Remember when George W. Bush, after a meeting with Vladimir Putin, said “I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy…I was able to get a sense of his soul.” Guess he got that right!
Maine Senator Susan Collins looked Brett Kavanaugh right in the eyes, deep into his soul, and was convinced he was trustworthy and that when he spoke about the importance of precedent in Roe V Wade, he would honor it. Kavanaugh defended precedent in his Supreme Court nomination hearings as did Neil Gorsuch, though, at least with Gorsuch, she didn’t confirm a rapist to the Supreme Court. Thanks Susan.
So when the document leaked that the judges were preparing to overrule Roe V Wade, Collins claimed foul, stating it was inconsistent with discussions she had with Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch. Can you believe it? The two God fearing, anti-abortionists lied to her? Such blasphemy! Either Collins is like one of those parents who actually believed their child when they swore the dog ate their homework, which makes her either a gullible fool, or a partner in deception.
In all fairness, Kavanaugh worked hard to convince her. At his hearing he made it seem that Roe was safe.
“Roe said the liberty interest included a right to privacy. Casey (vs Planned Parenthood) added that the right to choose whether and when to have a child made it easier for women “to participate equally in the economic and social life of the nation.” He also said: “Casey is precedent on precedent.”
Begs the question: What do you get when you make a precedent (on precedent) sandwich? More precedent? Well, actually what you get is a sandwich with nothing in it, generally something you just throw away.
In its landmark decision in 1973, the Supreme Court inferred from the 14th Amendment that the government’s ability to take away people’s liberty unfairly, which courts have interpreted as implying a right to privacy and personal autonomy over decisions involving people’s bodies and relationships, was unconstitutional.
So if Roe V Wade is appealed, once again women’s rights to control their own bodies will be violated.
Here’s Nancy Pelosi’s take on it. She called the draft decision “monstrous” and a blueprint “for Republicans to obliterate even more of our freedoms because denying a constitutional right of privacy would make other rights, including same-sex marriage and contraception, vulnerable to attacks from social conservatives.”
The 14th Amendment also guarantees “ equal protection.” “Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual, and cannot be infringed by the state,” the court stated in Loving v. Virginia. Will the court also move to declare inter-racial marriages unconstitutional as well. After all, there are probably many red states that would love to ban them. After all, it is such a stain on the White Supremacist vision of America for a white person to marry a person of color.
States all over the country have laws ready to be triggered when the court officially follows through on overturning Roe v Wade.
In fact, the State Legislature in Louisiana advanced a proposal this week that would classify abortion as homicide, going further than anti-abortion measures in other states by making it possible for prosecutors to bring criminal cases against women who end a pregnancy. In addition to punishing women who obtain abortions, opponents said the bill would arguably criminalize in vitro fertilization and forms of birth control.
*Poll after poll show that the majority of Americans believe women have the right to choose what to do with their bodies. Then again the majority of Americans support equal rights for LGBTQ individuals, humane and just immigration policy, do not want the government legislating what should be taught in classrooms, don’t support banning books and oppose making it more difficult to vote.
So folks, what we are seeing, from the attempt on January 6th to overturn the election, to the promulgation and embracing of the “Big Lie,” to the radical attempt to control and decide who has equal rights and liberty, is the very dismantling of the democratic ideals that this country is founded on. The battle lines are clear. And let’s be sober and clear that when we look into the souls of most Republican legislators we see what is there: a soulless group of mostly white men who will lie and cheat and stop at nothing to gain power to impose their frightening autocratic vision on us all. As I have said before, the time for back-pedaling and outrage is over. It’s time for the Democrats to have the fight for all to see about which America people want to live in: an autocracy where individual freedoms and rights are stripped away or a country where everyone has equal rights.
*A Pew Research poll in 2021 found that 59 percent of Americans believed abortion should be legal in all or most cases, while 39 percent said it should be illegal in all or most cases.
Another poll last year, from the Washington Post and ABC, found 60 percent said the Supreme Court should uphold Roe v. Wade, while 27 percent said it should be overturned.
In 2019, an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll found 77 percent said the Supreme Court should uphold Roe v. Wade, but 26 percent supported keeping it in place while adding more restrictions.
The Grand Offal Party 