JoyceH

    I saw an interesting statistic. Something like 45% of the women of childbearing age who live in states with trigger laws didn’t know it. So today these women live in states where abortion is illegal – and they’re completely blindsided. I think the rage is going to be way more than any pundit or political operative expected.

  19. 19.

    sab

    @JoyceH: Yes. I was talking to my daughter-in-law last week. She is completely apolitical, except about Roe v Wade. She sees abortion as a necessary complement to safe pregnancies.

  20. 20.

    JPL

    Another major decision is coming down next week dealing with the EPA.  In the past, major decisions were released on the last day.   We have to consider the possibility that the court is going to gut the EPA.

    Living in a country with clean air and water is not a right according to the constitution.

  21. 21.

    mrmoshpotato

    Where Is Ginni Thomas?

    Well, she’s still alive – but most likely dead inside.  So – Hell? – not yet.

  22. 22.

    Aussie Sheila

    @sab: so in that case, Dem activists will need to be very intentional in their primaries. Every candidate needs to be put on the record regarding their position on the legal and constitutional realities. No more Sinemas, who imho is the worst, much worse than the corrupt old pol Manchin. She promised so much more and delivered worse than zip.

    The ALP (Australian Labor Party) in Oz has a pledge rule with some carve outs which they agree on. Vote against Party policy, and you are expelled. I understand the big cultural differences between the two countries, but my observation over the last two decades in which I have takes an interest in US politics, is that the Dems are not very disciplined. I don’t mean voters, I mean activists and local powerbrokers.

    seems to me it’s time to get a bit more disciplined and let wannabes know it. Sign up here for the program, or no go in the primaries. After a while even scumbags get the message. And we have plenty of those down under make no mistake. I am a great believer in strong discipline when it comes to national politics. The economically and socially precarious deserve to have strong unyielding politics at their back.

  23. 23.

    sab

    @Aussie Sheila: It is hard to have discipline in our system because it is non-parliamentary. Congressmen run on their own. They decide to run, and they decide what party to run in. The party really has no control. If you can get enough people in your district to sign your election petition to get on the ballot then you are on the ballot. Thenif you can get enough people to vote for you then off you go to Washington.

    The Republican Party is a lot more structured because a handful of billionaires have privately financed a whole infrastructure that supports developing the party. Potential candidates are groomed from high school and university in Young Republican clubs. They get jobs through the party, and if they fail they still have private jobs to fall back on because they have been loyal party members.

    What qualified John Kasich, who spent his whole life in politics, to be an investment banker after he was Ohio governor. Brett Kavanaugh has a really thin legal resume. All he ever did was political stuff.

    Democrats, on the other hand, have to support themselves out in the real world job market in between political office stints.

  24. 24.

    sab

    @Aussie Sheila: I agree with you that party discipline would be helpful. In some of our cities the Democratic Party does have a strong support system. Shontel Brown came out of such a system, and it was why she was able to clobber the much more famous Nina Turner. She had good mentors coming up.

  25. 25.

    Aussie Sheila

    @sab:  I understand the broad problem, but to fix it you have to start somewhere. Expecting and enforcing party discipline could start where you are strong and become a habit more broadly over time. In the meantime, organising grassroots activists around a program would mean wannabes have to sign up to said program to get primary support. A few high profile  disendorsements might send a message over time. In the meanwhile, I am concerned that the Dems don’t BS their base over this issue. Either Congress can overturn and insulate from SCt review, or it can’t.
    The worst thing possible is to lie about the constitutional and legal problems ahead. Be honest up front, and plan accordingly.

    It is a terrible position for women in the US and I still can’t believe it, although at one level it seemed inevitable once tfg was elected.

    I always thought it was a possibility and didn’t underestimate his appeal to low information voters.

  27. 27.

    David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch

    @Emerald: Martha was good egg.  Ginni is more in the Magda Goebbles role.  I have no doubt she’d go into Dump’s Fuhrer Bunker and tie her fate with Dear Leader.

  28. 28.

    TriassicSands

    Hand Maiden Amy didn’t just wake up one morning and “hate abortion.” She’s always hated abortion and joined the SCOTUS determined to overturn Roe. It’s what we call an “agenda.” You know, what they all lied about not having.

  29. 29.

    sab

    @Aussie Sheila: I am old enough that I remember times before Roe v Wade, because I was in college when it was decided. So we are much worse off now than before, because the incest and life/health of the mother exceptions seem to be pretty much gone now.

    I cannot imagine being an obstetrician now. I expect that soon we will have doctor shortages in related fields.

  30. 30.

    David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch

    I like Sotomayor. She’s the sharpest legal knife on the bench. But her comment last week that Thomas cares about people didn’t age well. Both her and Breyer think if they’re kind to the fanatics they’ll moderate — ain’t happening.

  31. 31.

    TriassicSands

    @JPL: Living in a country with clean air and water is not a right according to the constitution.

    Oh, c’mon, JPL, there is no mention of clean air or water in the Constitution. Therefore, we have no right to either. Sure, climate change may make the planet inhospitable for human beings (no other species matter), but so what. The true believers — Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett — will all be raptured up to heaven, so no problem. The rest of us get to burn.

  33. 33.

    Aussie Sheila

    @David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch: 

    This is exactly the kind of garbage that misleads grassroots activists. Forget the comity BS between SC t justices, no one gives a shit. What rattles my cockles is the comity BS that Dem pols regularly swing towards their political opponents. It is bizarre.

    It is also misleading for the Dem base. Without shouting all the time, there should be a disciplined and unrelenting drum beat. No good Dem ever supports a republican. Why do people like Biden and Pelosi, both experienced and effective pols keep referring to my good friends on the other side, or we need a strong Republican Party? Unbelievable.

    Leaders lead. Followers pick up on cues. Going forward the Dems need to develop at least a minimalist program of economic and constitutional rights, and make sure their dollars and time go to those who sign up, not to those who balk. Prior to the formation of Labor Parties in the Anglo sphere, the liberal parties received support from both labour interests and petit bourgeoise interests. The road towards Labor parties was long and winding, but in the end delivered much more for their supporters than an anguished attempt to square the circle.

  35. 35.

    Baud

    @Aussie Sheila:

    Dems are currently 99% pure on abortion. The people who are angry at them are fighting over messaging, not policy.

     

     

    Going forward the Dems need to develop at least a minimalist program of economic and constitutional rights,

     

    That makes sense, but the problem in the U.S. is that there’s some faction of the Dem coalition feels ignored if they are not included in the core agenda.

  36. 36.

    JPL

    Yesterday IMMA mentioned that Thomas believes that Loving was partially found on Equal Protection, but he then overturned Casey.   Casey was also found partially on equal protection.

    Alito probably believes that a husband can’t rape his wife.   Be prepared folks for challenges to some domestic violence suits.

  37. 37.

    TriassicSands

    @sab:

    Alito has made it clear that they don’t believe in unenumerated rights. Unless, of course, they are about how Jesus wants the US to be a Christian nation whose primary allegiance is to the Pope.

    Seriously, the Ninth is meaningless to them.

  38. 38.

    TriassicSands

    @JoyceH:

    We’ll see. The fact that they didn’t know they live in states with trigger laws shows how disengaged they are. People like that are not reliable voters.

  39. 39.

    Betty Cracker

    @Aussie Sheila: By way of explanation, President Biden was a senator for a very long time, so it’s reflexive. I think he’s done better lately. Maybe someone at the White House pointed out how grating that language is for the Democratic base.

    Pelosi is correct when she says we need a strong Republican Party. A system with just two viable political parties requires a commitment to governance from both. We don’t have that now, and it’s not an exaggeration to say that this imperils American democracy.

    That said, I take your point about how it sounds to the average voter. The first time I heard that remark from Pelosi, it was in the context of a paragraph that went something like, “elected Republicans, take back your party from the demented Trump cult because America needs you to be sane.” I wish she would either include the context or stop making the remark publicly because it’s easily misconstrued.

  40. 40.

    Geminid

    @TriassicSands: The unengaged can become reliable voters. Republicans have made reliable voters out of people who might not have voted at all but for their interest in single issues like abortion and gun rights. If overruling Roe impels the unengaged, or at least some of them, to vote Democratic they may interest themselves in the broader set of issues Democrats fight for, and stick around.

  42. 42.

    JPL

    @Betty Cracker: It’s been a long, long time since the republican party that Nancy is talking about existed.   My adult sons have only known the current one.   Sometimes I’ll tell them a story about the olden days, when republicans just wanted to pay the bills.   Reagan changed the direction of the party.

  43. 43.

    David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch

    @JPL: ​  more on point is Obergefell was found on both equal protection and due process and cited Loving which was also found on both equal protection and due process.​ Now he wants to overturn one, but not the other that involves him.

  45. 45.

    Aussie Sheila

    @Betty Cracker: Yes I get your point re Pelosi, but ffs, Dem pols shouldn’t be commenting on Rethugs at all except as a way of ‘compare and contrast’.

    I understand how the rigid 2 party system cramps US progressive political style, but by now Dem pols should be held to account for not working it out. The UK is first past the post, but when it elects Labor governments they get things done. There is nothing worse for political engagement than asking for votes and money and not delivering. In the US you still have no right to vote in an equal and impartial manner and no rights to non gerrymandered electorates, no rights for women to control their bodies and on and on.  It now falls on Dem leaders and activists to develop not just a program, but a form of organising that can overcome both bad faith and the justifiable cynicism of the powerless and unconnected.

    I worry because in my lifetime every political trend that comes from the US infects the rest of us. I wish it wasn’t so but it is. While I don’t worry about abortion rights here in Oz, there are other trends that we aren’t immune from. I also understand that it is a terrible burden for US progressives and that the obstacles are daunting.

  46. 46.

    Betty Cracker

    @JPL: My adult child doesn’t recall sane Republicans either. I’m old enough to have experienced the party’s descent into madness as gradations. Reagan started them on the path to radicalization, but for decades most still agreed to work with Dems on the nuts and bolts of governing like allowing presidents to assemble cabinets and seat justices, honoring America’s commitments abroad, raising the debt ceiling, etc. Their brains broke in 2008.

  47. 47.

    PaulB

    I’m waiting for a liberal judge to cite this stupid decision while mentioning that the word “corporation” doesn’t appear in the Constitution.

  48. 48.

    Betty Cracker

    @Aussie Sheila: I share your concerns and agree 100%. FWIW, as an American, I welcome comments about our politics from people in other countries because 1) sometimes it’s easier to see what’s happening at a remove, and 2) as you observed, what happens in the US has a wider effect, so you have a stake in this too.

  49. 49.

    Baud

    @PaulB:

    Yeah, I was thinking this makes corporate personhood easier to overrule.  But that’ll require a new slate of justices.

  50. 50.

    Baud

    @Aussie Sheila:

    There is nothing worse for political engagement than asking for votes and money and not delivering

     

    Our system isn’t set up for quick action. Only ⅓ of the Senate is up each cycle for example.

    But your observation really only applies to the left side. It took 50 years for the GOP to deliver on abortion. They maintained a high level of engagement throughout that time.

  52. 52.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: I think the program of Newt Gingrich’s Contract for America in 1994, and the success it had in that year’s midterms, was another turning point for the Republicans. Self-described independent conservative M.D. Russ makes a good case for this in his excellent Bearing Drift article “Trump is the Republican President,” June 2022.

    Going back further, the Southern political realignment that brought the stinking segregationists into the Republican party had a profound effect on the balance of power within the party.

    And for the bigotry and xenophobia, one can go all the way back to 1860, when the American (Know-Nothing) Party dissolved itself and most of it’s members joined the new Republican Party. Their political descendents were the Taft Republicans of the 1950s, and the Goldwater Republicans of the 60s. Now, they and Jeff Davis’ descendents are in control.

  53. 53.

    Aussie Sheila

    @Baud: yeah but the republicans never made their real goals the focus of their overall brand. Democratic pols and activists might have known, but they seem to never rise to the challenge, even experienced pols still blather about rethugs in a way they never reciprocate. It takes time to build a brand although I hate that term. The Dems need to rebuild their ‘brand’ and this time, mean it.

  54. 54.

    Baud

    @Aussie Sheila:

    yeah but the republicans never made their real goals the focus of their overall brand.

    I don’t understand this. The GOP brand had been solidly anti-abortion since Reagan.

    @Aussie Sheila:

    The Dems need to rebuild their ‘brand’ and this time, mean it.

     

    That’s fine and all, but our constituents can’t agree on what that brand should be. And a clear “brand” could just as easily be a niche brand that few voters want to be associated with.

    Honestly, if the issue is abortion, the GOP and Dem brands are pretty well defined and have been for a long time.

    ETA: In the past, Dems had a decently sized contingent of anti-choice representatives.  That has whittled down to just a handful today.

  55. 55.

    geg6

    @Emerald:

    That’s a bad analogy.  Martha was an abused woman.  She gave Woodward and Bernstein the evidence that got her awful husband convicted.  She was no Ginni Thomas.

  56. 56.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: I’m not sure it’s a matter of discipline on the right so much as having a far more homogeneous coalition, and as a consequence, simpler and clearer messaging.

    @Geminid: I agree that all of those turning points you mentioned were critical. My point was Pelosi isn’t harkening back to an era that expired 40 years ago.

  59. 59.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: You’re right about the Dem “brand” on abortion being clear. I hope that’s enough to save us in the upcoming elections.

  63. 63.

    Aussie Sheila

    @Baud: I disagree. A brand focussed on abortion alone is clearly inadequate. And in any case for those who don’t need one or think about such things it doesn’t make much sense. The political ‘brand’ needs to tap into deep cultural, social and economic roots. The Democratic Party has carried, properly and righteously, the civil rights brand since the late ‘60s, but it doesn’t seem to have matched it with broad based economic rights. While I get the proper irritation with Bernie bros, it does seem to me that the us liberal/progressive/left has, from this distance, a whiff of sanctimoniousness and superciliousness that politically active and educated people often have towards those less well placed.

    I reckon that is the effect of a lack of a well organised and powerful working class, but whatever it is, it needs to be fixed, because given lack of secure voting rights and the rest, US liberals are appear to be thrashing about with no secure organic base upon which to build, while all the while calling for more money to elect more Dems who find they can’t do anything once elected. That is a recipe for fascism.

  64. 64.

    David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch

    10 years ago the entire wingnut legal apparatus wanted to overturn ACA because, they said, a state that can force you to buy medical insurance could then force you to …. (checks notes)… eat broccoli.   Their whole argument was based on broccoli.  Anthony Kennedy stressed it at oral argument.

    Now that same wingnut apparatus is forcing women to eat broccoli carry unwanted pregnancies, even when their lives are in danger.

  65. 65.

    JPL

    @Mimi: If the case made it to the supreme court, they would refuse to hear it and send it back to lower courts.   They only accept the cases they want to change.  The next case will be about the IUD and then they will allow states to mandate what birth control you use.

  66. 66.

    Baud

    While I get the proper irritation with Bernie bros, it does seem to me that the us liberal/progressive/left has, from this distance, a whiff of sanctimoniousness and superciliousness that politically active and educated people often have towards those less well placed.

     

    I don’t really think it can be fixed in any way that the BernieBros/progressive/left would accept. Mine is a minority view, but I believe any hope of prevailing means reducing our dependency on them.

  71. 71.

    Geminid

    @Baud: I think most of the Sanders supporters voted for the party’s nominee in 2016 and 2020. The ones who didn’t are very loud, though, and tend to give the more pragmatic ones a bad name.

  72. 72.

    lowtechcyclist

    @sab: ​
     

    Congress theoretically could block them from considering certain topics as being beyond their jurisdiction.

    I’ve heard this said many times, and I assume it’s based on the second paragraph of Article III, Section 2.

    If so, I’d say it’s based on a pretty shaky reading of its wording, which really seems to me to be about when SCOTUS will have primary jurisdiction, and when it will have appellate jurisdiction.

    And given that Section 2 starts off, “The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases…” I’d like to hear the argument that Congress could cut the Article III courts out of the action altogether on even a single issue. And given the way that several of the Circuit Courts are stacked, I don’t know that excluding SCOTUS from both original and appellate jurisdiction would gain us that much.

    I think this is just one more ‘magic bullet’ that isn’t.

  73. 73.

    Aussie Sheila

    @Baud: Well here is your problem. The Bernie bros left you hate so much is the way it is because there is no strong geographically spaced working class movement. Yes I know it is inconvenient, but it is the truth. The US on line left is truly awful, I get it. I can’t believe the drivel I come across sometimes, and its stance on Ukraine was simply dreadful ( I except Bernie from that because he didn’t gaff around about Russian imperialism). However……US liberals suck in a way that even centrists where I am don’t so much.

    It comes down to organised power. Who has it, who doesn’t . The best hope I see in the US isn’t the on line left so much as younger people organising themselves into  unions. Instead of wasting hundreds of millions of dollars ( simply eye watering to outsiders) on  doomed campaigns for average replacement level pollies in states that are hard to win, why not take a breather, spend hundreds of millions over an electoral cycle on union organising, then see how it goes? It couldn’t go worse than it already has.

  74. 74.

    lowtechcyclist

    @JPL:

    Another major decision is coming down next week dealing with the EPA. In the past, major decisions were released on the last day. We have to consider the possibility that the court is going to gut the EPA.

    And there’s a real chance that their overturning Roe is going to look like a mere tactical nuke compared to this bomb – that they’re basically going to gut the power of the Executive Branch to do much of anything that Congress hasn’t authorized in very specific detail.

    They’re working on taking us back to Articles of Confederation territory, except on issues where they want the Federal government to be able to dictate.

  76. 76.

    Geminid

    @Aussie Sheila: The states that are hard to win are the states that we need to win. But the resources we throw into those states do not preclude supporting union organizing. The Biden administration has tilted the  table back in favor of unions just by enforcing existing laws, and that in itself is worth a lot of money.

    The unions themselves expend money to organize. One of the largest, the Teamsters may not have hundreds of millions to spend, but I bet that by the time they finish their push to organize Amazon they’ll have put tens of milllions into the effort.

    Of course, not all union members vote Democratic, but plenty do and their unions’ organizational clout is now solidly on the side of the Democratic Party. Their efforts may make the difference for Tim Ryan and Marcy Kaptur in Ohio and John Fetterman in Pennsylvania, and among others.

  77. 77.

    Anne Laurie

    @Mimi: What Ginni going to do when the Supremes come after interracial marriage?

    Silly liberal, the leopard would never eat Ginni’s face!

    But seriously… Loving is the one ‘horrible judicial overreach’ that Clarence Thomas never mentions reversing.  I think he has *some* idea that not all of his ‘allies’ can be trusted not to come after him, although it’s fairly clear Ginni thinks the Law is whatever she & her best buds find convenient, right this very moment.

  78. 78.

    Geminid

    @Mimi: When the Supreme Court comes after interracial marriage, I think that Ginni’s going to give Clarence the side eye, and he’s going to say, “Uh-huh.”

  79. 79.

    David ☘The Establishment☘ Koch

    @lowtechcyclist: ​
      it’s worse than that, for even when Congress enacts a law in great detail like ACA or OSHA vaccines or Voting Rights they still want to overturn it.

  80. 80.

    Geminid

    @Baud: There actually is an interesting subgroup of former Sanders supporters on Twitter who describe the reasons for which they rejected that movement and became more loyal Democrats. Now they push back hard at what they call the “Dirtbag Left.” They still consider themselves progressives, but have a more pragmatic approach than their former colleagues. Michael Paulauski is a good example of this group.

  81. 81.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Betty Cracker: Pelosi is correct when she says we need a strong Republican Party.

    Only if ‘sane’ is also in the description.  We already *have* a strong Republican Party, and that’s the problem.

    She needs to phrase it: “this nation needs two sane major political parties.  It would be nice if the Republican Party was such a party, but it’s not, and it’s hard to see how it becomes such a party anytime soon.

    She can go on, if she’s feeling sufficiently energetic:

    “They are against a woman’s right to choose. They are against voting rights – for black people in particular, and for anyone they think will vote against them in general. When Covid-19, which they call the ‘Chinese virus,’ attacked us, they opposed every measure to defend ourselves against it.  They shrugged at the Covid deaths of a million Americans, and fifteen million worldwide, yet they call themselves ‘pro-life.’

    “Speaking of which, they may defend the life of every fetus, but once they’re born, it’s fine and dandy with them if they get shredded with bullets, they regard that as an acceptable cost of the gun rights that they value more highly than the right to life itself. We don’t want to live in a Wild West world where any person walking down the street could be openly carrying weapons of mass slaughter, and no way to tell whether they’re a ‘good guy with a gun’ or seconds away from turning dozens of people into hamburger.  But that’s the world they want, and have been fighting for.

    “And they want to pretend that climate change isn’t happening, even though everyone from the military to insurance companies can see it coming and are planning for the risks it entails.  We need to act strongly to limit its effects before it’s too late, but they block every attempt. We want to save the world, they are okay if it burns. Maybe they think they’ll be Raptured before things get too bad. I am a Christian, and Jesus asked us to pray that God’s will be done here on Earth, as it is in heaven.  We’re supposed to do what we can to make this world more like heaven, rather than turning it into a hell that the chosen few will be Raptured out of.

    “But that hell is what the Republican Party stands for: the hell of climate change, of millions dying of this plague and the inevitable next one, of people being able to shoot each other anywhere, anytime, of women not having control over their own bodies. a world where minorities are persecuted just because hatred of minorities – black people and other ethnic minorities, gay and trans persons – is perhaps their most defining characteristic. Meanwhile, it has been the goal of the Democratic Party at every turn to improve the lives of everyday people and the world we all live in.

    “I have said that we need two strong, sane parties. But right now there is only one, and that’s the Democratic Party. If you want a better world, vote for Democrats. If you want a hellscape, vote Republican. It’s that simple.”

  82. 82.

    Lacuna Synecdoche

    @JPL: ​

    Another major decision is coming down next week dealing with the EPA. In the past, major decisions were released on the last day. We have to consider the possibility that the court is going to gut the EPA.

    It’s not likely to be just the EPA. The conservative terrorists on SCOTUS intend to tear down all the precedents upholding the executive branch regulatory infrastructure. As goes the EPA, so too will go the FDA, OSHA, the SEC, and so on.

  83. 83.

    J R in WV

    @YY_Sima Qian:

    …No one knows what China or the US will be like in 10 years. Time for me to explore other options for my family…

    My best Chinese friend and former co-worker is pretty happy living and working with her family’s 2 kids in Canada. She is an IT expert.

  84. 84.

    J R in WV

    @Emerald:

    Ginni Thomas seems to be settling quite nicely into a sort of quasi-Martha Mitchell role, doesn’t she?

    No, quite the opposite. Ms Mitchell was actually kidnapped and drugged by her husband’s minions because she was opposed to Nixon’s and her husband’s illegality and was on the phone with Helen Thomas.

    Mr Mitchell spent time (18 months, released early on account of poor health) in jail for his Watergate activities.

    Ginni Thomas appears to be at least as conservative and unAmerican as her husband Clarence, if not more so.

  86. 86.

    Benno

    @YY_Sima Qian: I’m on the faculty at a liberal arts university in Pakistan. Our graduates have gone on to some of the best grad programs in the US and UK. Half joking, but happy to talk…

  87. 87.

    Bill Arnold

    @TriassicSands:

    Therefore, we have no right to either. Sure, climate change may make the planet inhospitable for human beings (no other species matter), but so what. The true believers — Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett — will all be raptured up to heaven, so no problem. The rest of us get to burn.

    Gigadeath criminals will not be welcomed in Heaven. They will burn forever in hell, according to any careful reading of their own theology.

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