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Apr
20
Save the foetuses. To hell with the living.
April 20, 2007 |
That’s what five rich male religious right-wingers in the Supreme Court who can never get pregnant told 150 million women in America two days ago. FOETUSES TRUMP THE LIVING. Especially if the living are potential incubators to generate more fundies to spread their agenda.
Anyone else tired of learning about Anna Nicole Smith’s baby’s daddy?
Or of seeing the media orchestrate the Virginia Tech tragedy into a self-serving circus?
Warning: If you can’t handle blue language, don’t click.
Thought we’d reconnect with a few issues that our favourite networks hate to discuss.
Headline #1
The U.S. Supreme Court upholds the 2003 ban on late-term abortions.
The law lacks a “health exception” for a woman who might suffer serious medical complications, something the justices have said in the past is necessary when considering abortion restrictions. Yes, you read that right. If a pregnant woman wants a late-term abortion to save her own life, she needs a special court order. No doctor or nurse will touch her with a bargepole until she gets one.
CNN reports:
The sharply divided 5-4 ruling could prove historic. It sends a possible signal of the court’s willingness, under Chief Justice John Roberts, to someday revisit the basic right to abortion guaranteed in the 1973 Roe v. Wade case.
President Bush, who signed the law in 2003 and appointed two of the justices who upheld it, said the prohibition “represents a commitment to building a culture of life in America.”
“Today’s decision affirms that the Constitution does not stand in the way of the people’s representatives enacting laws reflecting the compassion and humanity of America,” he said in a statement released by the White House.
What the fundies who run our country mean by “compassion and humanity” is this:
Women who want a controversial abortion procedure for health reasons have few options beyond going to court and trying to prove that a Supreme Court decision banning the practice should not apply.
For women facing serious health risks, that may not be practical.
“The problem with that is it’s not going to be an easy thing for women to invoke,” said Vikram Amar, a professor at the University of California’s Hastings School of Law. “Because time is of the essence, and litigation takes money and time, the “as applied” route is not as practically feasible.”
The Center for Reproductive Rights said the Court’s decision paves the way for state and federal legislatures to enact additional bans on abortions as early as 12 weeks, including those that doctors say are safe and medically necessary.
How does the all-male right-wing Supreme Court justify this?
Justice Kennedy argued that that it is “self-evident” that “a mother who comes to regret her choice to abort must struggle with grief more anguished and sorrow more profound when she learns, only after the event, what she did not know.” …
His twisted remedy, though, is not to ensure that a woman has adequate information; it’s to ensure that she has no option. Her moral judgment is completely eviscerated.
The poor will start using coathangers again. The families of the five rich dudes and their political masters will fly abroad for their procedures.
So what these conversative, mostly white men, who legislate our medical choices are trying to tell us is:
“Women are natural mothers who would not naturally choose abortion, and therefore need protection from the option. If you choose not to be a mother for whatever reason, you are a freak and need to either abstain from sex, or be punished.” Read Yale law lecturer Reva Siegel’s brilliant insights into this mindset.
Let’s not forget, 18 fundie Democrats backed Samuel Alito for the Supreme Court.
Hopefully, the electorate will respond to them with their votes in 2008.
Headline #2:
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is testifying before the Senate. It has to do with the firing of eight attorneys from the Department of Justice.
See, stealing elections is a big deal. We all know that from 2000. So when Republicans got a beating in 2006, Karl Rove decided to cry ‘voter fraud’. The trouble was that most of the Democrat wins were landslides, and there was not much evidence to back it up.
So the Department of Justice went about trying to dish some ‘dirt’ on the elections and generate some evidence of voter fraud. Some attorneys refused to play ball. So The Attorney General’s lackey, Monica Goodling (check out her “credentials”) sacked them. Eight of them. Then, when it got too hot to handle, she resigned.
As the Washington Post points out, “Firing a prosecutor for failing to find wide voter fraud is like firing a park ranger for failing to find Sasquatch”.
Meanwhile, Bush has been populating the Attorney General’s office with more of his lackeys with very questionable, even alarming track records.
However, this doesn’t end there. Bona fide voters are being intimidated in a manner that is designed to deter them from approaching a polling booth in the future. Especialy poor, black first-time voters who are likely to be voting Democrat. Read about the Republican witchhunt in poor black neighbourhoods in Milwaukee in 2006 to find ‘voter fraud’.
Quote of the day:
Amidst asserting the need to restore peace, freedom and sunshine to Eye-Rack, President George W. Bush said,
“There are jobs Americans aren’t doing … If you’ve got a chicken factory, a chicken-plucking factory, or whatever you call them, you know what I’m talking about.”
abortion-ban, MUSINGS, Politics, supreme-court
Bee n’ Jai:
I pretty much agree with you…..its so disgusting to see the media pricking the wounds of the grieving families time and again…..can we give them space please! The blog you linked to, is spot on with certain facts.
and about the headline #1…..it just hurts!
thanks for the shout-out regarding the media circus on Vtech tragedy…..
Very true bee and Jai, I switch on the tv just to see students in VA tech being interviewed and the killer’s video tapes. Its repulsive.
Re: Headline # 1 - they took giant steps backward with that decision.
Headline # 2 - I can’t wait to see how this is going to end.
One of the first shocks I received in the US was when I was told abortion was not legal in many of the States!! And yes, because women are natural mothers they will not take recourse in abortion unless they have a compelling reason to. And they should get to decide whether the reason is compelling or not.
Thank God it is legal in our developing country - imagine what would happen to the state of women if it were not! It may be much misused but it serves a purpose - of making it available as a safe option, whatever the reason.
This is why I hate mainstream media. Blood-sucking mongers of woe and tragedy … aarrghhh !!!! There’s tornado/hurricane and these s*ckers are ready with their panicky-scripts making it look like the end of the world…. there’s a killing and the nasty wolves are all over the place harassing everybody even the cobweb in their house.
Huh!
Wherever we are, developed nation, under-developed, rich poor, hell , heaven …wherever we are, it’s filled with sick and distorted minds trying to control every body else’s lives…and the worst part is, majority of the people do not realise it or worse, even if they realise it, cannot / do not do anything !
Bee..good to see you writing about this..
Bee you know what I hate Ralph Nader more than ever. See what his stupidity has cost us. Bush and his men are out erasing the many freedoms that people fought so hard for.
How many of these so called moral virtuists will be ready to adopt kids there are plenty of them in the US leave alone the rest of the world. They care about the one in the womb but what about the millions who are suffering outside the womb.
Media is all over the place when we don’t want them to be
but when they needed to do their duty and ask all the questions they went absconding!!
sorry, indo, why do you hate ralph nader? didn’t understand? are you implying that he cut into gore’s vote? well, i think two-party democracy is a farce. more people need to contest, and it needs to become a multi-party system. otherwise you are limited to a choice between two aprties that are quite like each other. - b.
No offense, but this makes me really glad I’m not living in the US! I’m totally with you on all this, although I’m quite sure I don’t get the more “domestic” version of US headlines.
I thought America was meant to be progressive. Bad enough the attitude the administration has toward homosexuality but now this? Dark Ages here comes America!