#its because of same sex marriage and abortion

[djuvlipen]

controversial radblr opinion: the left isn't just as bad as the right and leftist men aren't just as bad as right-wing men. It is absolutely true that there is a liberal left and an antifeminist left that wants to decriminalise prostitution, that embraces porn, that deplatforms and boycotts women and lesbians for defending sex-based rights, that supports abusers and tolerates sexual violence, but there is also a left that wants to abolish porn and prostitution and supports women's rights (and yes, there are men advocating for this. I am not pulling a 'not all men', just stating the fact that there are leftist men who oppose TRA politics and the sex industry). Right-wing parties have absolutely never offered women that kind of support. Pretending that left doesn't exist anymore is plain wrong and frankly disrespectful to leftist activists who advocate daily for the abolition of prostitution and for holding abusers accountable (I am in such a party).

Claiming the left is just as bad as the right when it comes to women's rights is so disingenuous and irresponsible given the current political climate in Europe, where fascist parties have been steadily growing and becoming the #1 political force on the continent. It's not leftists who want to deprive women of their reproductive rights, who want to establish religious authoritarian regimes, arrest prostituted women. It's the right.

Feminism is a left-wing political movement and overemphasizing the differences between the feminist movement and leftist politics is irresponsible. Claiming you are 'politically homeless' is irresponsible and a pretty privileged thing to call yourself when poor women, disabled women, woc and lesbians don't have the luxury of not voting for the left. Divesting from left-wing parties because you disagree on their support of transactivism is irresponsible.

Politics won't wait for you, we shouldn't leave the entire leftist political platform to men and TRAs. Feminists have to invest leftist parties (and be active in those parties) if we want to have a political platform.

Feminism has its roots in Marxist thought. Read de Beauvoir, MacKinnon, Firestone, Federici - they all extensively rely on Marxist theory to analyse men/women power relationships. You can't be a serious feminist if you refuse to engage with Marx's work because he was a man. You can't be a serious feminist if you don't know some basic Marxist concepts (dialectical materialism is the one that comes to my mind) and if you disregard absolutely everything Marx ever did or said and even reject the label 'marxist'. Anti-leftist sentiment is very prevalent on here, and I absolutely get where it's coming from, but it's a misrepresentation of reality to say all of the left is just as misogynistic as the right. And I'm so sick of hearing they are one and the same when my country's far-right party (who opposes gay marriage, wants to restrict abortion access, and such) has been winning all our recent elections

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

For the second week in a row, Republicans in state legislatures are making the interesting choice of fighting for child marriage. In Missouri, where children 16 or older can marry with parental permission, a bill to prohibit anyone under age 18 from getting a marriage license easily cleared the Republican-controlled Senate 31 to one last month. But now, the bill can’t get out of committee in the state House because seven out of 14 committee members are House Republicans who oppose the bill.

Those opponents include Rep. Hardy Billington (R), who insists without any evidence or logic whatsoever that banning child marriage will lead to a spike in abortions, even as abortion is totally banned in the state. “My opinion is that if someone [wants to] get married at 17, and they’re going to have a baby and they cannot get married, then chances of abortion are extremely high,” he told the Kansas City Star this week. Earlier this week, I also had to write about a different Republican lawmaker in New Hampshire who used the same argument against a bill to ban child marriage. This doesn’t make sense—if someone of any age is pregnant and doesn’t want to be, they’ll probably seek abortion care; this actually has nothing to do with marriage.

Another opponent of the bill, Rep. Dean Van Schoiack (R), told the Star that he opposes the bill because he knows someone who got married as a 17-year-old girl and is still married. “Why is the government getting involved in people’s lives like this?” Van Schoiak said.

Of course, if we’re bringing anecdotes and lived experience into this, I think I trust state Sen. Holly Thompson Rehder (R), who introduced the bill, a little more than Van Schoiack. “As a child that did get married, I would say I have a lot more insight to this issue than what he does,” Rehder said of Van Schoiack. Per the Star, Rehder got married at 15 to a 21-year-old, while her sister at 16 married her 39-year-old drug dealer. “The government does tell people when they can get married because we do have an age limit right now. The fact that [Van Schoiack] feels that it’s OK for a parent to make a decision for a child, that is a lifetime decision, is offensive.”

At this point, I would like to note that Rehder, who is currently running for lieutenant governor, might be right about this one thing, but is wrong about… pretty much everything else. Rehder supports the state’s total abortion ban and campaigned on a pledge to promote “the Trump Agenda” in her district in Southeast Missouri.

Nonetheless, if her bill doesn’t make it to a vote before the end of the legislative session on May 17, Rehder, who’s currently running for lieutenant governor, said she plans to introduce it as an amendment attached to another bill. She told the Star she’s confident that brought to the floor for a vote, the bill would have a majority…but right now, it’s simply being held up by its Republican opponents on committee.

Rehder’s bill comes after Missouri lawmakers in 2018 raised the state’s minimum marriage age to 16 with parental approval following backlash at the time over how many 15-year-olds in the state were being married. Currently, Missouri prohibits marriage between a minor and someone who is 21 or older, similar to the state’s statutory rape laws that prohibit sexual intercourse between someone 21 and older and someone under 17. This is all pretty needlessly confusing, but what isn’t confusing is that this is part of a pattern of Republican lawmakers going to bat for child marriage—from the state representative in New Hampshire who insisted that “ripe” and “fertile” teens should be able to marry, to a different Missouri lawmaker who last year declared that 12-year-olds should be able to get married because he personally knew someone who married at 12 (I mean, I hope they’re doing well today, but somehow, I, err, have my doubts…).

Experts and advocates against child trafficking have long pointed to how laws that permit child marriage put them at greater risk. The bill in Missouri’s legislature is notably part of a bipartisan effort, introduced by Rehder and Democrat Lauren Arthur. But despite Rehder’s best efforts, their bill is being blocked by members of her own party, even as Republican politicians have spent the better part of the last few years escalating their baseless and fearmongering smears of queer people as child sexual predators. As it turns out based on the political affiliations of every lawmaker fighting tooth-and-nail for child marriage (and, consequently, adult predators’ ability to marry children), the call might just be coming from inside the house—the Missouri state House, specifically.

[contemplatingoutlander]

A Trump judge sends Southwest Airlines to right-wing reeducation camp

Ruth Marcus does an excellent job of pointing out how another Trump appointed judge (from Texas) is stomping on the Constitution when it comes to the separation of church and state. The judge in this case doesn't seem to understand the difference between people being allowed to hold religious beliefs and religious people harassing others who don't share their religious beliefs. The article is well worth reading. Here are some excerpts:

Another day, another extremist ruling by another extremist Trump judge, and this decision — from Texas, no surprise — is straight out of “The Handmaid’s Tale.” The judge held lawyers for Southwest Airlines in contempt of court for their actions in a religious-discrimination case brought by a former flight attendant and ordered them to undergo “religious liberty training.” And not just any instruction, but training conducted by the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a conservative group that litigates against same-sex marriage, transgender rights and abortion rights. [emphasis added] The issue arises from a lawsuit filed by Charlene Carter, a flight attendant for more than 20 years and a longtime antagonist of the Southwest flight attendants union. In 2017, after union members attended the Women’s March under a “Southwest Airlines Flight Attendants” banner, Carter sent Facebook messages to the union president containing graphic antiabortion messages.

[See more under the cut.]

“This is what you supported during your Paid Leave with others at the Women’s MARCH in DC …. You truly are Despicable in so many ways,” Carter wrote in one message accompanying a video of an aborted fetus. After the union president complained, Southwest fired Carter, saying her conduct “crossed the boundaries of acceptable behavior,” was “inappropriate, harassing, and offensive,” and “did not adhere to Southwest policies and guidelines.” An arbitrator found that Southwest had just cause for the firing. Carter, represented by the National Right to Work Committee, sued, claiming Southwest and the union violated her rights under federal labor laws and Title VII. The federal job-bias law bars employers from discriminating on the basis of religion, and Carter claimed she was dismissed because of her sincerely held religious beliefs against abortion. [...] The scary part is what came next. [U.S. District Judge Brantley] Starr instructed the airline to “inform Southwest Flight Attendants that, under Title VII, [Southwest] may not discriminate against Southwest flight attendants for their religious practices and beliefs.” Instead, Southwest said in a message to staff that the court “ordered us to inform you that Southwest does not discriminate against our Employees for their religious practices and beliefs.” This sent Starr into orbit.... “In the universe we live in — the one where words mean something — Southwest’s notice didn’t come close to complying with the Court’s order,” Starr said. “To make matters worse,” he said, Southwest had circulated a memo about the decision to its employees repeating its view that Carter’s conduct was unacceptable and emphasizing the need for civility. “Southwest’s speech and actions toward employees demonstrate a chronic failure to understand the role of federal protections for religious freedom,” Starr decreed. He proceeded to order three Southwest lawyers to undergo eight hours of religious-liberty training — a move he described as “the least restrictive means of achieving compliance with the Court’s order.” Luckily, Starr observed, “there are esteemed nonprofit organizations that are dedicated to preserving free speech and religious freedom.” [...] Adjectives fail me here. This is not even close to normal.... the notion of subjecting lawyers to a reeducation campaign by the likes of the ADF is tantamount to creating a government-endorsed thought police. Imagine the uproar — and I’m not suggesting these groups are in any way comparable — if a liberal-leaning federal judge ordered instruction on women’s rights (those are constitutionally protected, too) by Planned Parenthood. [...] This is the alarming legacy that former president Donald Trump has left us — a skewed bench that he would augment if reelected. The Trump judges seem to be competing among themselves for who can engage in the greatest overreach. [...] Conservatives are quick to balk at anything resembling the order that Starr issued when they disagree with the underlying principle. [...] I need no excuses for calling this what it is: a reeducation program — outrageous, unconstitutional and an abuse of judicial authority. [emphasis added]

[fandomsandfeminism]

Maybe it's just a lack of perspective thing, but when I see "blue state"* liberals making blanket statements about "red states"* and how how they are getting what they deserve etc etc for voting for Republicans, I'm just like.... why do you think Republicans being in power in these states is a bad thing?

(* caveat to remind people that there are no blue/red states. All states are politically blended and no president carries any state by even 70% and its an illusion made by first past the post winner take all elections.)

Like, who do you think is actually, tangibly, materially hurt by Ted Cruz?

Because if Ted Cruz contributes to voting down universal health care, or federal protections for trans people, or recognition for same sex marriage- that will not affect those of yall in "blue" states. Blue states with blue govenors and blue legislators will and have passed state laws and state protections at a state level for these things. Blue states will double down on abortion access and voting access and trans health care. They have! Trans people in California aren't impacted by any fucking nonsense that comes out if Ted Cruz's mouth except for the inherent psychic damage of hearing his voice.

It's those of us in "red" states, who can't rely on state protections, who suffer when federal protections fail. Who's access to health care is limited, who's protections from discrimination are stripped, who have abortions banned and birth control threatened, who have government officials threatening to make registries of trans people and chip away at voting access again and again and again. Greg Hot Wheels Pointy Boots Abbott is actively out to get us, and without federal protections, he can do what he wants.

(The maybe one big exception here is climate change actions, where lack of federal action is in fact bad for everyone. )

But for the most part, the people who are actually harmed by Republicans in power are the people who live in the states where they have power. It's the queer people and women and nonwhite folks in "red" states who are actually harmed.

So it is deeply stupid to decry those politicians AND then write off *all the people who are actually hurt by those politicians* as "deserving it."

(Yes, REGARDLESS of who they actually voted for. I can wax poetic all day about how damn gerrymandered and voter suppressed Texas is, but at the end of the day, my republican voting neighbors are hurt by this shit too, and I don't think they deserve it either.)

[theconstitutionisgayculture]

Same anon that's something the supreme Court question. Why do you say it like they are defending it when I have seen multiple people say they don't care about the Constitution either? Like aren't they the ones that overturning roe v wade and there's a possibility they will make same-sex marriages illegal again with all this project 2025 stuff that's going up?

speaking about that, is Biden actually accomplishing those goals? And please make this very clear with facts. This may require you to write up a longer post about this but I think I really want to understand if that is a fear monitoring thing or if this is another "Dems are bad, gop good" shit

First of all, Roe v Wade was always bad law. The idea that the right to privacy means a right to legal abortions never made sense, morally or constitutionally, and it never should have been in place at all, let alone for as long as it was. The Supreme Court overturning unconstitutional laws and reversing unconstitutional decisions is literally why it exists. The Constitution empowers the court for that very reason. If you want other examples of the court protecting the constitution, just look at the Heller decision, or any of the other decisions rolling back unconstitutional gun laws in the past few years. Look also at Matal v Tam, in which the court unanimously ruled that the government can't ban speech just because it's offensive. Which means that there can be no laws against so-called hate speech in the US, and the Orwellian tyranny you see all over Europe under the guise of combating "hate speech" can never legally happen here. Which is a massive win for free speech and the entire reason the 1st Amendment was written.

As for gay marriage getting overturned, it's incredibly unlikely, since there are zero court cases about gay marriage going on right now and the Supreme Court can't just make rulings out of nothing (much to the frustration of more than a few people, I'm sure) it's basically a non-issue. If you're referring to what Clarence Thomas said about gay marriage in his majority opinion overturning Roe, he specifically said that this ruling shouldn't be used as justification to overturn the Obergefell v. Hodges decision on its own, though he did say that those decisions deserve another look. And he's right. Obergefell is another case of an activist court inventing rights out of thin air. There is no such thing as the right to marriage, for gay or straight people. It should be overturned, and the issue of defining legal marriage should be left up to individual states, as the Constitution intended (see the 10th Amendment).

I've been asked about Project 2025 before, and I'll tell you what I told the last anon, as far as I can tell, it's a pile of nothing. It's a group of policy proposals made by a bunch of conservative political commenters I've never heard of, who, as far as I know, have no connection to any Republican political campaign or the RNC. No one on the right is talking about the project. No politicians have come out in support of it. No campaigns have said they're going to implement those policies. Project 2025 is a left-wing boogeyman, and not even one that's getting a lot of traction in left wing circles since the only time I've ever seen anyone talking about it has been in my ask box and a few fringe far left conspiracy sites that came up when I originally tried to figure out what it was. It's the left attempt to have their own Agenda 2030 to be scared and angry about, except there aren't any international organizations trying to get the governments of the world to adopt their policies.

speaking about that, is Biden actually accomplishing those goals?

So, I really don't know what you mean by this. What goals?

[allthecanadianpolitics]

A right-wing Christian organization behind successful efforts to roll back LGBTQ2S+ and abortion rights in the U.S. has been working in Canada for years. And while it has racked up some “successes” in this country, it’s near impossible to tell what the group is up to because of Canada’s lax finance laws, leading to calls for greater transparency.

The non-profit Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) has been a central player in efforts to limit the rights of women, queer and trans people in the U.S. since the 1990s. The organization has been so pervasive and effective in its campaigns to malign LGBTQ2S+ people that it was classified as a “hate group” by the Southern Poverty Law Center. The ADF has intervened in numerous high-profile court cases including the recent Supreme Court case 303 Creative, which limited the purview of anti-discrimination legislation, and Dobbs earlier this year, which overturned the right to abortion in the U.S. The ADF is on a roll, with no sign of slowing down. The Guardian reported in June the ADF plans to use “model legislation” and lawsuits to overturn same-sex marriage, enact a total abortion ban and strip away trans rights in the U.S.  [...]

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

June 26, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

JUN 27, 2024

Today President Joe Biden pardoned more than 2000 former military personnel who had been convicted of engaging in consensual sex under a gay sex ban in the military that has since been repealed. People covered under the pardon can apply to have their military discharges corrected and to recover the pay and benefits the convictions cost them. “[M]aintaining the finest fighting force in the world…means making sure that every member of our military feels safe and respected,” Biden said in a statement. 

Biden said he was “righting an historic wrong.” “This is about dignity, decency, and ensuring the culture of our Armed Forces reflect the values that make us an exceptional nation,” he said.

On this date in 2015, the Supreme Court handed down the Obergefell v. Hodges decision, which said that states must license and recognize same-sex marriage because of the Fourteenth Amendment’s requirement that citizens must have the equal protection of the laws and cannot be deprived of rights without due process of the laws.  

In the New York Times today, Kate Zernike explained how the public conversations about abortion have shifted in the two years since the Supreme Court overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that recognized the constitutional right to abortion. The state bans that went into place have illustrated that abortion is indeed healthcare, as people suffering miscarriages have been unable to obtain the imperative medical care they need. 

Zernike quoted pollster Tresa Undem, who estimated that before the 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision overturned Roe, less than 15% of Americans thought that abortion was relevant to them personally. Now, though, Undem said, “it’s about pregnancy, and everybody knows someone who had a baby or wants to have a baby or might get pregnant. It’s profoundly personal to a majority of the public.”

In the three weeks since Biden announced restrictions on asylum applications for undocumented immigrants, the number of people trying to cross the border has dropped more than 40% to its lowest level since he took office. This information will likely come up in tomorrow’s scheduled debate between the president and presumptive Republican nominee Trump, who has made it clear he intends to accuse the president of promoting immigration policies that bring criminals into the United States.

Former representative Adam Kinzinger (R-IL), a military veteran who joined the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol and who has fiercely criticized Trump, today endorsed Biden for president. 

In a video, Kinzinger said: “[W]hile I certainly don’t agree with President Biden on everything, and I never thought I’d be endorsing a Democrat for president, I know that he will always protect the very thing that makes America the best country in the world: our democracy. Donald Trump poses a direct threat to every fundamental American value. He doesn’t care about our country. He doesn’t care about you. He only cares about himself. And he’ll hurt anyone or anything in pursuit of power.” 

On CNN tonight, Georgia governor Brian Kemp told Kaitlan Collins he did not vote for Trump in his state’s Republican primary, although he said he would “support the ticket” in November so that Georgia would remain in Republican hands. It was an interesting statement, since he could easily have deflected the question or simply said he voted for Trump if he cared about avoiding Trump’s wrath. But he appeared not to care, suggesting that Trump’s power even with prominent Republicans is slipping. 

Two Republican voters from Pennsylvania told MSNBC tonight that they are voting for Biden. When asked whether they think there is “a silent Biden voter out there,” one said, “I do. I know there is…. We don’t want to talk about it, but we’re all going to vote for Joe Biden.” 

By a 6–3 vote, the Supreme Court today blessed the practice of taking “gratuities” as a gift for past behavior by an official, distinguishing them from “bribes,” which require proof that there was an illegal deal in place. The case involved a former mayor from Indiana who helped a local truck dealership win $1.1 million in city contracts and then asked for and received $13,000 from the dealership’s owners. The mayor was found guilty of violating a federal anti-corruption law that prohibits state and local officials from taking gifts worth more than $5,000 from someone the official had helped to land lucrative government business.

For the majority, Justice Brett Kavanaugh suggested that the law prohibited officials from accepting “gift cards, lunches, plaques, books, framed photos or the like” in thanks for an official’s help, although David G. Savage of the Los Angeles Times noted that the law came into play only when the gift was worth more than $5,000. 

Savage pointed out that as the federal law in question covers about 20 million state and local officials, the decision could have wide impact. This decision that officials can accept “gifts” so long as they are not “bribes” might have something to do with the fact that Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito have accepted significant gifts from donors—Thomas’s count is upward of $4 million—and it doesn’t relieve the sense that this Supreme Court, with its three right-wing Trump-appointed justices, is untrustworthy.

Writing for justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and herself, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said, “Officials who use their public positions for private gain threaten the integrity of our most important institutions.” 

Yesterday, House Republicans released draft legislation to fund the Justice Department and the Commerce Departments for fiscal year 2025, which starts October 1. They propose to slash nearly a billion dollars from the Department of Justice in retaliation for its bringing cases against Trump, and both to cut funding for the FBI and to block the construction of its new headquarters. Attorney General Merrick Garland called the cuts “unacceptable” and said that the “effort to defund the Justice Department and its essential law enforcement functions will make our fight against violent crime all the more difficult.”

In a secret vote yesterday  by a House panel that fell along party lines, House Republicans also agreed to say that the last Congress’s construction of the January 6th committee was invalid and illegal. This enabled them to back a last-ditch effort by Trump ally Steve Bannon to stay out of jail. After Bannon refused to respond to the committee’s subpoena for documents and testimony about the January 6 attack, a jury found him guilty of being in contempt of Congress. 

Today, Representative Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) filed a brief with the Supreme Court saying that Bannon was right to ignore the subpoena because the committee was illegally organized. Politico’s Kyle Cheney pointed out that the lawyer for the brief is not a House lawyer but rather comes from America First Legal, a public interest organization put together by Trump loyalist Stephen Miller to challenge the legal efforts to rein in Trump’s orders when in office. 

Finally, Milwaukee journalist Dan Shafer reported in The Recombobulation Area today that event bookings expected for the week of the Republican National Convention, which is set to begin on July 15, four days after Judge Juan Merchan sentences Trump for his 34 criminal convictions, have not materialized. Estimates were that the convention would bring $200 million in economic impact to Milwaukee, but that now appears to be optimistic. “[This is] certainly nothing like we were told or promised,” chef Gregory León told Shafer. With locals staying home to avoid the downtown area during the convention, “[i]f the [reservation] book stays the way it is, we’re not going to make enough money to cover costs.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[tuurverheydepoetryandprose]

Nationalists claim to love their nation, but they invariably hold most of that nation’s population in contempt.

They claim to only dislike economic migrants, but pretty quickly you find out the reasons for migration or what these people actually contribute matters a whole lot less than skin colour, language and clothes. Even when you’re a local & culturally indigenous, if you’re of the wrong ethnicity, you’re on their shit list somewhere, probably not even that far down.

They claim to only dislike feminists, but then they are against abortion, make arguments about women needing to live to support men, and are really anxious about women not having kids before 30. Very quickly the freedom of choice seems to be limited to only one gender.

They claim to only hate wokeism, but strangely they keep moving the needle on what that is. Trans people are the first target, but once they make progress restricting those people’s rights, they’ll start talking arguments about how the marriage between men and women is the pillar of society. Before you know it same-sex relationships are deemed unnatural along with a host of other things. And what is seen as unnatural can quickly become illegal. This is a proven and demonstrated pattern of anti-lgbtqia+ ideologies.

And then for the cis-het white men who are their base. They seem to really like them, don’t they? But ah, scratch some of these nationalists’ rhetoric and it turns out most of them are expendable to say the least. There are wolves and sheep etc. In other words, why don’t you go and die in that pointless war? Or go and slave in that pointless job and we’ll decide who gets to determine the direction of the nation and reap its benefits. Also, if you are disabled or neurodivergent, they’ll tolerate you for a while, but if you really drill down into their thinking, it doesn’t take too long before you’ll find eugenicist intentions.

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? That’s exactly because it is the same deal most neoliberal parties will give you only with the reactionary aspect mostly unveiled.

Like neoliberalism, nationalism is an ideology that serves only a very small group at its core, i. e. those already in power. The main distinction is that the former uses economic inequality and austerity to keep the privileged on top. With the latter its usually the use of reactionary violence and discriminatory policies. Combine both ideologies and you get 99% of the populist right. And still they claim to be for the people…

[fillejondrette]

a small selection of some of the more disturbing position statements from the 2024 Texas Republican platform https://texasgop.org/official-documents/#platform

Support restoring state sovereignty with the repeal of the 17th Amendment of the US Constitution and the appointment of US Senators by the state legislatures

We support affirmation of God, including prayer, the Bible, and the Ten Commandments being returned to our schools, courthouses, and other government buildings.

We urge lawmakers to enact legislation to abolish abortion by immediately securing the right to life and equal protection of the laws to all preborn children from the moment of fertilization, because abortion violates the United States Constitution by denying such persons the equal protection of the law.

We oppose environmentalism, or “climate change“ initiatives, that obstruct legitimate business interests and private property use, including the regulatory use limitation and confiscation by governmental agencies. We support the reclassification of carbon dioxide as a non-pollutant, abolition of the Environmental Protection Agency, and repeal of the Endangered Species Act.

We support legislation to prohibit the use of any government funds, as well as the transportation of pregnant women across Texas’ state lines, for the purpose of procuring an elective abortion and for the provision of a private right of action against all persons and organizations who aid and abet in the harming of the woman, and the killing of her pre-born child.

We urge the Legislature and the State Board of Education to require instruction on the Bible, servant leadership, and Christian self-governance. We support the use of chaplains in schools to counsel and give guidance from a traditional biblical perspective based on Judeo-Christian principles with the informed consent of a parent.

As long as parents are responsible for an adult child, through college or the age of 26 when children are on the parents’ insurance, the parents must have access to medical information, grades, and other information normally afforded to parents of minor children.

We support abolishing the Texas Child Mental Health Care Consortium, the trauma-informed care policy, school-based mental health providers, school-based or school-connected mental health interventions, and any other public school programs that serve to expand access to minors. Legislators shall prohibit all reproductive healthcare services in public schools.

We believe the Obergefell v. Hodges decision, overturning the Texas law prohibiting same-sex marriage in Texas, has no basis in the Constitution and should be nullified.

The Texas Family Code shall be completely rewritten with regards to No-Fault Divorce and Child Custody. Suits related to these topics shall be delineated in such a way as to remove the need for any but the most minimal judicial interaction, and promote the maintenance of the traditional family via required intervention or counseling prior to any decree of divorce. We urge the Legislature to rescind unilateral no-fault divorce laws, to support covenant marriage, and to pass legislation extending the period of time in which a divorce may occur to six months after the date of filing for divorce.

We recognize that we are living in a time of geopolitical upheaval and unprecedented complexity of threats to our liberties, constitutional governance, and national sovereignty. These threats emanate from “globalist” agents both within and outside our borders. The United States is a sovereign nation founded on the principles of freedom. We reject any assertion of authority over our nation or its citizens from foreign individuals or entities, such as the World Economic Forum, World Health Organization, and the United Nations. We stand firmly against the concept of a One World Government or The Great Reset.

[harrypotterfuryroad]

genuinely fascinated how terfs can still act like JKR isn't connected with highly homophobic and sexist people, as in people who are actively trying to campaig against abortion rights and same-sex marriage (Emma Nickelson, Posie Parker etc.)

At some point you'll have to realise that trying to enforce anti-trans laws will always affect bodily autonomy for all women and they are going after gay marriage next. Or I guess you could stay mad abt trans people, without being affected by them negatively in any way whatsoever

what’s it going to take to get you people to understand that they’ve been going for gay marriage since the second the obergefell decision was announced and they’ve been going for women’s bodily autonomy since forever

fucking hate it when people say they’re coming for women’s bodily autonomy or gay marriage “next” as though that hasn’t been a core part of the political strategy of the right for centuries, you’re just admitting that you haven’t been paying attention to things that don’t directly affect you

without the fights for abortion access or marriage equality the trans movement would have nothing to blatantly imitate in their push for legitimacy (the original slogan was “women’s rights are human rights,” and “queer as in fuck you” had its origins as a political statement to throw in the face of a government that was letting people die by the thousands with no intervention instead of the “it’s not a phase mom” thing it’s warped into (if your impulse here is to say that the aids epidemic is equally as bad as gender dysphoria i will embarrass you))

the difference is that The Gay Agenda™️ never had medically sterilizing minors as a core priority of its platform so conservatives never had that angle to use against us which is why anti trans legislation seems like it’s gaining traction much faster than anti gay legislation, but that’s mostly because a) it’s really easy to argue why cosmetic procedures with no medical evidence supporting their therapeutic efficacy are not necessary and b) homophobia and misogyny are so fundamental to our society that you don’t even notice it. women and gay people have been dealing with targeted legislation for centuries before the first pronoun pins rolled off the production line. or do you actually think that attempted drag bans are like a novel thing and have nothing to do with historical homophobia

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Daniel Villarreal at LGBTQ Nation:

A completed draft Texas Republican Party platform refers to homosexuality as “an abnormal lifestyle choice,” gender-affirming care as “child abuse,” and Drag Queen Story Hour as “predatory sexual behavior.” The platform has been voted on by state party delegates and will be formally adopted on Wednesday after a final vote count. The list of state party priorities calls for an end to legal same-sex marriages, same-sex parenting, all LGBTQ+ anti-discrimination laws, all transgender rights — including gender-affirming care for children and adults — a ban on LGBTQ+ content in schools and libraries, the defunding of all diversity-equity-inclusion (DEI) initiatives, and legal protections for anyone who discriminates against queer people based on “religious or moral beliefs.”

Furthermore, the Texas GOP platform calls for a complete end to all of the following: pornography, federal welfare programs, minimum wage laws, mandatory sick or family leave policies, net neutrality, removal of Confederate monuments, pro-immigrant sanctuary cities, public education of undocumented children, no-fault divorce, non-abstinence sex education, abortion, birthright citizenship, professorial tenure in colleges and universities, cannabis legalization, anti-climate change legislation, contact tracing for the tracking of communicable diseases, federal regulations ensuring safe farm food production, and U.S. participation in the United Nations and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The platform also calls for fertilized human egg cells to be legally recognized as people, the passage of a “state electoral college-style” law that would make it nearly impossible for Democrats to win statewide office, a ballot measure for Texas to secede from the United States, the invalidation of all federal laws not approved of by county sheriffs, and for Christianity to be inserted into public schools and government buildings.

[...] “Homosexuality is an abnormal lifestyle choice,” it continues. “No one should be granted special legal status based on their LGBTQ+ identification…. We are opposed to same-sex parenting, intentionally subjecting a child to the loss of their biological father or mother, and other non-traditional definitions of family.” “We oppose all efforts to validate transgender identity,” it adds. “There shall be no attempt to engage in so-called ‘gender affirming’ medical or mental health intervention for persons between the ages of 18 and 26,” including the use of names and pronouns associated with trans people’s genders. The platform would require health insurance companies covering gender-affirming care to also fully fund de-transitional procedures. The platform says that any professionals who aid a minor’s gender transition in any way should face professional, civil, and criminal penalties, as well as lawsuits from anyone affected by their behavior. Furthermore, it calls for all gender-segregated facilities in prisons, schools, and government buildings to only be accessible to people based on their biological sex assigned at birth.

[...] It also calls for laws prohibiting the exposure of minors to “social transitioning” (that is, exploration of a gender other than the one they were assigned at birth), “predatory sexual behaviors” like Drag Queen Story Hour, and “the desensitization of children to sexual topics.”

The Texas GOP's platform reaffirms and expands its war on LGBTQ+ Texans, such as including anti-LGBTQ+, anti-trans, and anti-drag planks like baselessly calling Drag Queen Story Hours "predatory sexual behaviors" and gender-affirming care "child abuse".

This is in addition to calling homosexuality "an abnormal lifestyle choice" (a bigoted dogwhistle term used against recognizing LGBTQ+ identity) and opposing trans identity.

[contemplatingoutlander]

The Overton Window: How Trump and the MAGA movement normalized autocratic, theocratic, and neofascist ideas 

According to Vox: 

There’s a concept in political theory developed by Joseph P. Overton which suggests that there’s a “window” of acceptable ideas and policy proposals in public discourse. Everything inside the window is normal and expected, while everything outside the window is radical, ridiculous, or unthinkable. And Overton argued that the easiest way to move that window was to force people to consider ideas at the extremes, as far away from the window as possible. Because forcing people to consider an unthinkable idea, even if they rejected it, would make all less extreme ideas seem acceptable by comparison -- it would move the “window” slowly in that direction. [emphasis added]

I thought I would share this old video from Dec. 2017 that looks at how Trump’s first year in office moved the Overton Window much farther to the right than it had before Trump became president. 

The video is well worth watching, because in retrospect, it was prescient of the huge right-wing shift in today’s political discourse and policies in which:

Election deniers came very close to becoming secretaries of state and governors in swing states.

Red states have passed numerous bills that prevent the discussion of racism, sexism, and LGBTQ+ issues in schools.

The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and numerous red states passed draconian laws banning abortion.

The Supreme Court is poised to support the discredited Independent Legislature Theory that could decimate the ability of the American people to elect a president of their choosing.

The Supreme Court has crippled the Voting Rights Act and red states are passing numerous voter suppression laws.

The gun lobby (and their acolytes in the Supreme Court) have created a nightmare where open carry laws are multiplying and gun control laws are being overturned.

Red states like Florida are legislating (or pushing to legislate) the teaching of a distorted, whitewashed history of the U.S., that emphasizes its founding as a “Christian” nation.

The Supreme Court has made it much harder for the Environmental Protection Agency to do its job at this critical time when the disastrous effects of climate change are accelerating.

Republicans are openly talking about dismantling programs like Medicare and Social Security.

The Supreme Court seems poised to overturn affirmative action in universities.

Some republicans are openly talking about banning birth control and same sex marriage and reinstituting sodomy laws.

[edited]

[mitchipedia]

Cory Doctorow: “If only the Democratic Party was as scared of its base as the Republicans are of their own.”

Progressives need to learn from the lunatic wing of the Repubican Party.

The GOP is wildly unpopular among Americans and maintains power due to voter suppression and antimajoritarian institutions such as the Senate and Electoral College. The Republican Party has only one one Presidential election on popular votes in the last 36 years, in 2004, when GW Bush won a plurality (not a majority).

36 years!

Doctorow:

The GOP’s platform just isn’t popular. Take the groomer panic: 71% of Americans approve of same-sex marriage. The people losing their shit about queer people are a strange, tiny minority…. Every one of the GOP’s tentpole issues is wildly unpopular: expanding access to assault rifles, banning immigration, lowering taxes on the rich, cutting social programs, forcing pregnant people to bear unwanted children, etc. This is true all the way up to the GOP’s coalescing support for Trump as their 2024 candidate. Trump has lost every popular vote he’s ever stood for, and owes his term in the Oval Office to the antimajoritarian Electoral College system, gerrymandering, and massive voter suppression…. … Dem leaders are basically ‘normal’ center-right politicians, not radicals. And, unlike their GOP counterparts, politicians like Clinton, Obama and Biden don’t hide their disdain for the radical wing of their party. Even never-Trumper Republicans are afraid of their base. Romney declared himself “severely conservative” and McCain “put scare quotes around ‘health of the mother’ provisions for abortion rights….. The GOP fringe imposes incredible discipline on their leaders. Take all the nonsense about “woke capitalism”: on the one hand, it’s absurd to call union-busting, tax-dodging, worker-screwing companies ‘woke’ (even if they sell Pride flags for a couple of weeks every year). But on the other hand? The GOP leadership have actually declared war on the biggest corporations in America, to the point that the WSJ says that ‘Republicans and Big Business broke up’.

Meanwhile the Biden administration has no coherent policy and governs by doling out favors to the coalition of wings of the Democratic Party.

This isn’t just bad for policy, it’s bad politics, too. It presumes that if some Democratic voters want pizza, and others want hamburgers, that you can please everyone by serving up pizzaburgers. No one wants a pizzaburger. The failure to deliver a coherent, muscular vision … has left the Democrats vulnerable. Because while the radical proposals of the GOP fringe may not enjoy much support, there are large majorities of Americans who have lost faith in the status quo and are totally uninterested in the Pizzaburger Party.

This opens the door to someone like RFK Jr., who is the Democratic Party’s version of Donald Trump, tapping into the party rank-and-file’s legitimate outrage at their party elite and the US government.

[mariacallous]

Holding a rainbow flag, Marco Marras walked on stage at the start of a rally being held by Giorgia Meloni in Sardinia during her election campaign to confront her about gay rights. As security men moved to shoo him away, the student told the Brothers of Italy leader, now Italy’s first female prime minister, he wanted to be able to get married and raise a family in his own country. Meloni replied: “You want a lot of things … everyone wants things; you already have civil unions.”

If gay people in Italy, a country that regularly ranks in reports as being among the worst in western Europe for LGBTQ+ rights, had already understood that privileges so far gained were threadbare, Meloni made it explicitly clear they would not get any better under her government.

“I acted out of a sense of duty,” said Marras, 24. “Meloni had come to Cagliari to meet an audience of ‘yes men’, people who support her and who call her ‘great Giorgia’. I wanted to show something that her electorate doesn’t want to see or accept – LGBT people – we are not monsters but normal people who want basic rights. She practically responded: ‘Be happy with what you have’ – they think I should live a lesser life because I’m gay.”

A government led by Brothers of Italy, a party with neofascist origins, and including Matteo Salvini’s far-right League and Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, was sworn into office on Saturday. The first formal step towards its formation resulted in the election of two controversial figures: Ignazio La Russa, a Brothers of Italy politician who collects fascist memorabilia, and Lorenzo Fontana, a League member with anti-abortion and anti-gay views, as speakers of the upper and lower house of parliament respectively.

Italy enacted a civil unions law in 2016 when the country was governed by a coalition led by the centre-left Democratic party, but the bill stopped short of legalising gay marriage, while a clause that would have allowed a person to adopt the child of their same-sex partner was scrapped after pressure from rightwing parties and the Catholic church.

A common feature of the rabble-rousing speeches given by Meloni, a self-described “Christian mother” who says she defends traditional family values, is the reiteration of her view that a child should only be raised by heterosexual parents.

IVF for homosexual couples is banned in Italy, forcing people to travel abroad to become parents. Surrogacy, meanwhile, is prohibited outright, and Meloni has proposed extending a ban to criminalise gay couples who seek surrogate mothers abroad.

“It’s shocking, you could risk jail or fines regardless of where in the world your child is born through surrogacy,” said Monica Savoca, who lives in the Sicilian city of Catania with her Spanish wife, Maria Carreras, and their two children. “This discussion over surrogacy is part of a medieval vision. We felt afraid after the elections – they call themselves ‘moderate’ when, in fact, we’re talking about an extreme-right government that shouldn’t exist in Europe.”

Some cities and towns in Italy have embraced gay parenting, for example by allowing children of same-sex couples to be legally registered with the surnames of both parents. However, authorities in other areas have been less welcoming, such as in Catania, where the town hall is being taken to court by Savoca and Carreras after it refused the registration procedure for their children – Pau, 12, and Mia, 11.

They said they had never felt discrimination in terms of acceptance of their family in other areas of society. “I must say that society is much more open than the political world,” said Savoca. However, if they lose their case, and given the current political climate, they are ready to leave Italy and return to live in Spain, where they were married and both children were born via IVF, one to each mother.

They are especially afraid about the appointment of Eugenia Roccella, a Brothers of Italy deputy who in 2017 said she wanted to either abolish or significantly modify the civil unions bill, as minister of families, births and equal opportunities. Roccella said the bill had damaged the traditional family, and also rejected a law that would have criminalised homophobia, arguing that it compromised free speech.

“This government shouldn’t only make us in the minority groups afraid, but everyone,” said Savoca.

Italy’s new prime minister has repeatedly said she is not homophobic and will not try to repeal the civil unions law. However, there are fears her leadership will trigger a rise in homophobic attacks. The law that would have criminalised homophobia, drafted by Alessandro Zan, a gay politician with the Democratic party, was shelved last year after being boycotted by the rightwing groups.

“When the law was a theme there was a reaction in terms of an increase in homotransphobic incidents,” said Zan. “This is because people who acted out their discrimination felt authorised to do so. It will be the same with the demonisation of gay families. For this reason, we need to be really tough in opposition as we cannot accept that parties exploit human rights to obtain a political dividend.”

Marras, who was hit with a barrage of online insults over his confrontation with Meloni, worries that her government will attempt to justify homophobia, and may try to tamper with the civil unions law.

“They could amend the law to allow ‘conscientious objectors’, who for example could be mayors who are permitted to refuse a civil union for moral reasons,” he said. “So they maintain the law but block its implementation.”

[quinnfabrayapologist]

terfs: femininity is evil and must be abolished from society in all its forms for the female sex to ever be liberated

you: this means terfs love femininity and think women ought to follow the rules of femininity :) i am very smart

Except the most prominent TERF figureheads are actually super pro femininity, as is the average TERF. Like... to such an extent I'm a bit alarmed you don't notice.

There have been multiple instances of butch lesbians and GNC women being harassed in bathrooms by TERFs because they don't look feminine enough:

Butch lesbian opens up about 'increasing harassment' she faces when she uses public toilets (inews.co.uk)

Woman, 22, barred from ladies toilets in M&S after staff mistook her for a man  | Daily Mail Online

Butch Woman Are Facing Transphobia In Public Toilets (refinery29.com)

And TERFs just straight up wanting butch women out of their spaces for the same reasons:

The most prominent figureheads of the anti trans movement in the UK include Baroness Nicholson, who is a member of the House of Lords, and is homophobic and anti choice:

She also links gay marriage to trans existence. Basically she's transphobic because she's homophobic. She also personally engaged with me RE the abortion thing and said that dropping the limit to 12 weeks was intended to stop 3rd tri abortions, which a) start way after 12 weeks, b) are 1% of all abortions, and c) happen either because there was no abortion access in 2nd tri or because most brain development happens in 3rd and so the parent(s) found out the foetus wasn't viable in 3rd tri. She wants to force people who have found out their foetus will not survive outside the womb to be forced to carry to term and birth a stillborn, instead of aborting it weeks earlier.

Kellie-Jay Keen, meanwhile, everyone's favourite tomato soup flavoured hatemonger and far right mouthpiece, has said that teenage girls shouldn't have access to birth control, and that Gillick competency should be revoked. Gillick is meant to assess medical competency in teens, meaning that teenagers in certain situations can make their own medical choices. I personally have Gillick rights to thank for me not becoming a mother at 13 years old, following my being gangraped by my 'boyfriend' and his friends, and Gillick competency letting me get an abortion. If not for Gillick, my dad would have made me see through the pregnancy, and Kellie wants Gillick gone because if teenagers can get birth control, they can get puberty blockers. Funny enough, my pregnancy was also following precocious puberty, where my GP recommended that I, a cis girl, take blockers, and my dad refused. Cis kids actually make up the majority of kids on blockers due to precocious puberty, and they get blockers without issue in most cases, it's just trans kids that have these issues getting a normal medication.

Lloyd Russell-Moyle MP🌹🏳️‍🌈 on Twitter: "Veil slips: Kellie-Jay Keen (aka Posie Parker) says girls/young women shouldn’t access reproductive service without parent permission. Rolling back women’s rights. That’s what “gender critical” is folks - first they come for trans then they come for you. https://t.co/TkWsLTc1eM" / Twitter

She also talks, in this clip, about how 'parents need to take back control of their children'. At several rallies she's said (incorrectly) that 'her side' are older women, and the women on the pro trans side are all young, and that the young women 'will become us' as in older conservative bigots. Not only is this blatantly incorrect, given the sheer number of pro trans older people who exist, but it is yet another reason that Kellie doesn't want kids to have rights. Because she thinks anyone under 40 will grow out of being empathetic to minorities.

This tweet was in response to a cisgender woman with short hair going to a rape survivor's group wearing jeans. This caused a TERF in that group to assume she was a trans man and try and get her kicked out, and then the TERF was barred instead:

Again, this woman had short hair and wore jeans. That's it.

Here's another TERF saying that as her trans daughter is in STEM, she's a man. Pushing that fake narrative about how girls can't be scientists like any good feminist would:

Meanwhile, here are 2 garden variety TERFs offering a list of things that help them ID trans women:

Note the second one, which lists feminine face, gait, demeanour, and voice. Because according to this person, there is a certain way to look, act, and speak feminine. And I had to throw in the first one because it lists 'skin lightness' and 'skull size' as a feminine trait. TERFs never beating the racism allegations.

And speaking of racism allegations, here's Sharron Davies, star of the TERF movement, saying that all of the WOC who won at the Olympics are really men:

And someone saying the quiet part out loud here:

And here's another famous TERF showing what her priorities are in the wake of Roe v Wade:

And on a personal level, here are a list of reasons TERFs have told me, a cis woman, that I am really a trans woman and lying about the cis part:

My nose is too big

My jaw is too square

My chin is too prominent

My forehead is too large

My shoulders are too wide. The person who said this also asked if it was hard to no longer be able to 'play linebacker on the men's team'. I am told this is related to rugby.

My most worn outfit is a button down shirt and jeans. Apparently I have a 'prominent bulge'. So for a cis woman my dick is huge.

My necklines are too high

My necklines are too low (and no woman would show that much of her breasts)

My teeth are crooked

I put 'MA' in my twitter handle after graduating my Masters and no 'real woman' would brag about her academic achievements.

I am a PhD student. This was somehow enough of an indicator that I was trans for someone to call me the t slur.

I argued, at length, in favour of trans people. Apparently a real woman wouldn't argue as much as I did, and the fact I was persistent in pushing my points indicated that I was a man.

I was on the radio, and my voice was low and raspy.

I stood next to a friend, also a cis woman, in a photo, and I was larger than her (because she's a UK size 6 and I'm a UK 10)

My clavicles are straight????

TERFs are strictly enforcing femininity at the expense of women's rights, like the right to healthcare/birth control/abortion. They are showing open contempt for women who don't fit their loose, objective ideal of what a woman is, and making GNC cis women feel that bit less safe in women's spaces because they don't look the way TERFs think they should. They are most likely doing this because the money and power behind the TERF movement is conservative men, including groups like CPAC, who sponsored Kellie's latest tour.

You personally might love birth control and abortion and defying gender roles, and good for you, but if you're a TERF, a radfem, a GC, whatever you want to call yourself, you've aligned yourself with a movement that want women back in the kitchen and back in the alley, staffed by conservatives and keyboard warriors who are just waiting for someone, anyone, to stick their head above the parapet and do something 'unwomanly' or 'unfeminine' so they can invalidate your entire life experience and argument. I, as a woman, very simply refuse to let a bunch of racist, anti choice, conservatives speak for me. If you want that, best of luck to you, but I won't stop calling it out when I see it because I refuse to lose my hard-won rights to appease a radical minority of bigots.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

COMMENTARY

"Freedom cities" and a "Department of Life": It's too late for Trump to ditch Project 2025

We can't forget what Donald Trump has been up to while Democrats have obsessed over President Biden

By LUCIAN K. TRUSCOTT IV

Columnist

PUBLISHED JULY 9, 2024

Republican presidential candidate former U.S. President Donald Trump speaks at the Faith and Freedom Road to Majority conference at the Washington Hilton on June 24, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

While Democrats have busied themselves arguing whether they should stick with the presidential candidate they’ve already got, the current president, or try to anoint someone – anyone—else, the Republican candidate has been playing a shell game trying to hide his support of the most extreme positions of (his) Republican Party. 

Where’s the abortion pea? Is it under the cup hiding the Supreme Court, which after Donald Trump’s three right-wing appointments overturned Roe v. Wade? Is it under the cup hiding the nationwide ban on abortion evangelicals support and House Republicans voted for? Or is it under the cup hiding the most extreme state laws on abortion which ban the procedure even for women who have been raped or suffered incest by a member of their own family?

There are nitty-gritty details to some of the proposals in Project 2025, and at least some of them involve variations on the leave-it-up-to-the- states theme of the Dobbs decision that overturned the right to abortion.

See why he’s playing a shell game? Trump is shifting the cups all over the table because you can smell his guilt on the abortion issue every time he opens his mouth. Everywhere he goes, at every rally, Trump brags that “his” justices overturned Roe v. Wade. But pressed for specifics on the issue, not even the words, all over the map, are adequate to describe Donald Trump on abortion laws. He’s for a 15-week national ban. No, he’s for a 16-week national ban.  Oops!  He’s against a national ban on abortion. Oops again! When the evangelicals attacked him on that one, he declined to endorse a national ban on abortion, putting out a video on Truth Social saying, “My view is now that we have abortion where everybody wanted it from a legal standpoint, the states will determine by vote or legislation or perhaps both. And whatever they decide must be the law of the land — in this case, the law of the state.”

Got that gobbledegook? That’s Trump’s idea of how to sound “moderate” on the issue that most women consider the defining issue of our time: whether a woman is in control of her own body, or the state is. Trump keeps moving the cups around for the same reason the sharks won’t lift the cup a mark has chosen until his $20 is on the table: because there is no pea under any of the cups. The issue of abortion is as black and white as any issue could possibly be. Either you are for a woman’s right to have an abortion, or you’re not. Trump is trying to find a middle ground when there is no middle ground.

Project 2025 was supposed to boost Donald Trump's campaign — but it may be backfiring instead

He managed to find what he would no doubt consider a middle ground on Monday when the Platform Committee of the Republican National Convention voted for an exceedingly abbreviated platform that rushed the process and fudged the issues of abortion and same-sex marriage by not taking a federal position on either. The Republican Party has opposed abortion at every convention since Roe v. Wade was passed more than 50 years ago.

But not this year, which is probably why Trump found it necessary to back away from Project 2025, the radical proposal by the Heritage Foundation for what a new Trump administration would look like and what its goals would be.  Project 2025’s position on abortion, put forward in a 920-page “Mandate” that was written or contributed to by dozens of former Trump administration officials, is straightforward: Life begins at conception. They want to turn the Department of Health and Human Services into the “Department of Life.” They want the Food and Drug Administration to withdraw its approval for the two drugs used in most medical abortions, mifepristone and misoprostol (which the FDA ruled as safe many years ago.) They want their new “Department of Life” to require a record kept of how many abortions take place in all states, what was the reason for the abortion, where the woman lives, and what was the gestational age of “the child.” They want the rules requiring confidentiality of medical records lifted so that states can pursue criminal investigations of women who cross state lines to get an abortion. And they want the Trump Department of Justice to use the ancient and never-used Comstock Act to prosecute anyone using the mails to send or receive abortion pills. If the Comstock Act is enforced in the way advocated by Project 2025, it would criminalize the sending and receiving of medical equipment used in performing abortions, right down to face masks and medical scrubs.

Could that be why Trump issued this passel of lies on Truth Social last week?

As Mary McCarthy famously said of her political and literary rival Lillian Hellman, every word of that statement is a lie, including “and” and “the.”

Trump is trying to run away from Project 2025 when, according to Judd Legum’s Popular Information, “Of the 38 people responsible for writing and editing Project 2025, 31 were appointed or nominated to positions in the Trump administration and transition. In other words, while Trump claims he has "nothing to do" with the people who created Project 2025, over 81% had formal roles in his first administration.”

According to New York Magazine, the plans for a Trumpian future in Project 2025 are doubled down by something called Trump’s Agenda 47, which they’ve cobbled together from a series of videos and papers put out on Truth Social.  In the videos, Trump’s positions are stated in a series of Q & A’s. In one, Trump goes beyond Project 2025 Hitlerian calls for having states keep records of abortions performed. Trump is asked if states should “monitor women’s pregnancies to make sure they are not terminated.” His answer is chilling: “I think they might do that. Again, you’ll have to speak to the individual states. Look, Roe v. Wade was all about bringing it back to the states.”

See how easy that is? The answers on abortion are all about “bringing it back to the states” and giving them free rein.  The state of Idaho is having to be forced by court order (still to face adjudication by Trump’s Supreme Court) to obey the federal law that requires emergency rooms to perform abortions if they are deemed necessary to save the life or health of the mother, in addition to that of the fetus.

Both Project 2025 and Agenda 47 want to end birthright citizenship, established by the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. They want to allow the DOJ to appoint a special prosecutor to “go after” Biden and other Trump enemies.  They want to purge the Civil Service of “disloyal” federal employees and replace them with Trump loyalists – which would involve firing thousands of federal workers protected by Civil Service laws passed by Congress. Naturally, both projects endorse rounding up, imprisoning, and deporting millions of undocumented immigrants, many of whom are awaiting court dates for hearings on applications for asylum. This operation would entail the deployment of up to 300,000 soldiers to get the job done. The Trump proposals would upend decades of laws intended to benefit minorities to compensate for decades of discrimination that goes back to slavery and turn the laws around to benefit white people.

But here’s my favorite: Agenda 47 proposes the establishment of so-called “freedom cities” on federal land. In one of his unhinged videos, Trump describes it thusly: “These Freedom Cities will reopen the frontier, reignite American imagination, and give hundreds of thousands of young people and other people, all hardworking families, a new shot at home ownership and in fact, the American Dream.”

I leave it to your imagination who would pick the “young people” and “other people” and “hardworking families” to live in these freedom cities, what criteria would be used, and where the funding would come from, but I guarantee you it will be some version of “leave it up to the states.”

There are nitty-gritty details to some of the proposals in Project 2025, and at least some of them involve variations on the leave-it-up-to-the- states theme of the Dobbs decision that overturned the right to abortion. They want to leave it to the states regarding the teaching of history that would include bans on teaching about slavery such as those Texas and other states have passed. They want to leave anti-pornography laws up to the states, which would probably mean that panels of Moms for Liberty types would be picking and choosing not only what children read in schools, but what books are allowed to be in libraries or even sold in bookstores. 

You can see where this is leading, can’t you? Leaving it up to the states was at the center of segregation laws in this country that were overturned by Brown v. Board of Education and other landmark federal civil rights decisions and the Civil Rights Act. What is to prevent the Trump Supreme Court from revisiting Brown to leave it up to the states to pass whatever laws they want regarding racial equity and opportunity? Do you think either the Trump Supreme Court or a new Trump administration would have any trouble with new state laws allowing segregated housing and schools?  If you don’t, you’re dreaming.

These people are radical and they’re organized. While Democrats squabble over who is going to be on the ticket in November, Trump and the authors of Project 2025 and Agenda 47 know exactly what they will do if he is elected on November 5. White Republicans and rich Republicans will win the lottery, and everyone else will be stuck buying ticket —if they can find them, because lottery sales will probably be left up to the states as well.