#take women's health out of the hands of republican legislators

[tomorrowusa]

Election Day is Tuesday November 7th.

One of the more high profile contests is the effort to place reproductive freedom into the Ohio Constitution.

If you're in Ohio, be sure to Vote Yes on Issue 1. If you're outside Ohio, send people you know there a friendly reminder to vote in favor of the measure.

Take abortion out of the hands of the gerrymandered GOP-run Ohio legislature!

Ohio is not the only place elections are taking place next week. Go to this site and scroll down slightly to here...

A strong Yes vote on Issue 1 may encourage further ballot initiatives in Ohio such as one to end gerrymandering.

There is no such thing as an unimportant election. Even school board elections have an impact on things like book banning and suppression of accurate history.

Democracy is not a spectator sport. 🇺🇸 ☒ 🗳

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

A group of House Democrats called for legislation on Monday that would add four seats to the Supreme Court, lamenting a “ultra right-wing” branch that just overturned the Roe v. Wade decision on abortion rights.

The eight lawmakers cited recent Supreme Court decisions that rolled back Miranda rights, threw out a New York gun control law and allowed religion to surface in schools — as well as the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision that overturned the right to abortion in Roe — in saying there was a need to add new Justices to the Court.

Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), the lead sponsor of the 2021 Judiciary Act, called the current makeup “a Supreme Court at crisis with itself and with our democracy” where “basic freedoms are under assault” from the 6-3 conservative supermajority on the bench.

The Supreme Court isn’t susceptible to the popular vote the way Congress is, Johnson said, and it has used that fact to amass power. “It’s making decisions that usurp the power of the legislative and executive branches,” he said.

Facing Republican opposition and some Democratic skepticism, the bill has little chance of becoming law, but it illustrates the deep anger among Progressive Democrats about the Court's direction under three conservative Justices nominated by former-President Trump: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.

Those three Justices have radically altered the direction of the Court, which now has twice as many conservative Justices as liberal ones. Kavanaugh replaced Justice Anthony Kennedy, a previous swing vote who had been nominated to the court by a Republican, while Barrett replaced liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Adding to Democratic anger, a GOP Senate blocked former-President Obama’s last nominee to the court, Merrick Garland, who is now the Attorney General. Gorsuch ended up being nominated to the court in place of Garland.

Introduced last year, the Judiciary Act has not progressed in Congress.

Some Democrats wary of the proposal are concerned that expansion would open the court up for Republicans to push more of their nominees into the openings.

“The nightmare scenario of GOP court-packing is already upon us,” said Rep. Mondaire Jones (D-N.Y.). “That’s how they got this far-right 6-3 majority in the first place.”

Lawmakers at Monday’s press conference, hosted by the Take Back the Court Action Fund, blamed Trump and the conservative legal movement for enabling a partisan court.

Republican politicians made controlling the judicial branch part of their platform, said Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), adding that the court has “gone rogue” and “become a radical institution.”

The lawmakers also emphasized that the longevity of the lifelong terms the sitting Justices are now serving makes action to expand the court more urgent.

Of 72-year-old conservative Justice Samuel Alito, Johnson said, “You can see the gleam in his eye as he thinks about what he wants to do to decimate the rights of people and put us back in the Dark Ages.”

Trump-nominated Gorsuch, Barrett and Kavanaugh, in their 50s, are “gonna be there for a while,” Johnson said.

Congress has changed the number of seats on the nation’s highest court seven times in the nation’s history. The new proposal would bring the total seat count to 13, meaning a decision from the court would need a 7-6 majority rather than the present 5-4.

Reps. Andy Levin (D-Mich.), Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) were also at the conference, along with Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who sponsored the bill in the Senate, and a handful of progressive activists.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

* * * * *

To say​ that the evidence that Republicans care about foetuses, babies and children is mixed is to take seriously their rhetoric about the unborn and weigh it against all the evidence of indifference and malice, the decades of Republican opposition to ensuring basic well-being for expectant parents and their offspring, including access to food, shelter and medical care. The evidence that they want women to suffer, live in risk, fear, powerlessness and occasionally to die as a consequence of the new legislation, is considerable.

One argument is that we know women will continue to get abortions, but they will be less safe; another is that abortion poses far less risk than pregnancy does, and the US has high maternal death rates, particularly among Black women. Another piece in the misogynist checklist is Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’s ominous words about Griswold v. Connecticut, the 1965 Supreme Court decision recognising married couples’ right to birth control. You would think people who are against abortion would be for the prevention of unwanted pregnancies, but the opposite has long been the case. 

The argument is that women should not get pregnant unless they intend to have the child and therefore should be forced to have it. In all these arguments the other person involved in unwanted pregnancy disappears, and virtually nothing mentions the existence, let alone any possible consequences, for the impregnator. The recurrent Republican aspiration to deny women abortions in the case of ectopic pregnancies is also chilling. With an ectopic pregnancy, a fertilised egg is implanted outside the uterus. It cannot become a viable embryo that will grow into a living human being. On the other hand, it can and often does become fatal to the person in whom it grows, and is the leading cause in the US of maternal death in the first trimester.

In 2019, Ohio Bill House Bill 413 included language demanding that ectopic pregnancies be reimplanted into the uterus; that same year the ultra-right-wing Federalist published an article entitled ‘Is Abortion Really Necessary for Treating Ectopic Pregnancies?’ Short answer: yes, and the author apologised, but the campaign continues (and the piece is still on their website). In 2022, the Missouri Republican Brian Seitz introduced a state bill making abortion a felony, including in the case of an ectopic pregnancy.

The new abortion bans also pose risks to women having miscarriages, since a dilation and curettage (or, if the pregnancy is further advanced, a dilation and evacuation) can be regarded as an abortion. Lack of such care can result in sepsis and death. Women have also been told they will be denied access to medicines used to manage other health conditions on the grounds that they could cause or be used for miscarriages or abortions. The surveillance state created by tech’s tracking of all our daily activities (travel, online searches, expenditure, as well as digital period-trackers) has created new ways to invade the privacy of anyone suspected of pursuing an abortion, notably women who may have either induced an abortion with pills or travelled out of state in pursuit of one. 

To be a person in her reproductive phase is to be a potential criminal under the new laws.Medical caregivers are also under new scrutiny. Early reports in the wake of the Supreme Court’s overturn of Roe v. Wade suggest that in some states with abortion bans doctors are so afraid of being criminalised even for treating an ectopic pregnancy that they’re waiting for the rupture that makes it a medical emergency rather than treating it on detection. Exceptions to abortion bans for rape and incest have been withdrawn, and the Speaker of Missouri’s House of Representatives says that, yes, a twelve-year-old victim of incest should be forced to carry the pregnancy to term. A twelve-year-old is a child; the argument that all this is being done because they care about children is undermined by such positions.

Two arguments make better sense in light of the forty years of Republican attacks on reproductive rights. One is that many or most of the politicians pursuing this agenda are cynical salesmen using a volatile issue to recruit voters so they can pass legislation they really care about, making the rich richer, the poor poorer, and corporations more powerful. The other is that they are angry Puritans intent on punishing women for the sin of wanting the freedom to have sex without motherhood and recognise that denying reproductive rights returns women to their earlier status of separate and unequal. The sheer vengefulness of the recent measures adds weight to that argument, but doesn’t detract from the other. Both can be true.

[Rebecca Solnit :: London Review of Books]

[beardedmrbean]

Complaints from some progressive Democrats about the much-heralded Respect for Marriage Act are on the rise, as they realize that the legislation often labeled in the press as the "same-sex marriage" bill would not actually require states to recognize same-sex marriages.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., lauded the legislation as a "momentous step forward for greater justice for LGBTQ Americans." But complaints from the far left started surfacing as the Senate passed the bill last week.

Washington Post columnist Jonathan Capehart, who is gay, said in a column that he supports the bill but admitted that the more closely he looks at it, "the more my joy diminishes."

"What the act does not do is require states to issue marriage licenses in contravention of state law," he wrote.

SENATE PASSES SAME-SEX MARRIAGE BILL WITH BIPARTISAN SUPPORT

Charlotte Clymer, former press secretary for the Human Rights Campaign and LGBTQ activist, put it more sharply in a blog post. "I hate the Senate bill and we need it to pass it," she said, adding that "it sucks" and "it's our only real option."

Democrats in Congress whipped up the bill after Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas issued a concurring opinion in the case Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade. There, he said that in light of the decision to let states decide abortion, the court should also "reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents," including the Obergefell v. Hodges case that took same-sex marriage out of the hands of states and said it is a right guaranteed by the Constitution.

RICK SCOTT DEFENDS RELEASING 'RESCUE AMERICA' PLAN AHEAD OF MIDTERMS: 'I DON'T REGRET IT ONE BIT'

No other justices joined Thomas. But that opinion became a major campaign issue for Democrats and spurred lawmakers of both parties to write legislation aimed at requiring states to recognize same-sex marriage, in case the Obergefell precedent fell.

But if the Respect for Marriage Act (RMA) passes, it would not go so far as to require states to permit same-sex marriages, which is what has some progressives disappointed. Instead, it would require the federal government to recognize same-sex marriages performed in states where they are legal.

The act would also require states to recognize same-sex marriages in other states for the purpose of distributing benefits, and wouldn't let them interfere with the federal recognition of those marriages. But otherwise, each state would still be able to define marriage as they see fit, and would not be required to issue licenses or permits for same-sex marriages that take place in their state.

Tim Schultz, president of the 1st Amendment Partnership, told Fox News Digital that the passage of RMA is about "political realism," and that both sides had to cede some ground in order to turn the language into law. Schultz noted that the bill doesn’t go as far as banning states from making gay-marriage illegal, and includes an amendment by Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., aimed at protecting religious liberty.

GOP SENATORS DEMAND ANSWERS OVER SPIKE IN MIGRANT CASES DISMISSED BY COURTS AS DOCS NOT FILED IN TIME

"The interest groups on the left I think are begrudgingly admitting that these religious protections had to be in the bill to pass," Schultz said. "Some of them are saying that’s an affirmative good. Others are saying, ‘Well, I guess this is what you have to do to attract Republicans.’ I’m not saying they feel religious liberty in their soul."

"I think that this is actually a big political deal," Schultz added. "I think that legally the RMA is not a huge deal. And I think that's why people are hyperventilating for no good reason."

"But I think like politically it's a very big deal. Because I think it shows that there is a kind of center that wants to get things done on this issue."

Schultz says the overturning of Obergefell is a "very unlikely scenario."

[arpov-blog-blog]

..."...inflation is at/near Fed target rates, some prices are falling, rents/mortgage rates/gas prices are down, the soft landing appears to be happening; crime and murder rates have come down substantially over the past year, and remain a fraction of what they were 30 years ago; we have the lowest uninsured rate ever recorded, and ACA signups this year have set records; we’ve seen record domestic oil and renewable production, making America more energy independent then we’ve been in many decades; the President has forgiven over $130b in student debt, by some measures Gen Z home ownership rates are outpacing Millennials and Gen X, years of minimum wage increases across the county has created a much higher entry level wage for young and new workers; consumer sentiment is rising, and measures of life/job/income satisfaction are at elevated levels right now; the historic investments the President has made will create opportunities for American workers for decades to come, leave America far stronger and by dramatically accelerating the energy transition from fossil fuels make it far more likely we prevent the planet from warming; polling out this week has the President with sturdy leads in MI, NH and PA, and gaining 3 points and leading now in one important national tracking poll; after a great 2022 election, Democrats just saw a blue wave in 2023, as we won elections of all kinds across the country and outperformed our 2020 results - an election we won by 4.5 pts - by an average of 5 points in almost 40 state legislative special elections.

My summary of where we are now:

Joe Biden is a good President. The country is better off. We have a very compelling case for re-election. The Democratic Party is strong, winning elections across the US and our “bench” is the most talented it’s been in many decades.

Republicans, on the other hand, are making an enormous mistake in sticking with Trump, who is far more degraded, extreme and dangerous - and further away from the electorate - than he was in 2020 when he lost by 4 and a half points. His performance on the stump is far more erratic, and he keeps making hugely consequential political mistakes (calling for a repeal of the ACA, saying he wants the economy to crash - WTF?). Donald Trump 2024 is an historically awful and terrible candidate.

Can we get to 55 and make the 2024 elections a clear repudiation of MAGA, sending a loud and important signal that America has rejected this horrible politics, and has chosen democracy and freedom over illiberalism extremism? Yes, I think making 2024 a big election, a big win, high single digits even, is something that is possible for us, and something we must be working towards every single day. For by doing so it far far more likely we can send MAGA back into the dustbin of history where it so clearly belongs."

The Republican Party has metastasized into something truly dangerous to America and the world. Bibi needs to go. Gun violence remains an outrageous imposition on our liberties. The viciousness of the assault on women’s reproductive freedom, I will admit, overwhelms me sometimes, and I wish I felt we were making more and faster progress here. Declining life expectancy here in the US is a warning about our collective health we must heed. The degradation and poisoning of our daily discourse is a far greater problem than many of us understand or will admit. I could go on.

But that’s not what we do here at Hopium. We do more, worry less. We channel our anxiety, our fear into concrete action. We postcard, canvass, call, text, donate and spread the good news about Joe Biden and the Democrats through our networks. We win elections, kick their ass, take things like the six week abortion ban in Ohio, Jacksonville, the Virginia Assembly, A Wisconsin Supreme Court seat and years of rancid gerrymandering away from them. We are proud patriots, who love our country, and are doing everything we can to make sure the remarkable world of “possibilities” that was available to us is there for our kids and grandkids. When they talk down America, we talk it up. We are Democrats."

[linapoletti]

Anyone who has been through the process of having a child knows that for a pregnant woman, the entire experience is something of a walk over a tightrope. For most, it begins with a take home test, and if it comes back positive there is still something of a 10-20 percent chance of a miscarriage. Once that hurdle is cleared, women go for regular ultrasounds, where they try to make sure that everything looks right, and most women have tests done for fetal abnormalities. Some pregnancies are relatively easy, while others can leave a woman bed-ridden for months. Although we have brought the numbers down, the risk of death due to childbirth is still around 30 per 100,000 in the US, meaning that pregnancy might still be the most dangerous thing many women will ever do in a modern first world country. Of course, there can be, and usually are, pregnancy complications short of death, and many women report long-term physical, emotional, or cognitive damage. When the baby is born, doctors conduct more tests, and this includes finding out whether the child is blind or deaf.

In addition to the physical dangers involved and natural concerns about the health of the baby, one thing I’ve sometimes thought about is the invasion of privacy throughout the process. People talk about the pain, the cramps, morning sickness, carrying extra weight around. But think that, assuming all goes well, a woman has to at the end of all this lay down, spread her legs, and allow perhaps a dozen or so strangers to spend hours, perhaps days, undertaking a procedure involving the most intimate parts of her body in the most vulnerable moments of her life. There is no equivalent for men.

...

Of course, the pro-life movement has its own moral intuitions. For decades, it has been sharing photos of bloody and dismembered fetuses. This certainly isn’t pleasant to look at, but most people simply don’t care all that much. They worry more about maintaining control over their own lives, and granting autonomy to their sisters and daughters, than saving the supposed “children” of strangers whose circumstances they know nothing about. Given that there’s no evidence we’re on the verge of a religious revival, the pro-life movement doesn’t have an answer to this.

For these reasons, I don’t think our politics will “move on” from abortion anytime soon. Even if, say, the national leaders of the Republican Party, wanted to focus on other things, they can’t control what judges, state legislators or individual members of congress do, and there is a class of fanatical activists that will keep pushing forward. Most culture war issues tend towards 50/50 because people don’t have direct experience with the topic involved and can revert to partisan cues. Few Americans are trans, find themselves victimized by an illegal immigrant, or get shot by police. These issues are abstractions most of the time. Pregnancy and childbirth can never be. A woman’s time on this planet is shaped and defined by decisions made about her reproductive health. You won’t be able to propagandize them into wanting to hand final authority over such choices to the state.

Conservatives like to troll liberals by asking “What is a woman?” In the next few election cycles, they’re going to find out.

[newstfionline]

Thursday, January 5,2023

House G.O.P. Paralyzed as Right Wing Blocks McCarthy Speakership (NYT) Republicans were deadlocked over who would lead their new majority after Representative Kevin McCarthy of California lost six votes for the top job, as hard-right lawmakers in open revolt dealt their party leader a humiliating setback and prompted a historic struggle on the House floor. The mutiny, waged by ultraconservative lawmakers who for weeks have held fast to their vow to oppose Mr. McCarthy, paralyzed the House on the first day of Republican rule, delaying the swearing in of hundreds of members of Congress, putting off any legislative work and exposing deep divisions that threaten to make the party’s House majority ungovernable. This did not end the California Republican’s bid for speaker. He has vowed not to back down until he secures the post, forcing votes until he wins and raising the prospect of a grueling stretch of votes that could go on for days.

Apartment Rent Growth Slows (WSJ) The pandemic-fueled boom for multifamily building owners is fading fast going into 2023. Apartment vacancies are piling up. The biggest wave of new rental buildings in nearly four decades is expected to cut the pace of rent growth across the country. Some in-demand Sunbelt cities are already experiencing rent declines, in part because many tenants and people searching for apartments feel they can’t devote any more of their income to rent.

Move on from COVID? Child care disruptions continue (AP) Forty-seven. That’s how many days of child care Kathryn Anne Edwards’ 3-year-old son has missed in the past year. RSV, COVID-19 and two bouts of the dreaded preschool scourge of hand, foot and mouth disease struck one after another. The illnesses were so disruptive that the labor economist quit her full-time job at the Rand Corp., a think tank. She switched last month to independent contract work to give her more flexibility to care for her son and 4-month-old daughter. In the first and even second year of the COVID-19 pandemic, multi-week quarantines and isolations were common for many Americans, especially children. But nine weeks of missed child care, nearly three years in? “The rest of the world has moved on from the crisis that I’m still in,” said Edwards, who studies women’s issues. “That’s sometimes how it feels like to me.” This fall and winter have upended life for working parents of little children, who thought the worst of the pandemic was behind them.

US reopening visa and consular services at embassy in Cuba (AP) The United States Embassy in Cuba is reopening visa and consular services Wednesday, the first time it has done so since a spate of unexplained health incidents among diplomatic staff in 2017 slashed the American presence in Havana. The Embassy confirmed this week it will begin processing immigrant visas, with a priority placed on permits to reunite Cubans with family in the U.S., and others like the diversity visa lottery. The resumption comes amid the greatest migratory flight from Cuba in decades, which has placed pressure on the Biden administration to open more legal pathways to Cubans and start a dialogue with the Cuban government, despite a historically tense relationship. They are anticipated to give out at least 20,000 visas a year, though it’s just a drop in the bucket of the migratory tide, which is fueled by intensifying economic and political crises on the island.

Bolivia farm region blocks borders, grain transport as protests lead to clashes (Reuters)Protesters in Bolivia’s farming region of Santa Cruz are blocking highways out of the province, threatening to snarl the domestic transport of grains and food, as anger simmers following the arrest of local governor Luis Camacho. The region, a stronghold of the conservative opposition to socialist President Luis Arce, is in its sixth day of protests that have seen thousands of people take to the streets and nights of clashes with weaponized fireworks and cars burned. The protests, sparked by the Dec. 28 arrest of Camacho over an alleged coup in 2019, are deepening divides between lowland Santa Cruz and the highland, more indigenous political capital La Paz, which have long butted heads over politics and state funds.

Where The Money Isn’t (AP) Denmark ended 2022 without recording a single bank robbery, in no small part because there are only 20 bank branches in the entire country that still bother to carry cash. Cash transactions are nearly obsolete in Denmark, replaced by cards and smartphones, and the number of bank branches period is down from 219 in 1991 to just 56 in 2021. For the past six years, cash withdrawals have shrunk by about three-quarters every year. Even ATM robberies hit zero last year as well.

Ukraine Keeps Downing Russian Drones, but Price Tag Is High (NYT) Exploding drones are lumbering and noisy and relatively easy to shoot from the sky and, over the New Year’s weekend, Ukraine says, its military downed every single one of about 80 that Russia sent the country’s way. “Such results have never been achieved before,” a Ukrainian air force spokesman said on Tuesday. But some military experts wonder if the successes are sustainable. Ukraine is getting more and more skilled at knocking down drones, but there is a growing imbalance: Many of its defensive weapons like surface-to-air missiles cost far more than the drones do. And that, some military experts say, may favor Moscow over the long haul. Artem Starosiek, the head of Molfar, a Ukrainian consultancy that supports the country’s war effort, estimated that it costs up to seven times more to down a drone with a missile than it does to launch one. That is an equation that the Kremlin may be banking on, some analysts say.

Blame game (Washington Post) The deaths of scores of Russian troops in a devastating strike on New Year’s Day has set off a blame game among Russian officials now facing criticism for allegedly packing hundreds of soldiers into a barracks and storing ammunition in the same building—all within Ukrainian firing range. In a rare admission of heavy losses, the Russian Defense Ministry said Wednesday that 89 soldiers, including a lieutenant colonel, died after Ukrainian forces hit their garrison in a missile strike. In a statement, the ministry blamed the attack in part on the “massive use … by personnel of mobile phones.” The signals alerted the Ukrainians to the garrison’s location, the statement said, adding that a commission is working to investigate the incident. But war commentators and ordinary Russians cast the casualty estimate as a gross undercount, and some said the true death toll numbered in the hundreds. Even if understated, the public acknowledgment of the precision Ukrainian attack set off the most public outpouring of grief over fallen soldiers in the more than 10 months since the start of Russia’s invasion.

Restrictions on travelers from China mount as covid numbers there surge (Washington Post) Nearly a dozen countries have imposed entry restrictions on travelers arriving from China as it battles a surge in covid infections that has raised alarmed about the emergence of new variants and concerns about Beijing’s disclosure of information on the outbreak. Morocco went so far as to ban Saturday all arrivals from China, regardless of nationality, “in order to avoid a new wave of contaminations in Morocco and all its consequences.” China has repeatedly described such measures as having no scientific basis. At a regular press briefing Wednesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning criticized the measure and called on countries not to use pandemic prevention as an excuse to engage in “political manipulation.” On Tuesday, she warned that her country would take “corresponding measures.” China also requires a negative coronavirus test for any arrivals, but will soon scrap a mandatory week-long quarantine.

Taiwan to give cash payouts to citizens in ‘New Year blessing’ (Reuters) Taiwan plans to give cash payouts of nearly $200 to every citizen this year, Premier Su Tseng-chang announced on Wednesday, saying the island’s economic growth will be shared by everyone. The export-reliant economy, a global tech powerhouse for products including semiconductor chips, grew 6.45% in 2021, the fastest rate since it expanded 10.25% in 2010. While economic growth is expected to slow in 2022 and 2023, the government has made plans to plough an extra T$380 billion ($12.4 billion) in tax revenue from last year back into the economy to help protect the island from global economic shocks, including subsidies for electricity prices and labour and health insurance.

Government-Sponsored Flight (Guardian) In an attempt to reinvigorate the shrinking population of its rural towns, Japan is offering Tokyo families ¥1 million ($7,500) per child to move to the countryside. According to the Japanese press, the incentive is set to go live this April, providing urbanites a boosted incentive to turn from city mice to country mice. The new incentive is a huge jump from the government’s previous policy, which provided relocation checks of ¥300,000 (just under $2,300) to families moving out of the metropolis. The ¥1 million payment will be provided to families moving out of the 23 “core” wards of Tokyo, though they will need to stay in their new hometowns for five years if they want to keep the money. Other stipulations include that at least one parent must continue working their old job remotely, find a new job at a small or midsize company in their new town, or start their own business there. Half of the cash will be provided by the national government, with the other half paid out by the municipality welcoming the family. Japan hopes that 10,000 individuals will move from Tokyo to the countryside by 2027 thanks to the cash incentive.

Right-wing Israeli minister challenges own government with visit to Temple Mount (Washington Post) Israel’s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben Gvir, visited a sensitive holy site in Jerusalem on Tuesday, despite reported objections by the prime minister and senior security officials. Israeli media said that Benjamin Netanyahu and others warned that a provocative visit to what Jewish Israelis refer to as the Temple Mount in the heart of the Old City could worsen an already escalating conflict with Palestinians and embitter relations with the wider Arab world. While there were no immediate demonstrations in Jerusalem, the move drew condemnations from nations across the region, including ones with which Israel is hoping to build new ties. Jordan summoned Israel’s ambassador in protest, and Netanyahu’s first trip to the United Arab Emirates since signing a normalization deal there in 2020 was delayed after Abu Dhabi called for an end to the “serious and provocative violations.” A visit to the site by Ariel Sharon, then opposition leader, in 2000 with an army of security guards set off the years of fighting of the second intifada. More recently, confrontations have been sparked by trips made by right-wing Israeli lawmakers to the site, which is revered in Judaism. Palestinians see these moves as part of an effort to extend Israeli control over the site—which also is revered by Muslims, who call it the Noble Sanctuary.

Drone advances (AP) Drone advances in Ukraine have accelerated a long-anticipated technology trend that could soon bring the world’s first fully autonomous fighting robots to the battlefield, inaugurating a new age of warfare. The longer the war lasts, the more likely it becomes that drones will be used to identify, select and attack targets without help from humans, according to military analysts, combatants and artificial intelligence researchers. That would mark a revolution in military technology as profound as the introduction of the machine gun. Ukraine already has semi-autonomous attack drones and counter-drone weapons endowed with AI. Russia also claims to possess AI weaponry, though the claims are unproven. But there are no confirmed instances of a nation putting into combat robots that have killed entirely on their own. Experts say it may be only a matter of time before either Russia or Ukraine, or both, deploy them.

[weaselfog3]

Things about Divorce (TV Series 2016

The breaking up of a marital relationship is practically always an distressed activity, at the really least marked by frustration and the reduction of aspiration and assumptions. What's especially troubling regarding this is that people commonly overlook that they are married. This is the kind of point where there are actually no desires – as opposed to a marriage where desires are regularly there certainly. (At this point I need to have to move on.). There are several methods to work along with relationship, also if they are not always helpful for the person. In add-on, there are actually lawful, monetary, adult, psychological, and functional problem that call for opportunity, energy, and adjustments in tasks. For an association working along with little ones to safeguard their wellness, the primary obligation is to care for them. This calls for that the individual participate in the growth of those mental and health necessities. A brand-new member of the association has actually to undergo a psychological, physical, and various other changes that may consist of being placed in a mental company or under therapy for a compound abuse disorder. It may take individuals years to reclaim balance. It's not what we desire to do, and it's not what we want to have.". And to assume our task require additional attention. The exact same is real, if we anticipate federal government authorities to handle the nation like a business. Priscilla Milan doesn't take place. No one deserves to be out in the road along with his hands in the air, as we've performed. The aspect is not that authorities has come to be also large a organization, as some insurance claim. However, separation offers an important function officially and mentally. In this write-up, we provide what is considered as one of the most vital results of this area and look ahead at how marital relationships between individuals of a variety of genders who discuss the very same label are connected to particular social phenomena, such as feelings of inadequateness, absence of financial aid, anxiety and anxiety. By contrast, divorce does not cause any of the signs described in this post as an indication of absence of social help. Why Folks Acquire Divorced One of the most notable celebrations of the 20th century was a adjustment in the roles women could take on in private and public lifestyle, permitting women more chances for satisfaction and happiness. Guys in office and in public were even more willing to offer insight, and possessed even more independence to decide on whether their companions would keep celibate. In the days afterward, males were no more likely to take part in this discussion due to the stigma that women held for their parts in social lifestyle. Along with a switch in duties inside and outside the home came a necessary—and typically contentious—shift in the branch of responsibilities inside the home, one of several elements fueling a very advertised increase in separation fees and liberalization of divorce legislations. The most recent questionnaire released Wednesday makes numerous observations as effectively. (The study was administered through The Center for American Progress, a Republican think tank that opposes abortion and civil civil rights. Cheating has long been a leading cause of breakup, along with economic turmoils. Right now in its third month, American women possess a monstrous 40% much higher mortality price than men, depending on to National Health and Medical Surveys. Although the research study found that 1 in 3 women (21%) really want their companions to relocate elsewhere, only 21% of the 20 million couples that breakup annually finish up along with two partners. And divorce merely influences one-third of couples every year. But one effect of liberalized mindsets to separation is a primary enhancement to that list—the hunt for emotional distance. It's like the beginning of a man or female relationship, when you possess to sort by means of your partnership's past times and demands and take into profile what it indicates to be a man. Therefore with that in thoughts, I created these listings and listed below are the top 20 very most used and really loved publications. Don't experience like reading something also challenging? People today possess higher expectations for partnership complete satisfaction. This has to perform along with how they view each various other, what types of individuals they put up with, and what components of them they would such as to be known to a companion, or even their very own private degree. Some individuals may think that being psychologically committed to each various other is extra vital than how or where they're eager to interact in connections, and others could possibly find it much more complicated to identify how much their necessities in shape in to those teams' specific needs. What are common main reasons for divorce? Marriage is developed to help make everyone satisfied prior to you and your really loved ones are gone. The explanation that breakup occurs is an deliberate act of love between two people all together that makes everyone delighted and safe. Marital relationship and the Family With the legalization of same-sex marriage, people are capable to move in with one one more without their being separated by a household court of law. Study suggests that usual causes for separation include absence of affection, shortage of devotion, extramarital relations, and essential conflict. This has led to investigate that recommends that breakup is one of the most popular source of breakup. Research study on how these variations determine the regularity of divorced marital relationships reveals that these elements do not appear to affect the price of separation, but only determine the fee of divorce between pairs. It isn't only usual reasons, either. Other popular source are steady disagreement, financial differences, obsession, and abuse. Very most importantly, liquor misuse decreases motivation. Some scientists forecast that overuse, misuse, or abuse could lead to mental illness or self-destruction, while others assert that drinking assists management habits. Consuming, having said that, is not the only resource of inspiration to drink. Some individuals are much less motivated to stay sober if they feel like they're being penalized. FDA Drinking makes you prefer to gave up cigarette smoking.

[loafclub90]

What You Need to Know Before Getting a Divorce for Beginners

The dissolution of a marital relationship is just about always an upsetting event, at the incredibly least marked by dissatisfaction and the reduction of desire and assumptions. What's specifically upsetting about this is that folks often fail to remember that they are married. This is the kind of thing where there are no desires – as opposed to a relationship where desires are regularly certainly there. (At this aspect I require to move on.). There are actually Find More Details On This Page of means to deal with relationship, even if they are not consistently helpful for the person. In addition, there are actually lawful, monetary, adult, emotional, and sensible obstacle that call for opportunity, energy, and modifications in accountabilities. For an company working with little ones to safeguard their health, the key obligation is to care for them. This needs that the individual engage in the growth of those mental and health demands. A brand-new member of the association has to go through a psychological, bodily, and various other improvements that might feature being put in a mental organization or under treatment for a material abuse disorder. It may take folks years to reclaim balance. It's not what we prefer to perform, and it's not what we want to possess.". And to presume our task require even more attention. The same is correct, if we anticipate federal government officials to deal with the country like a company. That doesn't take place. No one deserves to be out in the road along with his hands in the sky, as we've carried out. The aspect is not that government has ended up being as well significant a organization, as some insurance claim. However, separation offers an significant function legitimately and psychologically. In this post, we provide what is considered as one of the most essential results of this area and look in advance at how marital relationships between people of a variety of genders who share the very same name are linked to specific social phenomena, such as sensations of inadequacy, shortage of financial aid, anxiety and anxiousness. By comparison, breakup does not trigger any of the signs and symptoms defined in this short article as an clue of shortage of social support. Why People Obtain Separated One of the very most considerable activities of the 20th century was a modification in the functions women can take on in personal and public life, enabling women even more opportunities for complete satisfaction and happiness. Males in workplace and in community were extra prepared to offer insight, and had even more independence to opt for whether their companions would keep celibate. In the times afterward, guys were no extra prone to participate in this dialogue due to the preconception that women kept for their jobs in social life. Along with a switch in parts inside and outside the property happened a necessary—and typically contentious—shift in the branch of accountabilities inside the home, one of many aspects fueling a strongly advertised surge in separation fees and liberalization of separation legislations. The most up-to-date poll released Wednesday produces numerous observations as well. (The study was administered by The Center for American Progress, a Republican think container that resists abortion and public liberties. Extramarital relations has long been a leading trigger of separation, along with economic turmoils. Now in its third month, American women have a whopping 40% greater death rate than guys, depending on to National Health and Medical Surveys. Although the research found that 1 in 3 women (21%) yearn for their partners to relocate elsewhere, simply 21% of the 20 million couples that separation annually finish up with two partners. And divorce only influences one-third of married couples every year. But one consequence of liberalized perspectives to breakup is a significant enhancement to that list—the hunt for emotional distance. It's like the beginning of a male or lady partnership, when you possess to arrange by means of your partnership's pasts and demands and take in to profile what it suggests to be a man. Thus along with that in mind, I helped make these checklists and listed below are the top 20 very most used and enjoyed manuals. Don't really feel like reading something also complicated? People today possess higher assumptions for partnership contentment. This has actually to do along with how they view each other, what styles of people they hang with, and what parts of them they would as if to be recognized to a companion, or also their very own personal amount. Some people may believe that being mentally committed to each various other is extra vital than how or where they're eager to involve in connections, and others could possibly locate it even more complicated to identify how a lot their requirements in good condition into those teams' certain requirements.

What are typical main reasons for breakup? Marital relationship is developed to create everyone happy just before you and your enjoyed ones are gone. The cause that breakup develops is an intentional act of passion between two people with each other that creates everyone pleased and risk-free. Relationship and the Family Along with the legalization of same-sex marital relationship, people are capable to relocate in along with one yet another without their being separated through a family court of law. Study suggests that usual explanations for breakup consist of absence of affection, absence of dedication, infidelity, and essential incompatibility. This has led to look into that proposes that breakup is one of the most popular trigger of separation. Research on how these differences affect the regularity of divorced marital relationships reveals that these elements do not appear to determine the cost of separation, but only affect the rate of separation between couples. It isn't only common reasons, either. Various other widespread source are steady problem, economic differences, substance addiction, and misuse. Very most significantly, liquor abuse decreases incentive. Some analysts predict that overuse, abuse, or misuse might lead to mental health problem or self-destruction, while others assert that alcohol consumption helps command habits. Consuming, nevertheless, is not the only resource of incentive to consume. Some people are much less determined to keep clean if they really feel like they're being disciplined. FDA Drinking produces you prefer to quit cigarette smoking.

[opedguy]

Biden Lashes Out at MAGA Republicans

LOS ANGELES (OnlineColumnist.com), Aug. 26, 2022.--Speaking at a fundraiser in Bethesda, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C., Biden lashed out a MAGA Republicans, referring to Trump’s brand of the GOP, calling them “semi-fascists,” a non sequitur at best.  Biden’s fiery speech hopes to shift momentum in the upcoming Midterm elections, where Democrats hope to hold onto the Senate and House of Representatives.  Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Minority Leader, admitted that it would be tough for the GOP to take the Senate, looking at the current electoral map.  Biden’s speech cleverly opposes Democrats and independent voters with Trump’s MAGA Republicans, something that resulted June 24 in the conservative, Trump-appointed court reversing 1973 Roe v. Wade, the time-honored precedent giving woman the right to chose abortion.  Biden’s attack on MAGA Republicans directly relates to the Supreme Court’s shocking ruling.

Heading into the Midterms, Biden has enjoyed a bump in his approval ratings largely related to the fact that gas prices have come down, with the White House touting the economy, even though that last two quarters have been in negative growth.  But with Biden signing the so-called  $737 billion “Inflation Reduction Act,” providing $369 billion allocated for climate change, $265 billion for prescription drug reform, $124 billion in IRS enforcement, etc.  Adding to Biden’s legislative victory, Biden announced Aug. 24 that he will rebate $10,000 for federal student loans reductions, all adding up to benefits for working families.  So when Joe delivered his fiery speech at a kickoff rally at a Rockville, Md, High School, he went after Trump with a vengeance.  Biden’s handlers and speechwriters know that nothing fires up the base before the November Midterms elections more than Trump.

Biden laid all the blame on Trump for ending Roe v. Wade, a women’s health issue resonating with the Democrat base, independents and cross over Republicans.  “What we’re seeing now is the beggining of the death knell of an extreme MAGA philosophy.  It’s not just Trump, it’s the entire philosophy that underpins the-- I’m going to say something.  It’s like semi-fascism,” Biden told the donor event. Making up words like “semi-fascism” shows that he doesn’t really know what his speechwriters say, trying to capitalize on the end of Roe v. Wade before the Midterms.  Whatever “philosophy” Biden rails about with Trump, what’s his philosophy when it comes to going to war against the Russian Federation?  At no time in post WW II history has U.S. national security been compromised more than under Biden.  Biden has wrecked U.S.-Russian and U.S.-Chinese relations.

MAGA philosophy that Biden talks about believes in balance federal budgets, economic growth with low inflation and prosperity, improving the standard of living for all Americans.  How ironic that Biden calls MAGA “semi-fascism” when all his Trump did was maintain healthy economic activity at home and working, pragmatic relations with America’s adversaries abroad.  Where’s the media calling out Biden for the last two quarters of negative economic growth, signaling recession?  Where the independent U.S. press questioning Biden’s proxy war in Ukraine costing the U.S. Treasury over $20 billion, climbing daily depending on Ukraine’s cash demands.  Ukraine no longer pays any of its government salaries, except with U.S. tax dollars.  How long can Biden keep the proxy war going against the Russian Federation, endangering the European Continent with WW III?

Yet to Biden MAGA has become the latest fake slogan just like Democrats did in the 2020 presidential race.  Democrats blamed Trump for everything but the kitchen sink.  He was responsible for the white supremacy and racism resulting in George Floyd’s May 25, 2020 death at the hands of Minneapolis police. But no, to Democrats Trump was demonized as a racist and white supremacist.  Democrats blamed Trump for botching the Covid-19 response, when all he did was push drug makers to come up with vaccines.  One week after the Nov. 3, 2020 presidential election, Pfizer announced it was releasing the first Covid-19 vaccine.  Bit to Democrats then and today, it’s the same demonization, blaming Trump for everything.  Biden takes no responsibility for today’s hyper-inflation forcing the Federal Reserve Board to hike interest rates to the point that economic growth grinds to a halt.

Biden gives Americans a stark choice heading into the Midterm election, either vote for Democrats or vote for “semi-fascism.”  “America must choose.  You must choose—whether our country will move forward of backward,” Biden said, not admitting that his proxy war in Ukraine drains the Treasury and threatens WW III on the European Continent.  “Trump and the extreme MAGA Republicans have made their choice—to go  backwards full of anger, violence, hate and division,” Biden said.  Where’s the “anger, violence, hate and division,” when Biden decided unilaterally that he must end U.S.-Russian relations to financially support and defend Ukraine, a country without any national security significance to the United States.  Trump and his MAGA movement had excellent relations with America’s adversaries, far removed from Biden’s warmongering, endangering U.S. national security and American prosperity.

About the Author

John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news.  He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.

[xtruss]

We’re Not Going Back to the Time Before Roe. We’re Going Somewhere Worse

We are entering an era not just of unsafe abortions but of the widespread criminalization of pregnancy.

— Comment | July 4, 2022 Issue | By Jia Tolentino | Friday June 24, 2022

Illustration by Chloe Cushman

In the weeks since a draft of the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization—a case about a Mississippi law that bans abortion after fifteen weeks, with some health-related exceptions but none for rape or incest—was leaked, a slogan has been revived: “We won’t go back.” It has been chanted at marches, defiantly but also somewhat awkwardly, given that this is plainly an era of repression and regression, in which abortion rights are not the only rights disappearing. Now that the Supreme Court has issued its final decision, overturning Roe v. Wade and removing the constitutional right to abortion, insuring that abortion will become illegal or highly restricted in twenty states, the slogan sounds almost divorced from reality—an indication, perhaps, of how difficult it has become to comprehend the power and right-wing extremity of the current Supreme Court.

Support for abortion has never been higher, with more than two-thirds of Americans in favor of retaining Roe, and fifty-seven per cent affirming a woman’s right to abortion for any reason. Even so, there are Republican officials who have made it clear that they will attempt to pass a federal ban on abortion if and when they control both chambers of Congress and the Presidency. Anyone who can get pregnant must now face the reality that half of the country is in the hands of legislators who believe that your personhood and autonomy are conditional—who believe that, if you are impregnated by another person, under any circumstance, you have a legal and moral duty to undergo pregnancy, delivery, and, in all likelihood, two decades or more of caregiving, no matter the permanent and potentially devastating consequences for your body, your heart, your mind, your family, your ability to put food on the table, your plans, your aspirations, your life.

“We won’t go back”—it’s an inadequate rallying cry, only prompted by events that belie its message. But it is true in at least one sense. The future that we now inhabit will not resemble the past before Roe, when women sought out illegal abortions and not infrequently found death. The principal danger now lies elsewhere, and arguably reaches further. We have entered an era not of unsafe abortion but of widespread state surveillance and criminalization—of pregnant women, certainly, but also of doctors and pharmacists and clinic staffers and volunteers and friends and family members, of anyone who comes into meaningful contact with a pregnancy that does not end in a healthy birth. Those who argue that this decision won’t actually change things much—an instinct you’ll find on both sides of the political divide—are blind to the ways in which state-level anti-abortion crusades have already turned pregnancy into punishment, and the ways in which the situation is poised to become much worse.

In the states where abortion has been or will soon be banned, any pregnancy loss past an early cutoff can now potentially be investigated as a crime. Search histories, browsing histories, text messages, location data, payment data, information from period-tracking apps—prosecutors can examine all of it if they believe that the loss of a pregnancy may have been deliberate. Even if prosecutors fail to prove that an abortion took place, those who are investigated will be punished by the process, liable for whatever might be found.

Five years ago, Latice Fisher, a Black mother of three from Mississippi, who made eleven dollars an hour as a police-radio operator, experienced a stillbirth, at roughly thirty-six weeks, at home. When questioned, she acknowledged that she didn’t want more kids and couldn’t afford to take care of more kids. She surrendered her phone to investigators, who scraped it for search data and found search terms regarding mifepristone and misoprostol, i.e., abortion pills.

These pills are among the reasons that we are not going back to the era of coat hangers. They can be prescribed via telemedicine and delivered via mail; allowing for the prescription of an extra dose, they are ninety-five to ninety-eight per cent effective in cases of pregnancy up to eleven weeks, which account for almost ninety per cent of all abortions in the U.S. Already, more than half of all abortions in the country are medication abortions. In nineteen states, doctors are prohibited from providing abortions via telemedicine, but women can seek help from clinicians in other states and abroad, such as Rebecca Gomperts, who leads Aid Access, an organization based in Austria that is openly providing abortion pills to women in prohibition states, and has been safely mailing abortion pills to pregnant people all over the world since 2005, with the organization Women on Web. In advance of the U.S. bans, Gomperts has been promoting advance prescription: sympathetic doctors might prescribe abortion pills for any menstruating person, removing some of the fears—and, possibly, the traceability—that would come with attempting to get the pills after pregnancy. Misoprostol can be prescribed for other issues, such as stomach ulcers, and Gomperts argues that there is no reasonable medical argument against advance prescription. “If you buy bleach in the supermarket, that’s more dangerous,” she has said.

There was no evidence that Latice Fisher took an abortion pill. She maintained that she had experienced a stillbirth—an occurrence in one out of every hundred and sixty pregnancies in the U.S. Nonetheless, she was charged with second-degree murder and held on a hundred-thousand-dollar bond. The district attorney, Scott Colom, had campaigned as a progressive reformer; advocates pushed him to drop the murder charge, and to provide a grand jury with more information about an antiquated, unreliable “float test” that prosecutors had used as a basis for their allegation that Fisher’s baby was born alive. Fisher was eventually cleared of all charges; the ordeal took more than three years.

Even if it remains possible in prohibition states to order abortion pills, doing so will be unlawful. (Missouri recently proposed classifying the delivery or shipment of these pills as drug trafficking. Louisiana just passed a law that makes mailing abortion pills to a resident of the state a criminal offense, punishable by six months’ imprisonment.) In many states, to avoid breaking the law, a woman would have to drive to a state where abortion is legal, have a telemedicine consultation there, and then receive the pills in that state. Many women in Texas have opted for a riskier but easier option: to drive across the border, to Mexico, and get abortion pills from unregulated pharmacies, where pharmacists may issue incorrect advice for usage. Some women who lack the freedom and money to travel out of state, and who might fear the consequences of seeking a clinical confirmation of their gestational stage, will order abortion pills without a clear understanding of how far along they are in pregnancy. Abortion pills are safe and effective, but patients need access to clinical guidance and follow-up care. Women in prohibition states who want to seek medical attention after a self-managed abortion will, as a rule, have to choose between risking their freedom and risking their health.

Both abortion and miscarriage currently occur more than a million times each year in America, and the two events are often clinically indistinguishable. As such, prohibition states will have a profoundly invasive interest in differentiating between them. Some have already laid the groundwork for establishing government databases of pregnant women likely to seek abortions. Last year, Arkansas passed a law called the Every Mom Matters Act, which requires women considering abortion to call a state hotline and requires abortion providers to register all patients in a database with a unique I.D. Since then, six other states have implemented or proposed similar laws. The hotlines are provided by crisis pregnancy centers: typically Christian organizations, many of which masquerade as abortion clinics, provide no health care, and passionately counsel women against abortion. Crisis pregnancy centers are already three times as numerous as abortion clinics in the U.S., and, unlike hospitals, they are not required to protect the privacy of those who come to them. For years, conservative states have been redirecting money, often from funds earmarked for poor women and children, toward these organizations. The data that crisis pregnancy centers are capable of collecting—names, locations, family details, sexual and medical histories, non-diagnostic ultrasound images—can now be deployed against those who seek their help.

If you become pregnant, your phone generally knows before many of your friends do. The entire Internet economy is built on meticulous user tracking—of purchases, search terms—and, as laws modelled on Texas’s S.B. 8 proliferate, encouraging private citizens to file lawsuits against anyone who facilitates an abortion, self-appointed vigilantes will have no shortage of tools to track and identify suspects. (The National Right to Life Committee recently published policy recommendations for anti-abortion states that included criminal penalties for anyone who provides information about self-managed abortion “over the telephone, the internet, or any other medium of communication.”) A reporter for Vice recently spent a mere hundred and sixty dollars to purchase a data set on visits to more than six hundred Planned Parenthood clinics. Brokers sell data that make it possible to track journeys to and from any location—say, an abortion clinic in another state. In Missouri, this year, a lawmaker proposed a measure that would allow private citizens to sue anyone who helps a resident of the state get an abortion elsewhere; as with S.B. 8, the law would reward successful plaintiffs with ten thousand dollars. The closest analogue to this kind of legislation is the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793.

For now, the targets of S.B. 8-type bounty laws are those who provide abortions, not those who seek them. But that seems likely to change. Connecticut, a progressive state on the matter of abortion, recently passed a law that prevents local agencies from coöperating with out-of-state abortion prosecutions and protects the medical records of out-of-state clients. Other progressive states will follow suit. If prohibition states can’t sue out-of-state doctors, and, if abortion pills sent by mail remain largely undetectable, the only people left to target will be abortion advocates and those trying to get abortions. The Stream, a conservative Christian publication, recently advocated mandatory psychiatric custody for women who get abortions. In May, Louisiana advanced a bill that would allow abortion patients to be charged with murder. The proposal was withdrawn, but the threat had been made.

The theological concept of fetal personhood—the idea that, from the moment of conception, an embryo or fetus is a full human being, deserving of equal (or, more accurately, superior) rights—is a foundational doctrine of the anti-abortion movement. The legal ramifications of this idea—including the possible classification of I.V.F., IUDs, and the morning-after pill as instruments of murder—are unhinged, and much harsher than what even the average anti-abortion American is currently willing to embrace. Nonetheless, the anti-abortion movement is now openly pushing for fetal personhood to become the foundation of U.S. abortion law.

If a fetus is a person, then a legal framework can be invented to require someone who has one living inside her to do everything in her power to protect it, including—as happened to Savita Halappanavar, in Ireland, which operated under a fetal-personhood doctrine until 2018, and to Izabela Sajbor, in Poland, where all abortion is effectively illegal—to die. No other such obligation exists anywhere in our society, which grants cops the freedom to stand by as children are murdered behind an unlocked door. In Poland, pregnant women with cancer have been routinely denied chemotherapy because of clinicians’ fears of harming the fetus.

Fetal-personhood laws have passed in Georgia and Alabama, and they are no longer likely to be found unconstitutional. Such laws justify a full-scale criminalization of pregnancy, whereby women can be arrested, detained, and otherwise placed under state intervention for taking actions perceived to be potentially harmful to a fetus. This approach has been steadily tested, on low-income minorities in particular, for the past four decades. National Advocates for Pregnant Women—the organization that has provided legal defense for most of the cases mentioned in this article—has documented almost eighteen hundred cases, from 1973 to 2020, of prosecutions or forced interventions related to pregnancy; this is likely a substantial undercount. Even in states such as California, where the law explicitly prohibits charging women with murder after a pregnancy loss, conservative prosecutors are doing so anyway.

Most pregnancy-related prosecutions, so far, have revolved around drug use. Women who used drugs while pregnant, or sought treatment for drug use during pregnancy, have been charged with child abuse, child neglect, distribution of drugs to a minor, assault with a deadly weapon, manslaughter, and homicide. In 2020, law enforcement in Alabama investigated a woman named Kim Blalock for chemical endangerment of a child after she told delivery-room staff that she had been taking prescribed hydrocodone for pain management. (The district attorney charged her with prescription fraud—a felony—before eventually dropping the prosecution altogether.) There has been a string of shocking recent prosecutions in Oklahoma, in which women who used drugs have been charged with manslaughter for miscarrying well before the point of viability. In Wisconsin, state law already allows juvenile courts to take a fetus—meaning a pregnant woman—into custody for the fetus’s protection, resulting in the detention and forced treatment of more than four hundred pregnant women every year on the suspicion that they may be consuming controlled substances. A proposed law in Wyoming would create a specific category of felony child endangerment for drug use while pregnant, a law that resembles Tennessee’s former Fetal Assault Law. The Tennessee law was discontinued after two years, because treating women as adversaries to the fetuses they carry has a chilling effect on prenatal medicine, and inevitably results in an increase in maternal and infant death.

The mainstream pro-choice movement has largely ignored the growing criminalization of pregnancy, just as it has generally ignored the inadequacy of Roe. (It took Joe Biden, who campaigned on making Roe the “law of the land,” more than a year to say the word “abortion” on the record after he became President; the Democrats, given the chance to override the filibuster and codify Roe in May, predictably failed to do so.) Many of those who support the right to abortion have tacitly accepted that poor and minority women in conservative states lost access to abortion long before this Supreme Court decision, and have quietly hoped that the thousands of women facing arrest after pregnancy, miscarriage, stillbirth, or even healthy deliveries were unfortunate outliers. They were not outliers, and, as the columnist Rebecca Traister noted last month, the chasm between the impervious class and everyone else is growing every day.

Pregnancy is more than thirty times more dangerous than abortion. One study estimates that a nationwide ban would lead to a twenty-one-per-cent rise in pregnancy-related deaths. Some of the women who will die from abortion bans are pregnant right now. Their deaths will come not from back-alley procedures but from a silent denial of care: interventions delayed, desires disregarded. They will die of infections, of preëclampsia, of hemorrhage, as they are forced to submit their bodies to pregnancies that they never wanted to carry, and it will not be hard for the anti-abortion movement to accept these deaths as a tragic, even noble, consequence of womanhood itself.

In the meantime, abortion bans will hurt, disable, and endanger many people who wanted to carry their pregnancies to term but who encounter medical difficulties. Physicians in prohibition states have already begun declining to treat women who are in the midst of miscarriages, for fear that the treatment could be classified as abortion. One woman in Texas was told that she had to drive fifteen hours to New Mexico to have her ectopic pregnancy—which is nonviable, by definition, and always dangerous to the mother—removed. Misoprostol, one of the abortion pills, is routinely prescribed for miscarriage management, because it causes the uterus to expel any remaining tissue. Pharmacists in Texas, fearing legal liability, have already refused to prescribe it. If a miscarriage is not managed to a safe completion, women risk—among other things, and taking the emotional damage for granted—uterine perforation, organ failure, infection, infertility, and death.

Most miscarriages are caused by factors beyond a pregnant person’s control: illnesses, placental or uterine irregularities, genetic abnormalities. But the treatment of pregnant people in this country already makes many of them feel directly and solely responsible for the survival of their fetus. They are told to absolutely avoid alcohol, coffee, retinol, deli turkey, unpasteurized cheese, hot baths, vigorous exercise, drugs that are not prescribed to them, drugs that they have been prescribed for years—often without any explanation of the frequently shoddy reasoning behind these prohibitions. Structural factors that clearly increase the likelihood of miscarriage—poverty, environmental-chemical exposure, working night shifts—are less likely to come up. As fetal personhood becomes law in more of the land, pregnant people, as Lynn Paltrow, the director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women, has pointed out, “could be sued, or prevented from engaging in travel, work, or any activity that is believed to create a risk to the life of the unborn.”

Half a century ago, the anti-abortion movement was dominated by progressive, antiwar, pro-welfare Catholics. Today, the movement is conservative, evangelical, and absolutely single-minded, populated overwhelmingly by people who, although they may embrace foster care, adoption, and various forms of private ministry, show no interest in pushing for public, structural support for human life once it’s left the womb. The scholar Mary Ziegler recently noted that today’s anti-abortion advocates see the “strategies of earlier decades as apologetic, cowardly, and counterproductive.” During the past four years, eleven states have passed abortion bans that contain no exceptions for rape or incest, a previously unthinkable extreme.

In Texas, already, children aged nine, ten, and eleven, who don’t yet understand what sex and abuse are, face forced pregnancy and childbirth after being raped. Women sitting in emergency rooms in the midst of miscarriages are being denied treatment for sepsis because their fetuses’ hearts haven’t yet stopped. People you’ll never hear of will spend the rest of their lives trying and failing, agonizingly, in this punitive country, to provide stability for a first or fifth child they knew they weren’t equipped to care for.

In the face of all this, there has been so much squeamishness even in the pro-choice camp—a tone that casts abortion as an unfortunate necessity; an approach to messaging which values choice but devalues abortion care itself, which emphasizes reproductive rights rather than reproductive justice. That approach has landed us here. We are not going back to the pre-Roe era, and we should not want to go back to the era that succeeded it, which was less bitter than the present but was never good enough. We should demand more, and we will have to. We will need to be full-throated and unconditional about abortion as a necessary precondition to justice and equal rights if we want even a chance of someday getting somewhere better. ♦

— Published in the print edition of the July 4, 2022, issue.

[feyariel]

Naturally, I am seeing posts from people who think that electoralism will work in this age against the anti-abortionists and that Biden/the Dems are still better than the Republicans. It is as myopic as ever.

I'ma start with how the Dems are culpable:

Ruth Bader Ginsberg was ancient when Obama took office. She had two years to step down and allow him to appoint another Justice, but did not. It's a known issue that the Presidency and the Congress change hands frequently (it's a pendulum), so this was gross irresponsibility.

While people are quick to bring up that Clinton warned us about Trump being anti-abortion (which he himself said, so it was unnecessary), her running mate was also anti-abortion.

There has been next to no effort to make abortion rights specified in law. We've relied on Roe v. Wade this entire time, but overturning rulings is something politicians always talk about doing. The above, about how Clinton "warned" us about Trump? She didn't: the Republicans have run on doing everything to remove abortion rights for longer than I have been alive. Using scare tactics demanding you vote for someone (especially someone with nearly identical policies to their opponent) because of doom-saying is not activism, especially when you have political power. Edit: What effort has been generally consists of worrying about what the Republicans will do when it is clear that Democrat control is slipping, with votes that go nowhere -- like the Women's Health Protection Act debacle, stymied by designated enemy Joe Manchin. The time for passing such legislation is when the pro-abortion party has a stronghold, not when it's preparing to cede power to the opposition. And yet, here we are, long after Obama's first two years with unequivocal Democrat control of Congress, not having any sort of substantive abortion legislation in place.

Are we going to forget Biden's role in helping to appoint conservative Justices? Saying he did so due to incompetence (as is often the case when defending him about Clarence Thomas) is not a defense: you want neither malice nor incompetence in your elected officials. And he has a long, repetitive history of taking conservative positions and helping conservative measures, including appointing Supreme Court Justices.

But the bigger issue is this electoralism crap. The Supreme Court is, as people have long pointed out, not a democratic institution -- by design. (I'm not going to go into the merits or problems with democratic and anti-democratic institutions here. It's a neutral statement.) Talking about electoralism when you have a body that is appointed for life by a presidency that is known to change hands frequently (and confirmed by a congress that does the same) and which routinely votes in ways that do not reflect popular opinion is out of touch; doing so when they have just overturned an extremely popular ruling is either demented or intentionally, maliciously ignorant.

Pro-abortion rights people are not going to win a permanent victory through electoralism.

The same is true of every other major issue facing the Left, from the ongoing, worsening border crisis no one's talking about anymore to the escalating forever war to environmental collapse. I mean, Hell, those three alone Biden has made worse and the Dems are still treating him as the supposed "best we can do".

This isn't even getting into how the country has been an oligarchy for decades now. This is just about the Dems being incapable of defending the positions their constituents want (though that itself is an illustration of our oligarchy).

No, the only solution at this point is violence.

But I've said that for a while now. Maybe this time people will heed that call.

[obeymebutnotlikethat]

The woman on the Supreme Court, Amy, suggests forced pregnancy is fine because that's why we have adoption according to the Daily Beast.

Let me clarify one thing: forced pregnancy is different from forced birth based on one part. Forced pregnancy is a person getting pregnant without their consent or in terms "without sought or desire." Forced birth is forcing a person to carry the baby to term and give birth. Both can intersect with each other.

Second; that is not a reason why we have adoption. That is a messed up reason saying "I can make you have a baby because you can just give it away like its a second hand toy."

I've seen in circles that people think putting babies up for adoption is wrong and those people should be forced to care for the child or not have gotten pregnant at all. 1: if the baby isn't put up for adoption it may end up in the trash, abandoned, neglected, or dead. 2. This is high to ask when many Americans are not given access to contraceptives or even taught what they are. Some do not know what can come out of sex or about safe sex because not everyone is taught the same sexual education.

3. Adoption is for people who want to be pregnant but cannot care for the child or want it. This is an option when the person does not want or is unable to have an abortion.More adoption laws will not make a large impact when giving birth puts more people in financial debt than an abortion does.

You know the meme : if my mom aborted me I wouldn't have even known. I want that part ebbed in the mind not for any sick reason. The debate has been around fetus and children already born. Children who have already been born are not things to just discard. There are so many kids in the system already and just having adoption be the go to is not ok.

I just hate that these systems already with problems are not being fixed but people keep using them as a fall back plan. As if already born children have the same process as a fetus. As if they won't feel anything.

So:

A list of side-effects to forced pregnancy and forced birth

Baby in trash

Attempted abortion

Praying for miscarriage

Home abortions

Attempted suicide

Suicide

Overdose

Domestic violence strong hold. Limiting available access to abortion, planned parenthood that helps in reproductive rights, and proper education can trap someone is a domestic violence situation or worsen it. More likely than not the baby will be used over the person and the baby is kept/brought up into a domestic violence situation.

Trauma

PTSD

Financial debt looking at a few grands in hospital fees.

P.S

They had a clause this year about a woman would have no say in her reproductive health. Her rapist would have a say if she could have an abortion but not her. When you are saying a rapist has more rights to his victims body than the victim then you are on the wrong side. Its also the laws written out this year to allow your rapist custody too.

I mean one state just closed their "if you got drunk on your on you cannot take your rapist to court" law.

There was a senator in 2017 or 2018 that said he does not care about IVF fetuses because they aren't inside a woman. In 2011-2012 the Republican handbook looked to discard IVF in whole but make a person have their rapist baby.

Greg Abbott vetoed a bill that would teach about domestic violence, child abuse, and dating violence to children and teens( that could prevent unwanted pregnancies).

Stop writing legislation that hurts us and punishes us but congratulates and lets our rapists get more control over us.

Edit: Not only women can get pregnant. Its good to be inclusive when discussing this topic as it affects so many people.

[whitehotharlots]

Previewing the 2024 Democrat Primary

Within a couple weeks of his being sworn in, just about every person on earth will wish Joe Biden was no longer president. Sure, the few surviving John B. Anderson voters will be thrilled to see 4 years of crushing austerity and half-assed attempts at Keynesian stimulus. But most people will begin dreaming about a brighter future.

Good news! The 2024 Democratic primary field is going to contain dozens of options. Bad news! They are all going to be disgusting piles of shit. 

The “top tier”

While it’s too early to do any handicapping, these are the candidates the media will treat as having the most realistic chances of securing the nomination. 

Kamala Harris

Kamala did not win a single primary delegate in 2020. This is because she dropped out before the first primary, and that was because no one likes her. She has no base beyond a few thousand of twitter’s most violent psychos. Her disingenuousness approaches John Edwards levels: any halfway incredulous person can see immediately beyond her bullshit. She has no principles whatsoever, and while that may be par for the course for Democrats, she lacks even the basic politician’s ability to intuit anything that might, hypothetically, constitute a principle. 

Even better: she is an awful public speaker. She sounds like how a talking dog would speak if he were just caught stealing people food off the kitchen table. She communicates in weird grunts and faux sassy squeaks, which is how she imagines real black women sound like, but something about her is unable to sell the bit. She begins her sentences in halfhearted AAVE, stops and panics halfway through as she realizes that maybe this sounds fake and offensive, and then reminds herself oh wait, no, this is okay since I’m black. This doesn’t happen once or twice per speech. This is how every single sentence sounds. 

Kamala is like Nancy Pelosi in that no sketch show will ever impersonate her correctly, because anything that came close to authenticity would be considered far too cruel. This might benefit her in the primaries, as she exists in the minds of Democrats as someone and something she absolutely is not in reality. Nominating her would be like allowing your child’s imaginary friend to attempt to drive you to the store. 

Andrew Cuomo

Easily one of the 50 worst people alive, Cuomo has a solid chance because Democrats, same as Republicans, are unable to differentiate between electability and self-serving ruthlessness. Cuomo used the deadliest public health crisis in American history as a pretext for cutting Medicaid and firing 5,000 MTA workers, and his approval rating increased. New York Dems are little piggies who love eating shit. If we assume that the political media will continue their habit of refusing to discuss the legislative history of right wing Democrats, Cuomo might well cruise to the nomination and then lose to literally any human being the GOP nominates by an historic margin. 

Joe Biden

The party loves him because he is a right wing racist. “Progressives” tolerate him because black primary voters over 40 supported him, and their opinion is supposedly a magic window into god’s truth. Everyone else can tell he is manifestly senile. I don’t put it above the DNC to pick a candidate who is in horrible health, dying, or even dead--whatever the financial sector wants, they’ll get. But I would be shocked if his approval rating is above 39% by mid-2023, and by that point deep fake technology will be advanced enough they’ll put out a very lifelike video in which the Max Headroom version of Joe explains he’s proud of his accomplishments--that budget’s almost balanced already--but, man, I gotta abd--I gotta abdica--, uhh, I gotta, I, uhh, I gotta move down, man. 

Wild Cards

These candidates would have all have a chance if they ran, but they could all much more easily retire to Little Saint James off of kickbacks they’ve gotten from Citibank and I.G. Farben. 

Rahm Emanuel

Rahm is going to receive some hugely influential post in the Biden administration. Let’s say he becomes Secretary of Education. His signature achievement will be replacing all elementary school teachers with Amazon’s Alexa, which saved the taxpayers so much money we were able to quadruple the number of armed police officers we put into high schools. This will give him several thousand positive profiles on network news programs and the near-universal support of the Silicon Valley vampires who will own 99% of the country by the time Biden’s term ends. They will use their fancy mind control devices to convince geriatic primary voters that Rahm’s the one who will bring Decency back to the white house. His candidacy will be the paragon of wokeness, as expressing concern toward the fact that he covered up the police murder of a black guy will get you called a racist. 

Rahm has a bonus in that Jewish men are now Schrodeniger’s PoC. When they are decent human beings, they are basic, cis white men who are stealing attention from disabled trans candidates of color. When they love austerity and apartheid, they become the most vulnerable people of color on earth and criticizing them in any way is genocide. No one will be able to mention a single thing Rahm has ever done or said without opening themselves to accusations of antisemitism, and that gives him a strong edge against the rest of the field. The good news is that an Emmanuel candidacy would result in over 50% of black voters choosing the GOP candidate--which, I guess that’s not really good but it would certainly be funny. 

Gavin Newsom

Newsom is every bit as feckless as Cuomo, but he doesn’t put off the same “bad guy in an early Steven Segal movie” vibes. He will mention climate change 50 times per speech and no one will bother to mention how he keeps signing fracking contracts even though his state is now on fire 11 months of the year. If anything, this will be spun into an argument about how he’s actually the candidate best suited to handle all the water refugees gathering on the southern border. Look for his plan to curb emissions by 10% by the year 2150 to get high marks from Sierra Club nerds. He’s also a celebate librarian’s idea of what constitutes a handsome man, so he’ll have some support from the type of women who claim to hate all men. 

Larry Summers

I mean, why not? Larry, like most members of the Obama administration, has politics that are eerily similar to those of Jordan Peterson. In normal circumstances, this makes a person a dangerous fascist who should not be platformed. But if that person has a D next to their name this makes them a realistic pragmatist who has what it takes to bring suburban bankers into our tent. If current trends in Woke Phrenology continue apace, Larry’s belief that women are inherently bad at STEM will be liberal orthodoxy by 2023, and his dedication to the Laffer Curve could see him rake in massive donations. Seriously, I’m not kidding: cultural liberalism is now fully dedicated to identity essentialism and balanced budgets. Larry is their ideal candidate. If he were black and/or a woman, I’d put him in the very top tier. 

Jay Inslee

Unlike Newsom, Inslee’s attempt to crown himself the King of Global Warming won’t be immediately derailed, since his state is only on fire because of protestors. This, however, poses a different problem. He’s going to be a good test case for the Democrat’s uneasy peace with the ever increasing share of the electorate who become catatonic upon hearing a pronoun. On the one hand, you need to take their votes for granted. On the other hand, they’re not like black people or regular gays: most voters actively, consciously despise wokies, and associating yourself with them will ruin a campaign even in deep blue areas. There’s still gonna be riots in a year. Biden’s gonna announce the sale of all our nation’s potable water to the good folks at Nestle and some trans freak named Sasha-Malia DeBalzac is going to use that as an opportunity to sell their new pamphlet about how it’s fascist to not burn down small businesses. No matter what Inslee does in response, it’ll end his career. 

AOC

I’m not one of those “AOC is a secret conservative” weirdos, but I am aware enough of basic reality to know she has zero chance of coming close to the nomination. The right and the center both regard her as a literal demon. The party is already blaming her for the fact that a handful of faceless Reagan acolytes failed to flip their suburban districts even though they ran on sensible pragmatic proposals like euthanizing the homeless. The recriminations will only get more unhinged when the Dems eat shit in the 2022 midterms. She will be a Russian, she will be white male, she will be a communist, she will be a homophobe: any insult or conspiracy theory you can name, MSNBC will spend hours discussing. Her house seat challenger will receive a record amount of support from the DNC in 2024 and it’ll be all she can do to remain in congress.

Larry Hogan

Don’t be dissuaded by the fact that he’s a Republican. Larry is the DNC’s ideal candidate: a physically repulsive conservative who owes his entire career to appealing to the most spiteful desires of suburban white people. He’s an open racist in a material sense--if you’re old-school enough to think racism is a matter of beliefs and actions, rather than the presence of cultural signifiers--but his is the beloved “never Trump” style of racism that Dems covet. He’s also a Proven Leader who thinks the role of government should be to finance the construction of investment property and give police the resources they need to run successful drug trafficking operations. Few people embody the Democrat worldview more than Larry. 

The Losers Bracket

These people will have at least a small chance due solely to the fact that the Democrats love losing. They have lost in the past, and in the Democrat Mind that makes them especially qualified.

Joe Kennedy

The man looks like a mushroom-human hybrid from a JRPG. Trump proved that physical hideousness need not doom a presidential bid, but a candidate still needs some kind of charm or oratorical abilities or, god forbid, a decent platform. Joe aggressively lacks all of these things. A vanity campaign would be a good way to raise money and perhaps secure an MSNBC gig, so Joe might still run. 

Mayor Pete 

I am 100% convinced that Pete’s 2020 run was a CIA plot meant to prevent working class Americans from ever having a chance of living decent lives. I am also 100% aware that Democrats are dumb enough to enthusiastically support a CIA plot meant to prevent working class Americans from ever having a chance of living decent lives. If we have some sort of military or terror disaster between now and 2023 the Dems are sure to want a TROOP, and wait wait wait you’re telling me this one is a gay troop? Holy hell there’s no way that could lose!

Stacy Abrams

Never underestimate the power of white guilt. She lost the gubernatorial race to Gomer Pyle’s grandson, and her spiritual guidance of the Dems saw the party lose black voters in Georgia in 2020. Nonetheless, she is regarded as a magic font of fierceness within the DNC. She might stand a chance if she can establish herself as the most conservative non-white candidate in the field, but there’s going to be stiff competition for that honor.

Elizabeth Warren

Liz is probably angry that the party so shamelessly sold her out even after she was a good little girl and sabatoged Bernie’s campaign for them--yet another example of high ranking US government officials reneging on their promises to the Native American community. Smdh. The fact that this woman hasn’t been bankrupted a dozen times over by various Wallet Inspectors genuinely astounds me. So Liz is probably going to run again, and her campaign will be even sadder the second time around. 

It might surprise you to hear this if you don’t work at a college or NGO, but Liz diehards actually do exist. She’ll get even less support this time because there will be no viable leftist in the field for her to spoil, but she’ll still hang in long enough to make sure the very worst possible candidate beats out the second worst possible candidate. Maybe she’ll fabricate a rape accusation against Sherrod Brown. Maybe she’ll spend her entire allotted debate time doing a land acknowledgment. With Liz, anything is possible--so long as it ends in failure. 

Amy Klobuchar 

Amy was the most bloodthirsty of the 2020 also rans. She will double down on the unpopular failures of the Biden administration, explaining that if you weren’t such a selfish idiot you’d love the higher social security retirement age and oh my god are so such a moron you think you shouldn’t go bankrupt to get a COVID vaccine? There’s a non-unsubstantial segment of the Democratic base that’s self-hating enough to find this appealing, but it won’t be enough to make her viable. 

Martha Coakley

She lost Ted Kennedy’s senate seat to a retarded man who was pretending to be even more retarded than he actually was. Then she lost a gubernatorial race to a guy who openly promised Massachusetts voters that he would punish them for electing him. Her record of failure is unparalleled, making her perhaps the ideal Democrat standard bearer for the twenty twenties. 

[trans-advice]

WINDY CITY MEDIA GROUP

NATIONAL Biden tracker, Task Force, trans journalist, Cuomo, West Virginia

by Windy City Times staff

2021-03-14

GLAAD announced the launch of its Biden Equality Accountability Tracker—a real-time record of the Biden administration's executive orders, announcements, legislative support and speeches that impact LGBTQ people and rights, a press release noted. GLAAD has tracked at least 24 pro-equality moves in the first 50 days, as well as noted LGBTQ Cabinet and staff appointments in the first days of the administration. GLAAD President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis introduced the tracker in her op-ed in Reuters, and in the statement. See https:// Article Link Here .

The National LGBTQ Task Force announced the addition of two new staff members and the consolidation of two departments as part of the organization's growth and restructure under the leadership of recently named Executive Director Kierra Johnson, a press release noted. Former Creating Change Conference Director Andy Garcia will now head a combined department of conference, policy and advocacy staff as director of the Advocacy and Action Department. Also, Ashawnda Fleming joins the Task Force Development Department and Leadership Team as the new chief development officer and Desiree Luckey has been appointed senior policy counsel, focusing on the organization's democracy work.

Trans sports journalist Christina Kahrl—a longtime ESPN senior editor and co-founder of both the Baseball Prospectus think tank and the Baseball Writers' Association of America—announced on Twitter that she will be the next sports editor of the legendary San Francisco Chronicle newspaper, Outsports noted. She will become the first out transgender editor of a major, metropolitan mainstream media outlet in the country when she takes the reins of sports coverage of the largest newspaper in Northern California. The Chronicle is the state's second major newspaper after the Los Angeles Times. In a message to Outsports, Kahrl said she recognizes the importance of her platform.

Many of New York's LGBTQ lawmakers are echoing growing calls for Gov. Andrew Cuomo to resign in response to numerous disturbing allegations of inappropriate behavior and sexual harassment, Gay City News reported. U.S. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, became the highest-ranking LGBTQ elected official in the state to call on Cuomo to step down when he issued a statement on March 12—the same day that new allegations surfaced. Congressmen Mondaire Jones and Ritchie Torres have also asked for the governor to step down.

Researchers at UCLA partnered with a researcher at West Virginia University (WVU) to publish a report addressing discrimination against the LGBT community in West Virginia, WDTV.com reported. Some of the key findings were that LGBT people in West Virginia experience discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations. For example, data show 39% of LGBT adults in West Virginia reported having a household income below $24,000, compared to 26% of non-LGBT adults.

A Houston bakery is facing two separate lawsuits from former employees alleging they were fired due to anti-LGBTQ+ discrimination, out.com noted. Gilbert Johnson and Katherine Phillips told OutSmart the Dessert Gallery Bakery & Cafe fired them because Johnson is gay and Phillips is a lesbian. Johnson further alleged he was fired in part for hiring a transgender employee. "We take seriously any allegations like those outlined in these complaints but stand firm that these allegations are simply not true," Dessert Gallery said in a statement. "We believe the proper place to disclose the facts of this case is in the courtroom and look forward to that opportunity."

A bill to strengthen the sexually transmitted disease public-health infrastructure of California is better than a similar effort that had initially been introduced last year, a principal co-author of the legislation told the Bay Area Reporter. Gay state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) co-authored Senate Bill 306 with Sen. Dr. Richard Pan (D-Sacramento), who introduced it Feb. 4. According to a news release from Wiener's office, the legislation will "permit the Family [Planning Access Care Treatment] program to offer covered benefits to income-eligible patients, even if contraception is not discussed during the patient encounter; update California's [Expedited Partner Therapy] statute to include provider liability protections used in other states; permit HIV counselors to administer rapid STD tests; update state law to require congenital syphilis testing during the third trimester of pregnancy; [and] require coverage of home STD tests by public and private insurers."

Former First Lady Michelle Obama spoke candidly in a People Magazine interview about her struggles with low-grade depression during the COVID-19 pandemic and the challenges of 2020, encouraging people to speak more openly about their mental health, CNN.com noted. Obama told People magazine that she "needed to acknowledge what I was going through, because a lot of times we feel like we have to cover that part of ourselves up, that we always have to rise above and look as if we're not paddling hard underneath the water." She added, "We had the continued killing of Black men at the hands of police. Just seeing the video of George Floyd, experiencing that eight minutes. That's a lot to take on, not to mention being in the middle of a quarantine."

Thousands of Texans are slated to lose their healthcare provider after Travis County Civil District Court Judge Lora Livingston allowed the state to remove Planned Parenthood from its Medicaid program, CNN.com reported. Texas has long sought to ban Planned Parenthood, which provides abortions in Texas, from Medicaid. Medicaid funding does not cover abortions except in cases of rape or incest or when the woman's life is at risk, due to the Hyde Amendment, dating back to 1976. In 2019, Planned Parenthood provided health care to more than 8,000 Medicaid recipients in Texas.

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem signed Senate Bill 124, a religious refusal bill that could grant a license to discriminate against LGBTQ people across a wide range of goods and services in the state, a Human Rights Campaign (HRC) statement noted. HRC President Alphonso David said, "While she may see discrimination as a path to the national far right spotlight, she should understand the damage she is doing to the state of South Dakota and LGBTQ people who are simply looking to live their lives free of fear and exclusion." Noem also signed legislation that would bar transgender girls and women from participating in female sports leagues.

Over objections from Democrats, Georgia House Republicans passed a sweeping elections bill that would enact more restrictions on absentee voting and cut back on weekend early voting hours favored by larger counties, among other changes, NPR reported. The bill's sponsor—GOP Rep. Barry Fleming, who chairs the House Special Committee on Election Integrity—said the 66-page measure "is designed to begin to bring back the confidence of our voters back into our election system" after Republicans lost confidence in the GOP-backed voting system following Democrats' victories in the November presidential contest and both of Georgia's U.S. Senate races.

The National AIDS Memorial announced Isabel Fatima (Ima) Diawara, of Los Angeles, as the first recipient of the Mary Bowman Arts in Activism Award, a press release noted. The newly created and inspiring program, funded through a multi-year grant from ViiV Healthcare, offers support to artist-activists who are working and committed to making a difference in the fight against HIV/AIDS. The Mary Bowman Arts in Activism Award honors the life of Mary Bowman—a poet, advocate, author, singer and young person living with AIDS who passed away in early 2019 at age 30.

A statue of late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was erected in her hometown of Brooklyn on March 12—three days before her 88th birthday, USA Today noted. The unveiling also comes in the middle of Women's History Month as another way to honor Ginsburg's legacy and her fight for women's rights. The statue is part of a larger series called Statues for Equality, which has worked to increase the representation of women in public sculptures around New York City and beyond.

LGBTQ-rights advocates are uniting to support Noel Koenke, a former employee at St. Joseph's University who's appealing the dismissal of her LGBT-related anti-bias case against the university before it could reach a jury, Philadelphia Gay News reported. Koenke worked as an assistant director of music and worship at the university; however, pressure to stay in the closet eventually caused her to attempt suicide and resulted in the dissolution of her marriage�and she resigned in November 2017. Koenke filed suit in October 2019, claiming the university violated Title IX, which prohibits sex discrimination in educational programs receiving federal funds.

New York-based fashion designer Alexander Wang responded, again, to a growing number of sexual assault and harassment allegations, out.com reported. Wang had previously called the initial allegations "baseless," and said they were "fabricated"—but now, his tenor has changed starkly. On Instagram, he posted, "It was not easy for [the alleged victims] to share their stories, and I regret acting in a way that caused them pain. While we disagree with some of the details of these personal interactions, I will set a better example and use my visibility and influence to encourage others to recognize harmful behaviors. Life is about learning and growth, and now that I know better, I will do better." Attorney Lisa Bloom—who reportedly is representing 11 of those who have allegations against Wang—responded on Twitter, "We have met with Alexander Wang and his team. My clients had the opportunity to speak their truth to him and expressed their pain and hurt. We acknowledge Mr. Wang's apology and we are moving forward. We have no further comment on this matter."

Fox personality Geraldo Rivera posted a tweet announcing that he was pondering running for the seat that will be left vacant by retiring Republican Senator Rob Portman of Ohio, who will not be seeking re-election in 2022, Yahoo! noted. Rivera—who regularly butts heads with Sean Hannity and Fox News contributor Dan Bongino for his moderate stances on things like immigration—said he would have run as a moderate Republican. But his political ambitions didn't last long as he posted another tweet less than 24 hours after the first one, saying that the run is not going to happen.

Lawyers for former U.S. Rep. Katie Hill and her ex-husband, Kenneth Heslep, told a Los Angeles judge that they remain hopeful of settling her allegations of harassment and years of abuse—but they still asked that the groundwork be laid for a possible trial of whether Hill's stay-away order should be extended, the Los Angeles Daily News reported. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Lawrence Riff ordered both sides to prepare lists of witnesses and exhibits they would use during the trial and submit them a week in advance of April 8, when a trial-setting hearing is scheduled. The judge said he was extending the temporary restraining order Judge Anne Richardson granted Hill on Dec. 8 until April 30. Heslep has denied allegations of abusing Hill, who resigned her seat in 2019 after nude photos of her were published and news emerged that she had a three-way relationship with her husband and a female campaign staffer.

On March 8, the Cambridge (Massachusetts) City Council passed a historic domestic partnership ordinance aimed at recognizing and protecting polyamorous and other multi-partner families and relationships, according to an item from the Polyamory Legal Advocacy Coalition (PLAC). The ordinance was developed with detailed input from the PLAC, and is the first of what advocates hope will be a wave of legal recognition for polyamorous families and relationships in 2021. Last year, Somerville (also in Massachusetts) became the first U.S. city to allow domestic partnerships of three or more partners.

In California, the second annual "Pride Ride" returns to Homewood Mountain Resort March 25-28, The Bay Area Reporter noted. Along with skiing and riding, there will be a variety of mini-events on and off the mountain, including a dual slalom drag race, ski parade down Rainbow Ridge, virtual scavenger hunt and more. See https:// Article Link Here .

[antoine-roquentin]

First, take a look at the very equivocal position of the Democratic leadership. One little noted detail is important. An amendment inserted in the lame-duck legislation that enshrined the “Swaps Pushout” weakening of the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill in January 2015, made it easier for big donors to funnel much larger sums of money to the national party committees. This has, I think, made it even easier for blocs of big donors to control those committees, even as small contributions sometimes surge. Not only in 2018, but in the 2020 primaries, I think this mattered.

As a result, the Democratic National Committee has not been subordinated to the Biden campaign, at least not yet. The surge in the southern Democratic primaries that destroyed the Sanders boom involved many big Democratic donors along with many black congressmen and women, together with the political and financial networks of former president Barack Obama and the Clintons. It was a coming together of the entire Democratic establishment to stop Sanders. Congressional black leaders were thus heavily identified with the “Stop Sanders” movement, too.

But with the combined economic collapse and the pandemic revealing the bankruptcy of the traditional establishment, the whole top of the party has had to scramble. How they have responded is very interesting. Thanks to the dissemination of so many videos, the realization about the racism that black Americans face — and not just by so many police — is very widespread. The revulsion is deep and real.

In response, the Democratic establishment is taking a leaf from the past — not the late ’60s, when groups highly critical of the Democrats became prominent, but the early ’60s. Joel Rogers and I described the process in our book Right Turn. When the civil rights movement emerged, major foundations, prominent business leaders of major multinationals, and foundations allied to them heavily supported that groundswell. John F. Kennedy famously called Martin Luther King in jail, while prominent Wall Street lawyers flew down south or otherwise helped represent civil rights campaigners who were under legal attack. That’s what’s happening right now, with groups closely allied with the Democratic Party helping to raise money. There will be tensions now, as there were then, between the party and the movement, but that’s the basic direction things are taking.                

So how does this play into the election?                                   

I think the basic script each party is following is evident. Democrats are hoping for a repeat of 2008. In that election, policy was hopelessly bungled by the Republican leadership. After Lehman Brothers went bankrupt, nobody in opposition had to say very much. Democrats could just sit and watch John McCain flail helplessly.

Donald Trump, by contrast, is clearly copying the Nixon playbook, though because he’s in power, 1972 is closer to the mark than 1968. His administration’s heavy-handed appeals to “law and order” are obvious, and so are the ways he tries to bait protesters. The “law and order” mantra is looking a bit thin, though, partly because the videos and protests so clearly touch a chord with many members of the public. But it is also apparent that the US military wants no part in quelling domestic protests, so that the best Trump is likely to be able to do is to try to irritate protesters and hope for strong public reactions. Attorney general William Barr is also pitching in, in spectacular fashion.

The other thing the White House is bent on doing is finding a way to levitate the economy. In 1972, Richard Nixon famously relied on Arthur Burns at the Fed to engineer a legendary political business cycle. Today’s Fed certainly reacts to pressures from Trump, but the drastically different world situation severely limits its room for maneuver. It can hardly do more than it has even if it wanted to.

This is why the president and the vice president are trying so desperately to downplay the pandemic. They want to drive people back to work and push up the GDP. Vice president Mike Pence is plainly encouraging state leaders to talk up their successes and downplay bad news, including spiking COVID-19 cases in the South and West. The White House thinks they have to get the economy moving again or Trump will be toast in November.           

How different is this from what the administration was doing earlier?  

It represents a doubling down on policies that Trump and his camp wanted to promote earlier and did for a while. As the pandemic hit, all over the developed world, prominent business figures and conservative economists warned about the dangers of a long lockdown. Some, including an occasional central banker, even talked sotto voce about how such policies would reduce state pension obligations. In the United States, the UK, and other European countries, advocates talked up the idea of “herd immunity.” Trump’s “kitchen cabinet” of business figures, including prominent private equity managers, were repeatedly cited as pushing the president to take a “go slow” attitude on lockdowns.

After the publication of the Imperial College estimates of the death rates such policies would entail, though, enthusiasm waned. The UK changed policy. The switch definitely affected the Trump administration’s attitudes. It helped, along with the ghastly reality of what was happening on the ground, especially on the East and West coasts of the United States, to force the administration to accept lockdowns and sheltering in place. Both in the United States and in the UK, though, pressures from business groups for rapid reopening remained very strong. Conservative groups have even urged reopening without establishing a viable testing regime, which is exactly what the administration has now done.

Clear camps are forming within business, and those look to be seeping into politics. Many small companies whose business models rest on low wages, along with financiers — meaning private equity first and foremost — whose strategies depend on buying and breaking up firms, continue to plump for rapid reopening.

By contrast, many firms in the rest of finance, and especially in high-tech and capital-intensive industries whose strategies do not rest on low wages, are less heedless of the dangers of quick opening. Many tech firms enthusiastically promote their products as solutions to the problems the pandemic creates — as is obvious with many internet and software companies. Robert Rubin called for joint panels of medical professionals and economists to decide when reopening was feasible and for contact tracing; even robotic assistance has been touted.

Where the rubber meets the road, though, is the critical question of worker safety. Trump gutted the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Not only is the number of inspectors way down, but key appointees are plainly uninterested in regulating on the issue at all.

It seems to me that this is a potentially fateful intersection between the movement growing out of Minneapolis and the Democrats. Calls to reopen quickly are basically demands by affluent white-collar managers who can work at home. They want to send blue-collar workers back to work under conditions the senior executives would not accept for themselves. Many of the blue-collar workers are, it is important to add, black or Latino. Though you would never know from reading any major newspaper, wildcat and other strikes have soared since Minneapolis. There are literally hundreds and hundreds of them, as Mike Elk’s Payday Report website is documenting. It seems clear that the protests have inspired many black and Latino workers to demand safe working conditions.

I don’t have much to say for the classic financial bailouts the United States has pursued — they protect the wealth of those that have it, while the government does something, but not much, to protect the livelihood of average citizens. But it would make a great deal of sense to move onto the national balance sheet the costs of redesigning work to make it safe. That would be a really good use of public resources.                              

So how does this play out in the election?                                                   

Right now, COVID-19 cases are soaring in many Southern and Western states, whose Republican governors had followed the White House lead and pretended the pandemic was over or would somehow never reach them. As a result, you can feel a seismic tremor in Trump’s support: the fabled 40 percent or so base level for him that people thought could never be breached is being broken.

But I remember 1988 very well, when Michael Dukakis was almost 20 points ahead of George H. W. Bush in late summer. A lot can happen to change what looks like an all but insurmountable advantage. One needs to remember that Biden looks good mostly next to Trump; the Democratic candidate doesn’t generate much enthusiasm from voters on his own. How the Biden campaign can tap the energy that fueled Sanders, and, to some extent, Warren, is not clear yet. The terms of trade between the camps are still being worked out, and the effort could fail. If Democratic elites are dumb enough to believe the claims so many have made that 2016 had nothing to do with economics, they could repeat that disaster.

I have a hard time believing that people who are out of work and watching how the government is allowing insurers to slip out of covering the costs of COVID tests will be inspired to vote for Biden without something far stronger than a “public option” for health care instead of Medicare for All, for example.

Plenty else can go wrong, too. Let’s just bracket the possibility of some foreign crisis, especially in the South China Sea, since it’s also clear Trump right now is still hoping that a big trade deal with China might come through. Otherwise, there are the old reliables for the GOP: efforts to hold down voter turnout and giant flows of big money.

This year, though, there’s a wrinkle to the first one. Trump’s campaign against the Post Office may have started out as a fight with Amazon, but right now, it’s clearly turned into something else. Empirical evidence from the Wisconsin primary is clear that voting in person led to several waves of new COVID infections.

As a result, interest in mail balloting is way up. Of course, Republicans are mostly opposed to that, though empirical evidence up to now does not suggest that mail ballots have strong partisan advantages one way or the other. But, of course, a broke Post Office won’t be delivering much of anything. My guess is that you’ll see Trump dig in ever more obdurately on this issue as election day approaches.

Which brings us to the money question. Here, I don’t have much to add to what my colleagues Paul Jorgensen, Jie Chen, and I wrote earlier in the year. In 2016, we found that Trump floated to victory on a big wave of late money from large private equity firms, among others. We also conjectured that the perfect correlation for the first time in American history between Republican success in Senate elections and the outcome of the presidential vote in states was not an accident. That turned out to be true. Trump did a bit better in states with Senate races. We’ve now shown how late money turned around those Senate races, when prospects just weeks before the election looked hopeless. That example is instructive. Democratic candidates who lost elections in those final days have told me how they watched the inflow of money turn around what had seemed a favorable situation. Problems with even counting ballots are, I think, likely to make 2020 very tense, no matter what polls say now or even the day before. Whether we live in a pre- or a post-apocalyptic era might be tested.