Today's Stoopid Fuckin' Republican

There is only one organ in a woman’s body “that is not there to serve a purpose for her and that is her womb.”

“I’m not going to apologize for saying that,” Tschida told MTN. “I think that’s exactly what it’s there for. It welcomes in a new life and that’s what it’s there to do, to nurture and sustain that life.”

So, if her womb is there to serve as an incubator for new life, but it's not there to serve any other purpose for a woman, then who's purpose are you insisting it's there to serve?

Gosh - lemme see - maybe that purpose is all about a man taking sole province over a woman's reproductive decisions. That's it, isn't it, you arrogant dominionist assholes?

Seriously now, guys - fuck off and leave people alone.

WaPo: (pay wall)

GOP lawmaker: Womb has ‘no specific purpose’ to a woman’s ‘life or well-being’

As millions of Americans protest restrictions that preclude abortions, even when the life of a woman is at risk, Montana state Rep. Brad Tschida (R) is arguing that a woman’s womb “serves no specific purpose to her life or well-being.”

Tschida, a former Montana House majority leader who is running for the state Senate, wrote an email this week to more than 100 legislators citing a podcast featuring a woman who is an antiabortion advocate, according to the Daily Montanan.

“The womb is the only organ in a woman’s body that serves no specific purpose to her life or well-being,” Tschida wrote on Monday, according to MTN News, the first to report the news. “It is truly a sanctuary.”

The false claim goes against long-accepted science surrounding the pear-shaped organ and how it helps in women’s reproductive health and function. The uterus plays a critical role not just in the growth and development of a fetus during pregnancy but also menstruation and fertility. Conditions and diseases of the uterus can cause painful symptoms that require medical treatment, according to the Cleveland Clinic.

Tschida’s remarks were met by backlash from Democrats who accused the lawmaker of holding “antiquated, and frankly offensive beliefs.” Among those critics was state Rep. Willis Curdy (D), Tschida’s state Senate opponent, who decried the comments as “absolutely ludicrous and flat-out creepy.”

“He is literally telling women what is and isn’t theirs and what they can and cannot do with their bodies,” Curdy tweeted.

But Tschida, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment early Friday, doubled down on his remarks to local media, and pointed to a comment from the antiabortion activist in the podcast episode he had referenced: There is only one organ in a woman’s body “that is not there to serve a purpose for her and that is her womb.”

“I’m not going to apologize for saying that,” Tschida told MTN. “I think that’s exactly what it’s there for. It welcomes in a new life and that’s what it’s there to do, to nurture and sustain that life.”

The Republican’s comments come as the country continues to navigate through the first weeks of a post-Roe landscape — a stretch dominated by protests, lawsuits, court rulings and a man’s arrest in the case of a 10-year-old rape victim in Ohio who traveled to Indiana for an abortion. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) announced Thursday that he was suing the Biden administration over federal rules that require abortions be provided in medical emergencies to save the life of the mother, even in states with near-total bans. The lawsuit follows new guidance from the Department of Health and Human Services that asserted federal law requiring emergency medical treatment supersedes any state restrictions on abortion in cases where the pregnant patient’s life or health is at risk.

While abortion remains legal for now in Montana due to protections in the state constitution, Gov. Greg Gianforte (R) has said previously that he would call a special legislative session on abortion if Roe was overturned. As Gianforte joined other Republicans on June 24 in celebrating what he called “a historic win for life, families, and science,” the governor tweeted that he was “in discussions with legislative leaders on next steps as we work to protect life in Montana.” Any legislative change to end the abortion protections would require a voter-approved amendment.

Tschida, who has represented Missoula in the state House since 2015, is running for a state Senate seat in a district that Democrats narrowly won in the previous two elections. The seat has been held by Democratic state Sen. Diane Sands, an outspoken advocate for women’s reproductive rights who recently spoke at a White House roundtable discussion on abortion access with Vice President Harris. Sands’s term ends next year.

In an email sent Monday to legislators, Tschida referenced an episode of a podcast featuring a professor who supported abortion rights debating with a woman who held antiabortion beliefs. Although Tschida told local media that he did not recall the name of the podcast, the Republican noted how the professor asked his antiabortion guest whether a woman should have to “sacrifice her organs because someone else told her to do so.” After thinking on the question, Tschida wrote, the woman expressed her opinion that “the womb is a place set aside for another person who arrives as a result of a choice of a man and a woman to procreate.”

“That single factor has struck me since I heard that commentary,” Tschida wrote.

The Republican told the Daily Montanan that the message he took away from the uterus exchange was comparable to a time he saw a doe fend off birds of prey from eating her dead fawn.

“We’ve got a mother that’s a wild animal that’s trying to protect her offspring who’s already dead, but we don’t have the same concern generally speaking for unborn in humanity,” he said. “I thought that was a pretty interesting parallel or dynamic.”

The Republican argued that voters cared about other issues more than abortion — such as inflation, the high cost of gas and election security — and that his views on women’s rights and their bodies would not be a factor in the November election.

“I’ve told people what I believe. I’ve told them how I would vote,” he said to the newspaper. “That’s up to the individuals.”

Abortion Stuff

Why does the shit Republicans are trying to pull remind me so much of the Fugitive Slave shit that the southern states pushed thru in the 1800s?

Every Republican voted against a woman's right to travel freely from state to state.

You are some kinda fucked up, America.

Reuters:

U.S. House passes bill to protect right to travel for abortion

The U.S. House of Representatives on Friday passed legislation to safeguard the right to travel across state lines to seek an abortion after several states banned the procedure in the wake of last month's Supreme Court ruling.

The Democratic-controlled House voted 223 to 205, largely along party lines, to prevent states that have limited abortion from obstructing women's ability to seek care elsewhere.

The bill faces long odds in the evenly divided Senate, where Republicans blocked similar legislation on Thursday.

Roughly a dozen Republican-led states have moved to ban nearly all abortions since late June, when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the Roe v. Wade ruling that had legalized abortion rights nationwide since 1973, and more states are expected to do so.

Some Republicans in those states have tried to go further. Missouri legislators considered a bill that would allow civil lawsuits against anyone who aids a woman in seeking an out-of-state abortion.

The issue received national attention after media reports on a 10-year-old girl who was raped in Ohio and had to travel to Indiana to obtain an abortion.

"Congress has the authority and the responsibility to protect people from these unconstitutional efforts," said Democratic Representative Lizzie Fletcher, the bill's author.

Other efforts to protect abortion rights have repeatedly foundered in the Senate this year, where Democrats need at least 10 Republican votes to advance most legislation.

Still, voting on the bills is one of the few actions congressional Democrats can take to demonstrate they are trying to protect abortion rights ahead of the Nov. 8 midterm elections, with control of Congress at stake.

Republican Representative Jodey Arrington said the bill was "wholly inconsistent with our values and founding principles of our nation."

The House will vote next week on a bill to codify the right to access contraception, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said in a statement on Friday.

And don't give me any crap about how the Democrats have failed to do this or failed to stop that.

Republicans are responsible for the shit Republicans are doing.

People get their houses robbed. It's not the homeowners' fault, and it's not the cops' fault - it's the fucking burglars' fault.

On Guns And Babies

An interesting take: Abortion as self defense.

WaPo: (pay wall)

Opinion
I asked about abortion at a Texas gun show. The answer I got was grim.

Standing next to a display of military-grade weapons, I wondered aloud to the dealers at the gun-show booth if more women should get guns in Texas to protect themselves now that they will be forced to carry a pregnancy to term even in cases of rape.

“You can’t rape a .38,” one of the gun dealers said, smiling.

The line was equal parts laughably cheesy and tragically grim. As we spoke, a little boy walked by waving around a toy machine gun, pretending to spray everyone in the vicinity with imaginary bullets. A few booths over, a female attendant wore a black-and-red “All Lives Splatter” T-shirt.

The Fort Worth Gun Show, at the Amon Carter Exhibit Hall, is one of the oldest gun shows in gun-loving North Texas. I attended the two-day event this month to see what it would be like on the heels of both the Uvalde school massacre and the overturning of Roe v. Wade. I wanted to see how the Texas gun community would make sense of the two events.

A dealer asked me whether I wanted to hold an MP-5, a military-grade rifle. “I’m sorry to say this,” he said. “But for women who deal with break-ins, many times the woman gets raped.” For my first gun, the dealers agreed I should start out with a .22 rifle.

Does the end of one constitutional right mean women should rush to embrace another that our Supreme Court is rushing to expand? Even before the fall of Roe it was a common pitch of gun enthusiasts: Women are safer when they own a gun. But the reality is, women who have guns are more likely to have them used against them. And the biggest danger is not a stranger slipping through a window or lurking in a parking garage, but a man already in their life.

Sadly, the threat of gun violence is even more true for pregnant women. According to a study published last year in the journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, homicide is a leading cause of death for pregnant women and those who have recently given birth.

The study, conducted by Tulane University researchers, revealed that the “pregnancy-associated homicide” rate in 2018 and 2019 was 3.62 per 100,000 women — 16 percent higher than homicides of women who are not pregnant or haven’t recently given birth. Homicide beat hemorrhage and pregnancy-related hypertension as the top single cause of death. A majority of the slain women were killed with guns, and two-thirds were killed in their homes, suggesting partners were involved, according to the authors. The rates were highest among Black women and younger women.

In Texas, the news here is a sad reflection of this. In October, 25-year-old Cavanna Smith had told her boyfriend that she was pregnant, and sent him a card with a picture of the ultrasound; she was later found dead, shot in the head. The boyfriend has been charged with her murder. In April, 20-year-old Dontia Clark was found shot to death in her Houston apartment a day after learning she was eight weeks pregnant. According to reports, there were no signs of forced entry.

Much has been said and written about women who seek abortions for medical threats such as ectopic pregnancies. But what of women who seek to end their pregnancies to protect themselves from violence at the hands of the men in their lives? Or who don’t want to bring a child into the world with a potential abuser? In Texas, women can no longer choose a safe abortion as a means of self-defense. What are we going to do, tell them to get a .22?

Much has also been made of the Senate’s recent agreement to close the “boyfriend loophole” on gun restrictions. Previously, under federal law, domestic abusers could be prohibited, via the national instant criminal background check system, from having guns only in cases where they have been married to, lived with or had a child with the victim; that’s now been widened to include those who have been in a serious relationship with the target. But in Texas, which allows private gun owners to sell to others without background checks, another enormous loophole remains open.

It’s no stretch to expect that even more pregnant women will be assaulted and killed by partners now that abortion is all but banned here. Texas lags other states in mental health resources and has faced funding shortages for domestic violence prevention. If women are to be forced to carry pregnancies — if Texas truly wants to “protect life” — so much more must be done about the issues of maternal homicide and interpersonal violence.

I left the gun show without a .22 rifle. Sad to say, but as a woman who values access to safe reproductive choices, my best form of defense is probably leaving my home state altogether.

Overheard

Funny how it's not funny.

Almost 80% of Americans consistently say abortion should be kept as an option for every woman. Three SCOTUS justices lied under oath about agreeing with those 250,000,000 Americans, and about Roe being "precedent upon precedent" - stare decisis. They lied under oath to get the job so they could overturn a fundamental principle of our experiment in democratic self-government.

Not fuckin' funny at all.

Today's GOP Fuckery

When Greg Abbott signed the Texas bill criminalizing abortion - and monetizing the enforcement provisions by essentially deputizing every vigilante schmuck with a hankerin' to play Wyatt Earp while putting $10,000 in his pocket - he was asked about not making provisions for rape and incest.

He side-stepped the question, and pivoted straight into feigning an angry rant about the terribleness of rape and how he was going to put a stop to rape in Texas and it's the rapists committing rape who need to be stopped before they can rape the rape victims who are raped and raped and raped.

And suddenly the question about forcing a woman to bear a child against her will, having been forced to get impregnated against her will is completely lost in the shuffle.

MIke DeWine tried to pull the same shit in Ohio.

Ohio Capitol Journal:

10-year-old rape victim apparently not among Ohio Gov. DeWine’s ‘most vulnerable’ needing protection

Gov. Mike DeWine spends a lot of time jawing about his concern for protecting the “most vulnerable” Ohioans whenever he signs a draconian law attacking the bodily autonomy of others.

But as we learned this week, a 10-year-old Ohio rape victim was forced to travel to Indiana for an abortion after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned national abortion rights, and within hours 

On Monday three days after the Supreme Court issued its groundbreaking decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, Dr. Caitlin Bernard, an Indianapolis obstetrician-gynecologist, took a call from a colleague, a child abuse doctor in Ohio.

Hours after the Supreme Court action, the Buckeye state had outlawed any abortion after six weeks. Now this doctor had a 10-year-old patient in the office who was six weeks and three days pregnant.

Could Bernard help?

Though Indiana lawmakers are poised to further restrict or ban abortion in mere weeks with a special session July 25, for now, the procedure still is legal there. And so, the Star reported, the girl soon was on her way to Indiana to Bernard’s care.

Asked Wednesday about the law he signed preventing this 10-year-old rape victim from having a choice over her pregnancy in Ohio, DeWine could only stutter and stammer through a political hack non-answer:

“Yeah, first of all, I have no more information than you do or anybody does. Reading in the, in the paper, it came came as you know, from a story out of, out of Indiana from, from a doctor over there. This is a horrible, horrible tragedy, you know, for a 10-year-old to be assaulted, 10-year-old to be raped, you know, as a father and grandfather, it just, it’s just gut-wrenching to even, even, even think about it. I assume that the doctor has reported this. I assume that if she was treated at an emergency room, you know, these are all mandatory reporters. So I’m assuming that this has been referred to children’s services, I assume has also been referred to local whatever the local law enforcement agency is. We have out there a, obviously a rapist. We have someone who is dangerous and we have someone who should be picked up and locked up forever. And again, I don’t, not knowing all the facts of the case, I’m just assuming that that process has has in fact, has in fact, been been followed. [sic]”

Everyone knows that the rape of a 10-year-old is horrible. That’s not the question.

The question is for DeWine to explain why he thinks he is justified in creating law to force child rape victims to carry pregnancies from their rapists. On that subject, DeWine’s silence rang loud.

DeWine would inflict the emotional and physical violence of forced birth-giving on child rape victims, but won’t take responsibility for his own actions.

This is a most disgusting form of cowardice.

Either DeWine has the courage of his convictions and explains why children must undergo this suffering he’s causing; or he’s a coward.

From his answer, it’s apparent he’s so unconcerned — while this has made national and international news all week — he hasn’t bothered to seek out the facts of the case.

Compare his current posture to the rhetoric DeWine deployed when he signed the law that caused this situation:

“The essential function of government is to protect the most vulnerable among us, those who don’t have a voice,” DeWine said.

If a 10-year-old rape victim does not rank among Ohio’s most vulnerable, I shudder to imagine DeWine’s conception of vulnerability.

This is just the beginning. This was one example that came within days of the Supreme Court’s ruling and the enactment of Ohio Republicans’ law.

Over the coming years, there will be many more. We will report on each story we can, and they will all be heartbreaking to read, I’m sure, and devastating to everyday Ohioans’ lives.

This is what happens when long-standing freedoms are ripped away from Americans by extremist politicians and politically motivated, activist courts.

This is what happens when politicians choose to be blind to the nuances and complexity of life, and instead stake out radical, absolutist positions, and then give those positions the power of law.

Ohio Republicans are planning to move legislation next that will ban nearly all abortions, again with no exceptions for rape or incest.

The sponsor says she has the votes in the General Assembly as well as the “full support” of DeWine.

State Rep. Jean Schmidt doesn’t know yet, she said, whether they will make this new, even more extreme law before or after the November General Election. She’s called forced pregnancy for rape victims “an opportunity.”

Ohio Republicans and Mike DeWine may be fine with making our state an example of heartless cruelty before the eyes of the nation and the world.

I think it’s sick and monstrous.

But that’s the law they made and threaten to make worse, so they don’t get to shirk responsibility and accountability for their actions.

Each heartbreaking story of suffering and pain falls squarely on their heads.

And isn't it weird - but no, not weird at all - that Republicans always come down on the side of retribution.

No matter what happens, their first inclination is to punish. Everybody gets punished for everything - the perp and victim and everybody else - punishing everybody means nobody can criticize us for playing favorites.

I think that grows out of Daddy State Awareness, Rule 6:

Total criminalization: if we're all guilty, then you can't hold me responsible without the risk of exposing your own culpability.

So it follows that if everybody's guilty of something, then everybody can be punished at any time for any reason. Or for no reason at all.

And if punishment is the order of the day, then everybody is under threat at all times, which makes everybody a little less likely to step outa line.

A Rerun

Overheard:

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter when life begins.

It doesn't matter whether a fetus is a human being or not.

That whole line of argumentation is a red herring - a distraction - a subjective and unwinnable argument that could not matter less.

It doesn't matter whether we're talking about a fertilized egg, or a fetus, or a five-year-old, or a Noble Prize winning pediatric oncologist.

NOBODY has the right to use your body against your will - even to save their own life, or someone else's.

That's it. That's the argument.

You cannot be forced to donate blood, or bone marrow, or internal organs, even though thousands of deserving people on the waiting lists die every year.

They're not allowed to harvest your body parts after your death without your explicit, written-signed-and-notarized, pre-mortem permission.

Denying a woman her right to abortion means she has less bodily autonomy than a corpse.

The Abortion Thing

Axios

Dashboard: The latest on Roe v. Wade and abortion

• Supreme Court asks Maryland officials to stop protests outside Justices' homes
• Texas Supreme Court blocks order allowing abortions to resume
• New York advances constitutional amendment to protect abortion access
• Democrats raised $80M in a week after Supreme Court overturned Roe
• The abortion trigger laws that have gone into effect now that Roe v. Wade is overturned
• Abortion providers sue Oklahoma to challenge bans
• Next post-Roe battlefield: Online abortion information
• Indigenous tribes push back on calls to open abortion clinics on federal lands
• Rep. Chu arrested alongside over 180 activists at abortion rights rally
• Judge to temporarily block Florida's 15-week abortion ban
• Court temporarily blocks Kentucky's total, 6-week abortion bans
• Biden backs filibuster changes to codify Roe v. Wade
• Exclusive: Biden to meet with governors on abortion rights

The Hill:

Florida synagogue files suit over 15-week abortion ban, citing violation of religious freedom

“The Jewish people are just one group among all the people of Florida whose religious beliefs about when life begins and when abortion is proper runs afoul of the Act. Thus, the Act violates the religious freedom of all Floridians who do not share the religious views reflected and codified in the Act,” said the lawsuit, filed by the congregation L’Dor Va-Dor.

A synagogue in Florida is suing the state over its 15-week abortion ban, arguing the law would penalize its congregants and is at odds with Jewish law and understanding regarding abortion.

Congregation L’Dor Va-Dor filed the lawsuit Friday in Leon County and is seeking injunctive relief, as the Florida abortion ban is set to take effect July 1. Under HB 5, Florida will begin banning all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, with no exceptions for incest, rape or human trafficking.

In the lawsuit, plaintiffs argue that HB 5 violates Floridians’ freedom of religion and that if congregants of L’Dor Va-Dor choose to get an abortion, as supported by Jewish law, they will be penalized by the state. It also states that HB 5 doesn’t specify all the possible penalties for violators of the law and is “unconstitutionally vague.”

L’Dor-Va-Dor also notes that its’ congregation isn’t the only one set to be impacted by HB 5.

“The Jewish people are just one group among all the people of Florida whose religious beliefs about when life begins and when abortion is proper runs afoul of the Act. Thus, the Act violates the religious freedom of all Floridians who do not share the religious views reflected and codified in the Act.”

America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news.

The timing of Florida’s 15-week abortion ban is also disputed, with the lawsuit stating it is, “arbitrary and capricious, is not supported by any rational basis or compelling state interest and is hard to understand for many women and their medical providers.”

That’s something that many experts have also reiterated, like the Center for Reproductive Rights, which noted that fetal viability is around the 23-week point of pregnancy and the parameters set by HB 5 are two months before that. The Guttmacher Institute, an abortion advocacy group, found an estimated 54,000 to 63,000 abortions occur after 15 weeks of pregnancy in the U.S.

Congregation L’Dor Va-Dor also argued that its pregnant members would be forced to travel to a different state to exercise their right to seek an abortion and that could result in delayed health care “and all such delays increase the danger and harm to women from abortion, which nevertheless is less than the dangers of childbirth.”

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) is listed as a defendant, alongside state attorneys Jack Campbell and David Aronberg, attorney general Ashley Moody, the Florida Department of Health and multiple other state health agencies.

When asked for a response to the L’Dor Va-Dor lawsuit, the Florida governor’s office told Changing America, “Governor DeSantis is and always has been pro-life. Our office is confident that this law will ultimately withstand all legal challenges.”

Florida is already facing another attack on HB 5, with Planned Parenthood in partnership with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and multiple other advocacy groups filing a lawsuit in June arguing the abortion law is “blatantly unconstitutional.”

Stephanie Fraim, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida, explained the firsthand experience and knowledge that health care providers have when it comes to the decision-making process of a pregnancy.

“Taking away a person’s freedom to make this decision themselves endangers everyone. This law is devastating and cruel. It is not what Floridians want nor what patients and their families need. On behalf of the patients who deserve access to all health care options and Floridians who value personal freedom, we will fight this abortion ban,” said Fraim, in a statement.

A synagogue in Florida is suing the state over its 15-week abortion ban, arguing the law would penalize its congregants and is at odds with Jewish law and understanding regarding abortion.

Congregation L’Dor Va-Dor filed the lawsuit Friday in Leon County and is seeking injunctive relief, as the Florida abortion ban is set to take effect July 1. Under HB 5, Florida will begin banning all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, with no exceptions for incest, rape or human trafficking.

In the lawsuit, plaintiffs argue that HB 5 violates Floridians’ freedom of religion and that if congregants of L’Dor Va-Dor choose to get an abortion, as supported by Jewish law, they will be penalized by the state. It also states that HB 5 doesn’t specify all the possible penalties for violators of the law and is “unconstitutionally vague.”

L’Dor-Va-Dor also notes that its’ congregation isn’t the only one set to be impacted by HB 5.

“The Jewish people are just one group among all the people of Florida whose religious beliefs about when life begins and when abortion is proper runs afoul of the Act. Thus, the Act violates the religious freedom of all Floridians who do not share the religious views reflected and codified in the Act.”

America is changing faster than ever! Add Changing America to your Facebook or Twitter feed to stay on top of the news.

The timing of Florida’s 15-week abortion ban is also disputed, with the lawsuit stating it is, “arbitrary and capricious, is not supported by any rational basis or compelling state interest and is hard to understand for many women and their medical providers.”

That’s something that many experts have also reiterated, like the Center for Reproductive Rights, which noted that fetal viability is around the 23-week point of pregnancy and the parameters set by HB 5 are two months before that. The Guttmacher Institute, an abortion advocacy group, found an estimated 54,000 to 63,000 abortions occur after 15 weeks of pregnancy in the U.S.

Congregation L’Dor Va-Dor also argued that its pregnant members would be forced to travel to a different state to exercise their right to seek an abortion and that could result in delayed health care “and all such delays increase the danger and harm to women from abortion, which nevertheless is less than the dangers of childbirth.”

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) is listed as a defendant, alongside state attorneys Jack Campbell and David Aronberg, attorney general Ashley Moody, the Florida Department of Health and multiple other state health agencies.

When asked for a response to the L’Dor Va-Dor lawsuit, the Florida governor’s office told Changing America, “Governor DeSantis is and always has been pro-life. Our office is confident that this law will ultimately withstand all legal challenges.”

Florida is already facing another attack on HB 5, with Planned Parenthood in partnership with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and multiple other advocacy groups filing a lawsuit in June arguing the abortion law is “blatantly unconstitutional.”

Stephanie Fraim, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida, explained the firsthand experience and knowledge that health care providers have when it comes to the decision-making process of a pregnancy.

“Taking away a person’s freedom to make this decision themselves endangers everyone. This law is devastating and cruel. It is not what Floridians want nor what patients and their families need. On behalf of the patients who deserve access to all health care options and Floridians who value personal freedom, we will fight this abortion ban,” said Fraim, in a statement.

Buy This Now

The ghost of RBG wants you to know

the morning after pill

is available on Amazon

and has a 3-year shelf life

Today's PSA

Advice from Dr Jennifer Lincoln

@drjenniferlincoln What to do next. NOW. #threeforfreedom #bansoffourbodies #roevwade #obgyn #birthcontrol ♬ Paris - 斌杨Remix

ThreeForFreedom.com 

Diving To The Bottom

I don't know what we can do in response to SCOTUS fucking people out of their rights, but I know it's not nothing.

Maybe start here:

Expand SCOTUS to 13

15 year term limit

WaPo: (pay wall)

U.S. abortion decision ‘horrific’ and ‘appalling,’ world leaders say

The Supreme Court’s decision Friday to overturn Roe v. Wade — and revoke the constitutional right to an abortion — has triggered widespread condemnation outside the United States.

World leaders and abortion rights advocates described the ruling as “horrific” and “appalling.” Crowds rallied in protest in cities including London, Paris and Edinburgh, Scotland.
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“One of the darkest days for women’s rights in my lifetime,” Scottish leader Nicola Sturgeon wrote on Twitter just minutes after the decision came down.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also called the news “horrific,” saying that “no government, politician, or man should tell a woman what she can and cannot do with her body.”

“Abortion is a fundamental right for all women. It must be protected,” French President Emmanuel Macron wrote on Twitter. “I express my solidarity with the women whose freedoms are today challenged by the Supreme Court of the United States of America.”

The court voted 6 to 3 Friday to uphold a Mississippi law banning all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Five justices also voted to overturn Roe, upending nearly 50 years of legal precedent guaranteeing the right to the procedure.

In many countries, abortion is protected by law, not court decision

The United States is now one of just three countries that have restricted abortion access in the 21st century. Over the past several decades, more than 50 countries have liberalized their abortion laws, according to the Center for Reproductive Rights, a global advocacy group opposed to abortion restrictions.

The United States is “out of step with the global community’s commitment to advance human rights,” more than 100 global health-care organizations said in a statement Friday.

In recent years, countries including Argentina, Colombia, Ireland and Mexico have all moved to expand abortion access. Mexico’s Supreme Court decriminalized abortion in a major ruling last September.

“Rarely have I been as proud to be part of the Mexican Supreme Court as I am today,” Chief Justice Arturo Zaldivar tweeted on Friday, in a clear allusion to the U.S. court decision. “All rights for all people. Until equality and dignity become customary.”

But the U.S. decision also alarmed advocates worried about its global effects.

“In 2018 the people of Ireland spoke loud and clear. Repealing one of the strictest abortion bans in the world. Giving Irish women their rights. We looked to America as an example of freedom,” Jennifer Cassidy, a former Irish diplomat and academic, wrote on Twitter.

Alvaro Bermejo, director general of the International Planned Parenthood Federation, said in a statement that the decision would embolden “other anti-abortion, anti-woman and anti-gender movements and [impact] other reproductive freedoms.”

Vickie Remoe, a writer from Sierra Leone, added that she was devastated by the decision, which she saw as “an attack on women period.”

“I am also worried about the far-reaching global implications this will have on access to safe abortions across the globe,” Remoe wrote in a tweet, “but especially in Africa.”

The decision did receive some prominent support outside of the country, including in Eastern Europe and Latin America.

The Vatican issued a statement that acknowledged the “heated debate” around the issue and said the U.S. decision would challenge “the whole world.” The head of the Catholic Church, which opposes abortion, called for “a non-ideological debate on the place that the protection of life has in a civil society.”

Some members of Europe’s far right voiced their approval. Beatrix von Storch, a senior member of Germany’s Alternative for Germany party, tweeted Friday that the decision was “good” and sent a signal of hope for unborn life.

Justin King - Beau Of The Fifth Column

"...family planning will become a crime...mothers will be lost...teen pregnancy will increase...child marriage will increase...poverty will increase...there will be malicious prosecutions...it's gonna be bad - it was always gonna be bad."

Expect a whole new economic sub-sector to open up, catering to the needs of people of means who will be able to circumvent these laws too.

When you shit on people's rights, it always ends up going bad.

Don't Call This Conservative

Today, SCOTUS has revoked the right to self-determination.

The decision is "about Roe v Wade", but the rules governing everybody's right to decide what happens with their own bodies have changed now.

WaPo: (pay wall)

The Supreme Court on Friday overturned the fundamental right to abortion established nearly 50 years ago in Roe v. Wade, a stunning reversal that leaves states free to drastically reduce or even outlaw a procedure that abortion rights groups said is key to women’s equality and independence.

“Roe was egregiously wrong from the start. Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences. And far from bringing about a national settlement of the abortion issue, Roe and Casey have enflamed debate and deepened division,” Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. wrote. “It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s elected representatives.”

The vote was 6 to 3 to uphold a restrictive Mississippi law. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., though, criticized his conservative colleagues for taking the additional step of overturn Roe and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which had reaffirmed the right to abortion.

The decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health was the most anticipated of the court’s term, with political tension surrounding the fight over abortion rights erupting in May with the leak of a draft opinion indicating a majority of justices intended to end the long-standing precedent.

The justices were considering a Mississippi law that would ban almost all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. The law had not taken effect because lower courts said it was at odds with the national right to abortion established in Roe v. Wade in 1973 and affirmed by subsequent Supreme Court rulings.

Here’s what to know

• In their joint dissent, the court’s three liberal justices took note of the states that will move quickly to restrict abortion access and emphasized the sweeping impact of the court’s decision on the rights of women to terminate their pregnancies.
• Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who helped shepherd several conservative justices onto the court, celebrated the Supreme Court ruing as “courageous and correct” and said the American people have gotten “their voice back” on the issue.
• House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) warned that her Republican colleagues in Congress are now “plotting a nationwide abortion ban” and more extreme measures could be enacted in the states.
• The decision comes from a court that is more conservative with the addition of three justices nominated by President Donald Trump.

13 states will ban abortion within 30 days. Others will follow.

Without Roe v. Wade, the national abortion landscape will change quickly. First, 13 states with “trigger bans,” designed to take effect as soon as Roe is overturned, will ban abortion within 30 days. Several other states where recent antiabortion legislation has been blocked by the courts are expected to act next, with lawmakers moving to activate their dormant legislation. A handful of states also have pre-Roe abortion bans that could be brought back to life.

Elsewhere in the country, the post-Roe landscape is less certain. While most state legislatures have adjourned for the year, some governors have expressed an interest in convening a special session to pass additional antiabortion legislation — or remove antiabortion laws already on the books. Abortion access in other states will depend on the midterm elections. Many other states have passed laws that explicitly protect the right to abortion, with several adding those protections this year in anticipation of the Supreme Court’s decision.

- more -

It will soon become the duty of every loyal country-loving American patriot to keep a close eye on the female population for any signs of Reproductive Foul Play.

Welcome to the dawning of Ceaușescu's America.

Today's Wingnut

These ChristoPunks have spent 50 years - and hundreds of millions of dollars - marching in lockstep with the politicians who've been angling and pimping and militating to get Roe overturned, and "suddenly" they have no plan to handle the consequences of their fuckery?

It was never about the babies. Never.

Right Wing Watch Blog

Appearing on "Wallbuilders Live," Texas state Rep Phil King admitted the state's adoption system is completely unprepared to deal with the fallout of Roe v Wade being overturned:

"We feel like the dog that caught the car ... I do not think we are prepared for this."

The Roe v Wade Thing

There are only a few options available when trying to reach a reasonable conclusion about Susan Collins.

They're all bad, but they all kinda boil down to these:

• She's a cynical deal-maker, and she got something she wanted (something we'll never know about) in return for her votes to confirm the assholes nominated by Trump - which makes her a snake.
• Or she's just another fuckin' idiot who got played - repeatedly - and she's still in there ready to get played again.

Abortion Is your Right

Abortion is still legal in the US, but it’s severely restricted in Oklahoma and Texas. The leaked US Supreme Court draft opinion is NOT final.

No matter what the Supreme Court ultimately decides, abortion will still be legally protected in some states. We’re tracking the situation closely and keeping this site up to date.

Find out more about state laws

abortionfinder.org

On Abortion

First - we've allowed the word "abortion" to become stigmatized - taking on a very negative connotation. We should stop worrying about that, and stop trying to soften the language.

"Abortion" is a legitimate clinical term for a legitimate medical procedure.

Second - women have the right to consider, and to seek, and to obtain every healthcare service they believe is appropriate for them as individuals. And that includes abortion.

If a woman is convinced that standing on one foot when it's dark on the second Thursday of an odd-numbered month while waving a lavender dildo at the moon is going to make her food allergies go away, then she should be free to try it.

(some restrictions may apply - offer void where prohibited)

If she's thought about it, and consulted with various professionals on the best way for her to deal with a pregnancy, then she should be free to take whatever course she deems right for her - or if she hasn't done any thinking or reflecting or praying or anything else - it's her business and nobody else's.

She sure as fuck doesn't need a buncha blue-nosed pinch-faced Puritan assholes horning in on the the deal and trying to dictate what's best for her, and forcing her to do something with her own personal body that she doesn't want to do.

Fuck off and leave people alone. Let's try that for awhile.

And as for "there are no rights implied in the constitution that aren't enumerated in the constitution" - 9th amendment, dumbass.

Anyway - WaPo: (pay wall)

Abortion in the Founders’ era: Violent, chaotic and unregulated

Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. calls himself an originalist, someone who thinks the Constitution should be interpreted only by how it would have been understood by the Founders when they wrote it. So it’s no surprise that his draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade is full of history.

At least seven times, Alito cited Sir Matthew Hale, a 17th-century jurist who didn’t think marital rape was possible because wives were the property of their husbands, and who sentenced at least two women to die for witchcraft. Alito also cited a legal text from 1250 by Henry de Bracton that, in another section, says women are inferior to men, and that they sometimes give birth to literal monsters.

Alito confined his exploration of the past to legal history and English common law. But to assess how the Founders would view abortion rights, it’s necessary to paint a fuller picture of what abortion was actually like in the time of the Founders.

And it was very different from how it might look in a post-Roe America.

Abortion in the Revolutionary War era

In the 18th-century United States and England, abortion was common enough that there were slang terms for it, like “taking the cold,” “taking the trade” and “bringing down the flowers.” It was less-effective and more dangerous than it is now; women seeking abortions often died from infected wounds or poisons. And it was generally unregulated, except for a few instances in England and one in colonial Maryland mentioned by Alito in the draft opinion.

In the late-18th and early-19th centuries, no states had laws against any form of abortion, though Alito averred that “manuals for justices of the peace printed in the colonies in the 18th century” sometimes "repeated Hale’s and [William] Blackstone’s statements that anyone who prescribed medication ‘unlawfully to destroy the child’ would be guilty of murder if the woman died.”

In the Revolutionary War era and the decades after, most homes would have had a medical manual like William Buchan’s “Domestic Medicine” or Samuel K. Jennings’s “The Married Woman’s Best Friend,” according to James C. Mohr in “Abortion in America: The Origins and Evolution of National Policy.” These books included recipes for concoctions that could induce menses that had been “blocked” or “suppressed” — a common way to refer to early pregnancy. One gave advice specifically for young women who had “what you call a common cold” (emphasis in original), before listing plant extracts believed to induce abortion. Another advised that if the concoctions didn’t work, one could try “violent exercise … jumping or stepping from an eminence, strokes on the belly, [and] falls.”

One of these plant extracts, savin, which comes from juniper bushes, was particularly effective and also plentiful in the United States. But it came with high risk; too much could be lethal to the woman. Plus, there was the issue of murder: For some men acquiring savin for a woman they had impregnated, the “problem” was still solved if the woman died. (Murder, often at the hands of a romantic partner, is still the No. 1 cause of death for pregnant people.)

Beyond the ruling classes in England and America, there is also evidence of abortion among Indigenous American peoples and the enslaved, according to John Riddle in “Eve’s Herbs: A History of Contraception and Abortion in the West.” Enslaved Black people likely brought this knowledge with them from Africa. A drink made of a certain type of cotton root native to Africa was used to induce abortion throughout the South.

Unlike many antiabortion activists today, most religious and legal scholars at the time did not think “ensoulment” began at the moment of conception but at the time of “quickening” — when a pregnant person can feel fetal movement, generally between 16 and 22 weeks. The vast majority of Alito’s historical references concern cases of abortion after the fetus was “quick.” He took pains to point out the few times his sources don’t mention it, but this isn’t necessarily evidence the people involved thought abortion before quickening was also wrong or a crime. Back then, a woman was simply not considered to be “carrying [a] child” before quickening, according to British historian Kate Lister.

The case of Eleanor Beare

In one of these instances, Alito introduced the English case of Eleanor Beare, writing, “In 1732, for example, Eleanor Beare was convicted of ‘destroying the Foetus in the Womb, and there-by causing her to miscarry.’ ” In the next paragraph, he wrote that “the judge said of the charge of abortion (with no mention of quickening) that he had ‘never met with a case so barbarous and unnatural.’ ”

But a read of Alito’s source for this quote, a contemporaneous trial summary in Gentleman’s Magazine, reveals that the judge was talking about more than just abortion. Beare was tried on three charges and convicted of two: giving a man poison for the express purpose of killing his wife, and ending the pregnancy of a servant who was raped in her home by inserting an iron skewer into the woman’s uterus.

The exact timeline is unclear, but the servant implied in her testimony the abortion may have taken place at least 14 weeks after the rape (by current measures, this would have made her at least 16 weeks pregnant), so it is clearly possible the abortion happened after quickening. She also implied that the last time she saw Beare, an associate of Beare’s may have tried to poison her.

The mayor of Beare’s town then testified he had received many complaints about Beare keeping a disorderly house, as if that were evidence of guilt, at which point the judge said the prosecution had proven its case so thoroughly there was no point in presenting evidence on the third charge. “His Lordship summed up the Evidence in a very moving Speech to the Jury, wherein he said, he never met with a Case so barbarous and unnatural,” the magazine reported. A judge today would not be allowed to say any of these things to a jury.

Beare was sentenced to three years in prison and two days on the pillory — an instrument locking the head in place in a public square — where she was assaulted so badly by passersby that she nearly died.

The first antiabortion law in the United States

England passed its first law officially banning post-quickening abortion in 1800. The United States didn’t follow until 1821, when the Connecticut legislature banned giving a noxious substance to a woman “quick with child.” This was in the wake of a sex scandal involving a controversial preacher and a young woman he allegedly impregnated. The pastor gave her “poison” and, when that didn’t work, inserted “a tool” inside of her. She later delivered a stillborn child.

How a sex scandal led to the nation’s first abortion law 200 years ago

Authorities wanted to jail the preacher but couldn’t find any laws on the books he had broken. In this context, said Mohr, the “Abortion in America” author, the country’s first antiabortion law should be viewed as more of a “poison-control measure.”

Lolita Buckner Inniss, dean of the University of Colorado’s law school, who has studied the case in depth, had a different take when she spoke about it with The Washington Post in 2019. She pointed out that this first law banned only medicinal abortions, not mechanical ones. Medicinal abortions were more often administered by women — “grannies and midwives, many of them immigrants and formerly enslaved women” — while the mechanical abortions, the Beare case notwithstanding, were more often the purview of men in the burgeoning medical field.

When abortion didn’t work

There’s another aspect of pregnancy and childbirth during the Founders’ time not mentioned in Alito’s draft opinion: the prevalence of infanticide. Desperate women would sometimes dump a newborn in an outhouse or otherwise secretly kill the child and destroy the body.

It is impossible to know how many women got away with this undetected, but Lister pointed out that it too was common enough to have a grotesque slang term that made it into a 1785 lexicon book. She has found numerous British trial records for women accused of killing their newborns; between 1700 and 1800, there were 134 of these cases in a single London court.

“We must remember that this is only one court, in one area and these trials are the ones that were caught,” she wrote. “The actual figures of illegitimate infanticide will never be known.”

This was the case even with the presence of foundling hospitals, where women could safely abandon babies. These homes were perpetually over capacity, to the point where mothers had to enter a lottery to win a spot at one of them. Mothers were often required to leave a token with their babies, like a colored ribbon or unique button, in case they wanted to return for them. Of more than 16,000 babies brought to one hospital between 1741 and 1760, only 152 were reclaimed.

None of this resembles abortion today, whether or not it remains legal nationally. Abortion pills are regulated and safe to use. Surgical abortions have also become safe, and the “quickening” standard has shifted to a “viability” argument. We know more than ever about fetal development, and some states have permitted later abortions for medical reasons. Child-bearing without marriage, though still stigmatized, has become less so.

This is one reason critics of originalism say the historical understanding doesn’t, or at least shouldn’t, matter. The legal scholars Alito quoted lived in a world where women were property, babies could be “monsters” and abortion was dangerous.

Today's Tweet

If precedence really doesn't count for much, then basically, the Roberts Court is telling us we have start over on this whole fuckin' thing.

If you watch one thing today make it Democrat @AyannaPressley pic.twitter.com/gWKwKTSwXC

— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) May 12, 2022

Takin' It To The Streets

About this event

On May 2nd, we learned from a leaked draft opinion that SCOTUS is poised to overturn Roe v. Wade, stripping the constitutional right to abortion in spite of fifty years of precedent.

The Supreme Court is making their official decision on abortion rights in June. Once that happens, 26 states could move quickly to ban abortion, meaning millions of people could live without local access to abortion care.

Roe has always been the floor, not the ceiling. Many Black, Indigenous, Latinx, and other people of color experience barriers to accessing abortions. The people in your community and across the country deserve the power and freedom to make their own personal reproductive health care decisions.

We have to act NOW, all across the country. Together we will send a strong message that we're not backing down. Supporting abortion access must be protected and defended.

Today's Tweet

Follow the thread for a little history lesson - one we all should know.

@Literature_Lady

"Justice Alito's invocation of Sir Matthew Hale in his leaked majority opinion is so, so much more fucked up than people realize. I'm a professor with a PhD, and my area of expertise happens to be women and gender in the early modern era (1500-1700). Here is what you need to know

— I'm still wearing my mask (@Kim_Kamensky) May 10, 2022

Mr Oliver, If You Please

John Oliver - HBO

What's deeply rooted in our history? Taking anyone who isn't white and male, and turning them into a fraction.

Policing The Clitorati

If I suspect a woman has engaged in some kind of Abortion-Friendly activities - like if it's plain she's sexually active and she goes months and months without getting pregnant - or if I know she's been pregnant lately and suddenly she's un-pregnant - am I legally bound to alert the authorities of my suspicions?

BTW, "conservatives" - not that it wasn't bullshit anyway - but your whole thing about, "That violates my HIPAA rights!" when confronted about vaccinations just went in the shitter because of a SCOTUS decision that you've spent years voting for. Congratulations, you stoopid fucking fucks. You're finally getting what you say you want.

Jennifer Rubin - WaPo: (pay wall)

Opinion: Criminalizing abortion: Cue the enforcement nightmare

One reason free people do not give the government the power to interfere and control intimate decisions is because the decisions and conduct are, by definition, closely guarded information not widely available and not subject to usual enforcement measures. The effort to investigate and enforce a law criminalizing a woman’s reproductive decisions necessarily becomes an exercise in authoritarian excess.

Consider what it would take to “prove” a woman had an illegal abortion. Would a search warrant be issued for her phone and computer to see what doctors and health-care providers she sought out? Would housekeepers, relatives and friends be interrogated as to her menstrual cycle?

It’s not clear whether states would respect doctor-patient confidentiality (an abortion ban seems to imply that is a thing of the past). Does everyone from the office assistant to the doctor get grilled about the woman’s gynecological history? Maybe security cameras at offices will be reviewed to see when and if she went in and out of a health-care provider. Are we to subpoena insurance records, travel records, bank records?

Too extreme? Well, it’s not clear how states would go about enforcing the law unless they took such steps. Whenever the government has attempted to control women’s reproduction, an extraordinary degree of surveillance, intrusion and spying has been required. Whether it was Romanian Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu’s infamous Decree 770 in 1966 trying to gin up the country’s birthrate or China’s one-child policy and its army of snoopers, the effort to determine what women (and men) were up to in their own homes always required an assault on privacy that affected everyone.he enforcement mechanism by necessity will be intrusive. And if that is where we are heading, there won’t be a “right to privacy” (how quaint!) to prevent such intrusions into the lives of women and those around them.

And remember, Texas shows that if states offer “bounties,” the state legislature can create a ruse that individuals seeking a reward for finding abortion law violators are not themselves “state actors.” If that holds up, then the Fourth Amendment goes out the window entirely; “private” bounty hunters are not restricted by the amendment at all.

Moreover, given the impossibility of policing all pregnancies and running down every accusation, the discretion put in the hands of individual prosecutors will be enormous; it is an invitation for selective prosecution. (Do we really think the rich, White daughter of a prominent businessperson will be hauled into court?) Some prosecutors will play Inspector Javert, harassing and menacing women; others will choose to look the other way, making further mockery of a law meant to chill conduct but not to be enforced.

Ultimately, we wind up with a society of snitches, suspicion and distrust. When the Texas bounty bill was first passed, Robin Fretwell Wilson of the University of Illinois law school wrote: “The encouragement of ‘voluntary espionage’ between neighbors hints at forms of totalitarianism that most Americans would publicly rail against.” She continued, “North Korea utilizes citizens as spies to inform the government of anti-government behavior of their fellow citizens. While the penalty there is certainly much greater — potential public execution ­— the underlying mechanism is the same, promoting fear and mistrust among neighbors.”

If you think this is unnecessarily alarmist, ask yourself: How do you think cases will be proved and prosecuted — and do you trust the crowd that determined there is no “life of the mother” exception to exercise restraint in investigating doctors’ and women’s “crimes”?