There’s way too much celebrating around the unanimous SCOTUS decision yesterday which The NYT characterized with the headline, “Supreme Court Maintains Broad Access to Abortion pill.” It didn’t…
All these systematic attacks on women's rights begs the question, what is it exactly that the far right has so against women that they are waging a war to curtail their power and influence in our society? Well, you can just chalk it up to an attempt to maintain male dominance. After all, if men are going to dominate in our society, certainly women are going to have to accept a back seat. But I think it goes farther and much deeper than that. Not universally, of course, but for the most part, womanhood has
had a civilizing influence on society. Being put in the role of bearing and rearing children, their perspective tends to lean them towards efforts towards strengthening families, education, opportunities for self-development and, of course, not sending their children off to war, etc. This perspective is reflected in the fact that they tend to vote Democratic. Given our current corporate overloads' current struggle to maintain power and control in the face of a level of income inequality that is causing massive social dysfunction and suffering and threatening economic collapse, they simply need to keep the influence of women under control and what better way to do it than by burdening them with children they cannot care for adequately and by shutting off avenues through which they can prosper. And, of course, many on the far right are advocating for actually repealing women's right to vote. That ought to keep the %^&#'s subdued!
I wonder about this a lot. Male supremacy -- specifically *white* male supremacy -- is certainly at the heart of it, and Christian fundamentalism clearly plays a role, but last I looked, the U.S. was at least an aspirational democracy and women make up more than half the electorate. Close to 60% of white women did vote for Trump twice, but the outcomes of recent abortion referendums, not to mention the 2022 midterms, suggest that overt misogyny is not a winning strategy.
I do suspect it has to do with the "corporate overlords" and the non-corporate billionaires and mega-multimillionaires who, after all, tend to have little direct contact with actual working people (except maybe their nannies and landscapers and household staff). There are far too few of them to win an election at any level, but since the late 1960s they've been extremely clever at harnessing the rage and angst of white working people and religious conservatives, both Catholic and Protestant. Not only has this won them elections, it's persuaded the Democratic Party to move ever rightward, ever further from the accomplishments of the New Deal and the Great Society. (Thanks to the horrors of the Trump and post-Trump years, more and more Democrats are finally putting the brakes on the rightward slide.)
What I'm thinking -- and it's such a scary thought that I can't hold it in my mind for very long -- is that Project 2025 is planning for, and working toward, a time when they can do away with democracy, aspirational or otherwise, once and for all. Which would explain why they're not more concerned about alienating women, especially younger women, especially women of color (who have seen through them from the get-go). They've gotten away with it in so many red states, so, their thinking goes, now it's time to go for the whole country.
Susanna I mentioned the absurdity of the likes of Beobert, Green and 60% of the women who voted for Trump and she said Stockholm Syndrome. These women, like the Arab women who wear the Abaya, chador, Niqab and Burga in stifling heat, are raised that way, and they believe that their bread is buttered by supporting and maintaining the status quo. And when they rebel, as did those brave young women in Iran, they are arrested, tortured, beat to death and hung from a crane.
The authors of Project 25 are confident in their aspirations, because they don't plan for a fair, peaceful election. They are already at work suppressing the votes of black and brown people. Bribery, misleading voter info., fear mongering are just a few methods up their sleeve. Money equals power and they plan to use it, as they have before. Look what they've already accomplished. SC judges that are bought and paid for, Eileen Cannon, appointed by tRump, has used every trick in her judicial book to delay Jack Smith's document's trial, many southern state legislatures are controlled by republicans, they have a majority in the House. Leonard Leo, Federalist society, is laughing all the way to the bank. Evangelicals want to see the End of Times, but before that happens they plan to dismantle our democracy and the freedoms we all enjoy. What more do you need to see and understand their intentions? Democrats, according to Hopium Chronicles, are beginning to wake up.
Perhaps, it's naive on my part to do what I suggested on a number of newsletters. We need to get the attention of the electorate. Getting their eyes and ears to pay attention to what's at stake in this upcoming election will make the difference between a democracy vs. a dictatorship. My suggestion has been a million man march in D.C. that promotes our vision for America. Leaders like Adam Schiff, Thom Hartmann, Steve Schmidt, Jamie Raskin, Jim McGovern, General Patraeus, Gavin Newsom, and entertainers like Taylor Swift, Barbara Streisand, Stephen Colbert, and Jimmy Kimmel are just a few that can move an audience and lead this march for freedom.. Time is running out!
Here is where I think you are nailing a core issue: "...maintain power and control in the face of a level of income inequality that is causing massive social dysfunction and suffering and threatening economic collapse..." I don't remember when I haven't wondered about the tipping point into revolution. The overlords never seem to have the slightest concept of the desirability of stability from supporting the serfs at some level of habitability and survival. They "always," as in down through known history of revolutions, seem to pursue the last eke of wherewithal. There seems to be an essential failing in human nature that allows a divorce in consciousness of interconnection with the actual providers. The oligarchs don't know when to stop; never have yet.
Well observed, I think, Mmerose. I think an economic system tends to create and reinforce itself. In the case of our current, unbridled, unmanaged form of capitalism, competitive forces require that business entities must constantly outpace their competitors. If asked why they are cutting wages, contaminating the environment with waste, cutting health and safety controls, and moving out of the United States to avoid our laws, they say, "I have to in order to compete because the other guy is doing it." And wealth and power are addictive; you never get enough to feel insulated. In this system, wealth automatically accrues to the top because, as there are winner and losers, the winners gain advantage, and the process is accelerated. I think we need to come to a full awareness that capitalism (industrialized, free enterprise) needs maintenance by a democratic government in order to equitably distribute the wealth, benefit the common good, and keep it free..
Shea it is not what they have against women, It is about disempowering the fragile male ego.
A disability that balanced, self assured, liberal males don't have. These poor saps on the right wing, can only feel like men, when women are disempowered and submissive.
You can take a clue from our four legged relatives. Males who lose out on the mating rut, experience low T, a drop in testosterone, biologists call them bachelors. They lose their sex drive, are not able to erect and copulate.
In the animal world, sexual intercourse has all of the hallmarks of force, that s what we call rape. Females are made receptive by an influx of hormones and they go into estrus (heat),, human females are endowed with a clitoris, a g spot and an orgasm, to make them not only receptive but desirous.
Males that can't dominate a female, find it difficult to erect and thus penetrate, PhRMA has a pill for that Viagra, it is a psychological emotional condition remedied by the miracle of chemistry.
The anti abortion movement is of the same origin, it is a rejection of the male and the male seed, the oh so precious seed that creates a mini me. It places the woman in charge of creation, not the man, and in the Christian mind an affront to their god, who made man and said that he had dominion over everything including the female.
Religion, life, al of it is just an excuse, for public relations purpose, and it has worked. Liberals have been calling Prolifers hypocrites, and they know it and laugh up their sleeves, because it is not and never has been about life,or the life of "unborn babies" except maybe the low IQ emotional ninnies, who really believe the propaganda.
It is all about male supremacy, which we call by another name. misogyny, They really don't hate women, they simply want to dominate and control them, as it is a hormonal driven biological imperative and too many homo sapiens sapiens are still not sufficiently evolved and let their hormones and basic drives rule them.
Thom you are a 100% accurate again in my humble opinion! I think the Supreme Court is also delaying whether ex-presidents can have absolute immunity until after the election and Trump wins. Both these issues will be put on hold until after this fraud election that should never have happened if Garland was doing his job.
As long as the rich own the media and social media, and there are phoney religions, the cult leader will be able to do their thinking for them. Trump and the media tells them what to think and they actually listen to them? I guess just as long as it is not the truth and something they don't want to hear, that's okay with the cult.
The cultural war is getting right wingers all worked up over trivial issues while letting the important issues go neglected. After frying the right winger's minds on religion.
Do you think Trump -- Trump himself -- is capable of thinking clearly enough to tell anyone else how to think? I don't. My best guess is that it's the other way around: those who are so generously supporting Thomas and Alito (and Leonard Leo, and a cast of thousands) believe that they'll be calling the shots. Trump is essential because he can rile the masses and win votes, but he's a means to an end -- or so they hope.
Susanna, I saw Trump telling his cult what to think on television just the other day. I will paraphrase it. This is right after he was found guilty of 34 felonies, "the radical left wants me dead and they want you dead also"!
Whether Trump thought that up himself or was told to say it to his cult, I'm not sure. But I have to agree with you, he's too stupid to be a godly leader or janitor.
By the way, the reason the GOP wants to control women in my opinion is because the right wingers, thrive on chaos. Liberals want law and order, while greedy rich people and churches want chaos and suffering, so they can weild more power and control. When the government takes care of the social ills, church attendance and donation goes down. With hungry humans looking for a job the price of labor goes down for the fascists also?
Some right-wingers certainly thrive on chaos for its own sake, but it's worth remembering that clever right-wingers use chaos, real or rhetorical or imaginary, as a means to an end. Mussolini did. Hitler did. Franco did. They used "chaos" as an rationale for suspending civil liberties, constitutions, etc., and taking over.
Trump followed that playbook with his "I alone can fix it," which he couldn't do, but he was posturing as a dictator wannabe.
My take is that for the white right "chaos" doesn't necessarily mean violence in the streets -- it means a multi-racial, multi-cultural nation where white Christian men aren't running the show. I'd put Viktor Orbán on a continuum with all of the above, and it's no secret how much the upper-level Republicans admire Viktor Orbán.
Yes, it does seem like chaos is one tactic by which fascists regimes take control--along with fear and despair. They dismember the social order that would be the means by which they would be resisted. And in an atmosphere of chaos, the populous will accept authoritarianism as a means of reestablishing an order. Thus, Hitler directed his Brown Shirt militia to attack gatherings of the Left. When the Left responded in kind and there was brawling in the streets, the German people said, "Do what you want, but get u peace in the streets." Hitler got Martial Law, started arresting his enemies, and it was all over. When those attacks come here, we must respond non violently. Any violent response will be used against us.
The belief that Trump is stupid, is, I think, questionable. My ten years as a teacher in a maximum security prison, taught me that sociopaths are not stupid. They are highly intelligent because their thinking is not slowed down by considerations of morality and empathy, and they can be moves ahead. They are, however, consummate actors, feigning human emotions they don't feel. They can, therefore, act stupid if they are trying to attract a following of people who pride themselves on being "anti-intellectual" or to fool their enemies. But intelligence does not translate into "good." Not able to feel empathy, their behavior is routed in the quest for power and to use their intelligence to find the loopholes in social laws and norms through which they can slip through to gain power. However, it's a moot point. Either way, Trump is evil.
I don't think he's stupid. I think he's canny, very canny. He's also telling people what they want to hear, so he doesn't have to persuade anybody. Long-range planning is not his strong suit, however. He also seems to be somewhat flummoxed that the tactics that have served him so well this far aren't working quite as well now. It's a very dangerous moment for the country.
Bob, what tRump said after his 34 count conviction was a subliminal message to his cult followers. They want you dead, therefore beat them to it and murder as many of them as you can. He has mastered the art of projection!
My daily habit is to scroll down the Google News menu. I have never been so appalled at the headlines as on this one. Thom throws in " -media headlines notwithstanding-!" I was already suspicious because I had picked up on the standing issue. Seeing the bugling of some great allowance for mifepristone, even all the "mainstream" usual suspects, I was amazed how far I had to poke down to get confirmation: yup, they copped out on standing. What a project to figure out who owns what headlines on this one! The idea would be to lull some suckers into a sigh of relief; "they" aren't THAT extreme, yadayada.
A minor savinug grace for the corrupted SCOTUS is that the court is (finally) under scrutiny for their transgressions. This decision does not resolve or stop stop the issue, but to many, it will appear that it does. Gets some of the heat off. The court is smart, calculating, sceaming, and playing the same delay game that they are helping Trump play. If permitted to delay until the voting, they will win. The SCOTUS' will be the chief enabler to a coup. The death of American democracy will be on their hands. The key is the law.
Furthermore, it's an awfully convenient decision indeed before this election. The Republican Justices have likely colluded when it comes to the strategy you have presented, Thom. I believe they are that bad and that bold. They lied to get there and are not the least bit interested in ethics.
Republicans' use of "the abortion industry" language was no mistake. They have to create that foul language to cover their real intent. They intend to and are putting women at risk while they deny them the health care they need to save their lives.
These creeps and zealots will ruin lives with the stroke of a pen. And, for some they will be signing their death warrant. If you know anyone that doubts that, recommend they watch the ABC Special "On The Brink". The brave moms tell exactly what the change in laws has done to them and their families.
Excellent parsing, but this SCOTUS speaks gut English, with its own ideological dictionary. They will find a way to ignore your common sense analysis and go for overreach, as opposed to the mind-numbing mental gymnastics in which they indulge when strictly “construing” any remotely progressive language in the Constitution or a statute. The only upside to the war on women in this country is the likely explosion of poor, overwhelmingly non-white babies, who will grow into young men and women with little education, massive resentment against a society that scorns them, and easy access to guns. It requires little imagination to see where that will take us. Every day brings some new bit of horrific news making a blue victory in November both more essential and somehow, unbelievably, less likely thanks to the boldness of the forces of evil and the disorganized timidity and frankly, the media suppression, of the forces and voices of those seeking to preserve some vestige of this country and its aspirational values.
No kidding! (What I actually said out loud when I read your first sentence had the f-word in the middle.) It was so obvious that the plaintiffs had no standing -- hell, even Kavanaugh recognized it! -- that SCOTUS should have passed on this case, but, well, we are where we are.
Same goes for the N.Y. Times. They know better, but they are what they are, so I'm not surprised.
There is only one cure for misogyny and that is that the women of America, and men who aren't scared charades of men, to rise up and vote every last one of this mother effers out of office.
Glad you pointed out Thom that this was a pyrrhic victory based on standing, not merit. It means nothing, except that the court wanted to reduce the heat under its own ass given Alito / Thomas' extraordinary malfeasance. Alito, in particular, always finds standing for conservatives, so this is a tiny little victory in that regard, but this makes me worry about the insurrection ruling coming out soon.
So no Viagra by Mail? No drug plans run by Health Insurance companies that send your prescription medications by mail? When will those Insurance companies and Big Pharma start to squawk?
Comstock argued for prosecuting anyone who helped others get an abortion. That included anyone who provided abortion medication. The Comstock Act was never officially taken off the books; it was superseded by Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed the right to abortion. Learn more about the Comstock Act and Project 2025 in this podcast.
It was incredibly frustrating to read/hear the mainstream media headlines/reporting that SCOTUS had upheld access to mifepristone when all they did was kick the can down the road, waiting for a claimant with standing. Why is it that the media has become so completely inept at reporting the facts?
ultimately, isn't the issue whether or not a man has possession of his wife, just like any other chattel? I'm a retired psychiatrist and spent much of my 42 yr. practice treating women for the stress, oppression, and powerlessness baked into modern marital practices. Fundamentalist Muslims have taken this culture to its ultimate conclusion: no education/work for women, breeding on demand, and total domination by their husbands, and death by stoning for stepping outside the marriage. Marija Gimbutas, mother to the "Goddess Culture" and author of a number of relevant and well researched books, determined from the archaeological evidence that men on horseback rode down out of the Eurasian Steppe about 3,500 BC, if I remember correctly, and transformed the earliest European peaceful matriarchal small villages into the patriarchy we have inherited today. What could go wrong? Everything?
The GOP is smelling blood and may in fact get their way because the pathway exists. Obama took off some laws that were on the books he should have left alone. I think the time is too short for them to accomplish this goal but the GOP never lets go of meat with blood for their voters that love to make other people experience pain especially by having some small direct act in doing so. The ongoing mental illness of this part of peoples goes on. They use to be ashamed to show it openingly until Trump.
When it's convenient, liberal pundits and their minions go on and on about women's rights. But it was Barack Obama and the Demoratic Party who dropped the ball on codifying Roe V Wade in 2008 when Obama PROMISED Planned Parenthood that the Women's Protection Act would be his first legislative action when he got into office. The FIRST. But then he never mentioned it again until a year later when asked by a reporter, and he said it was no longer a priority. https://medium.com/@barrykaufman/roe-v-wade-democrats-cry-wolf-one-time-too-many-4aa22af92412
Now Biden continues to make certain Netanyahu can slaughter women and children in Gaza. He has helped to starve children in Yemen. He did virtually nothing at all when the Dobbs decision came down, and for decades he supported the heinous Hyde Amendment.
There are two parties. Both lie and deceive their oblivious base while blaming the other side, all the while assisted by their echo chamber media. . You can see where that dynamic has gotten us.
If you are looking for "perfect," don't look in politics. It will always be "the lessor of the two evils," because there are always two parties, and they will always both contain some evil. And don't start with the advantages of a third party--which managed to elect Bush over Gore and then Trump over Clinton. No matter what you say, the world would be a drastically better place ,with thousands less dead, if Gore and Clinton had been our presidents. The way to accomplish change is to 1) Get active in the Democratic Party and force change from within; and 2) Exert pressure from outside through political organization and action. In the meantime, we vote for whom we must. Actually, I don't know if any meaningful change has ever been accomplished without non violent, direct action--like the civil rights sit ins, the HIV obstructions, union strikes, etc. My sister was a Freedom Rider, went to jail for change. But you know that Dr. King still supported voting for Johnson. Write to us from jail about all your moral purity and maybe it will mean something.
I haven’t studied the case law under the Comstock Act but, I do note, that the act prohibits mailing of any “obscene, lewd, lascivious, indecent, filthy or vile article, matter, thing, device, or substance … designed, adapted, or intended for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral use.” But drugs that induce abortion are not themselves obscene, lewd, lascivious, vile etc. by today’s generally accepted moral standards. How can they be, when even the right to an abortion within the first two trimesters was for 50 years in shrines in the constitution? And even the Act doesn’t say abortion itself is an “indecent or immoral use,” as it doesn’t place the word “other” in front of “any indecent or immoral use.” So, originalists, read the text. Had Mr. Comstock wished to outlaw all devices or medication‘s used to produce abortions, regardless of their “morality”, he certainly could have said so.
Dear Mike. You have to understand that many of our fellow citizens actually believe that sluts use abortion as birth control. This goes back even to when abortion meant physically getting your innards scraped out. I know because "slut" was a favorite word of my master-degreed mother in this context. If you scan YouTube comments on the subject, you will see the true underbelly of the thinking creep out in the form of a steady smatter of recommendations for her to "just keep her knees together."
Wow. Your inquiry contains quite a synchronicity. Somewhere in these comments I've gone off on "Other Powers" by (serious historian!) Barbara Goldsmith, and sure enough, a major character in that historical stew of impending Civil War abolitionists, suffragettes, spiritualists, abortionists and, yes, the abominable Comstock, is Henry Ward Beecher, father of the author of "Uncle Tom's Cabin." His career somewhat reflects that of Trump. The most famous preacher of the era, he was also the most prominent lecher, but his profitability to the congregation, combined with the general disregard of females, protected him from disgrace to the end. Only his female victims suffered. As for "Uncle Tom," I'm not sure his fictional memory is not insulted by comparison to Injustice Thomas. I read the book as a kid, but I think the whole point of "Uncle Tom" was coping with powerlessness in a kindhearted way, the which would certainly be the opposite of Clarence Thomas.
All these systematic attacks on women's rights begs the question, what is it exactly that the far right has so against women that they are waging a war to curtail their power and influence in our society? Well, you can just chalk it up to an attempt to maintain male dominance. After all, if men are going to dominate in our society, certainly women are going to have to accept a back seat. But I think it goes farther and much deeper than that. Not universally, of course, but for the most part, womanhood has
had a civilizing influence on society. Being put in the role of bearing and rearing children, their perspective tends to lean them towards efforts towards strengthening families, education, opportunities for self-development and, of course, not sending their children off to war, etc. This perspective is reflected in the fact that they tend to vote Democratic. Given our current corporate overloads' current struggle to maintain power and control in the face of a level of income inequality that is causing massive social dysfunction and suffering and threatening economic collapse, they simply need to keep the influence of women under control and what better way to do it than by burdening them with children they cannot care for adequately and by shutting off avenues through which they can prosper. And, of course, many on the far right are advocating for actually repealing women's right to vote. That ought to keep the %^&#'s subdued!
I wonder about this a lot. Male supremacy -- specifically *white* male supremacy -- is certainly at the heart of it, and Christian fundamentalism clearly plays a role, but last I looked, the U.S. was at least an aspirational democracy and women make up more than half the electorate. Close to 60% of white women did vote for Trump twice, but the outcomes of recent abortion referendums, not to mention the 2022 midterms, suggest that overt misogyny is not a winning strategy.
I do suspect it has to do with the "corporate overlords" and the non-corporate billionaires and mega-multimillionaires who, after all, tend to have little direct contact with actual working people (except maybe their nannies and landscapers and household staff). There are far too few of them to win an election at any level, but since the late 1960s they've been extremely clever at harnessing the rage and angst of white working people and religious conservatives, both Catholic and Protestant. Not only has this won them elections, it's persuaded the Democratic Party to move ever rightward, ever further from the accomplishments of the New Deal and the Great Society. (Thanks to the horrors of the Trump and post-Trump years, more and more Democrats are finally putting the brakes on the rightward slide.)
What I'm thinking -- and it's such a scary thought that I can't hold it in my mind for very long -- is that Project 2025 is planning for, and working toward, a time when they can do away with democracy, aspirational or otherwise, once and for all. Which would explain why they're not more concerned about alienating women, especially younger women, especially women of color (who have seen through them from the get-go). They've gotten away with it in so many red states, so, their thinking goes, now it's time to go for the whole country.
Susanna I mentioned the absurdity of the likes of Beobert, Green and 60% of the women who voted for Trump and she said Stockholm Syndrome. These women, like the Arab women who wear the Abaya, chador, Niqab and Burga in stifling heat, are raised that way, and they believe that their bread is buttered by supporting and maintaining the status quo. And when they rebel, as did those brave young women in Iran, they are arrested, tortured, beat to death and hung from a crane.
The authors of Project 25 are confident in their aspirations, because they don't plan for a fair, peaceful election. They are already at work suppressing the votes of black and brown people. Bribery, misleading voter info., fear mongering are just a few methods up their sleeve. Money equals power and they plan to use it, as they have before. Look what they've already accomplished. SC judges that are bought and paid for, Eileen Cannon, appointed by tRump, has used every trick in her judicial book to delay Jack Smith's document's trial, many southern state legislatures are controlled by republicans, they have a majority in the House. Leonard Leo, Federalist society, is laughing all the way to the bank. Evangelicals want to see the End of Times, but before that happens they plan to dismantle our democracy and the freedoms we all enjoy. What more do you need to see and understand their intentions? Democrats, according to Hopium Chronicles, are beginning to wake up.
Perhaps, it's naive on my part to do what I suggested on a number of newsletters. We need to get the attention of the electorate. Getting their eyes and ears to pay attention to what's at stake in this upcoming election will make the difference between a democracy vs. a dictatorship. My suggestion has been a million man march in D.C. that promotes our vision for America. Leaders like Adam Schiff, Thom Hartmann, Steve Schmidt, Jamie Raskin, Jim McGovern, General Patraeus, Gavin Newsom, and entertainers like Taylor Swift, Barbara Streisand, Stephen Colbert, and Jimmy Kimmel are just a few that can move an audience and lead this march for freedom.. Time is running out!
How about a campaign slogan for dems: Moms vs. CEOs
Love it. I'll position it next to the one I have that says: "How do you tell when
Trump is lying? His lips are moving.
Here is where I think you are nailing a core issue: "...maintain power and control in the face of a level of income inequality that is causing massive social dysfunction and suffering and threatening economic collapse..." I don't remember when I haven't wondered about the tipping point into revolution. The overlords never seem to have the slightest concept of the desirability of stability from supporting the serfs at some level of habitability and survival. They "always," as in down through known history of revolutions, seem to pursue the last eke of wherewithal. There seems to be an essential failing in human nature that allows a divorce in consciousness of interconnection with the actual providers. The oligarchs don't know when to stop; never have yet.
Well observed, I think, Mmerose. I think an economic system tends to create and reinforce itself. In the case of our current, unbridled, unmanaged form of capitalism, competitive forces require that business entities must constantly outpace their competitors. If asked why they are cutting wages, contaminating the environment with waste, cutting health and safety controls, and moving out of the United States to avoid our laws, they say, "I have to in order to compete because the other guy is doing it." And wealth and power are addictive; you never get enough to feel insulated. In this system, wealth automatically accrues to the top because, as there are winner and losers, the winners gain advantage, and the process is accelerated. I think we need to come to a full awareness that capitalism (industrialized, free enterprise) needs maintenance by a democratic government in order to equitably distribute the wealth, benefit the common good, and keep it free..
Drat! No likes from the likes of me, so here are a potload!
Shea it is not what they have against women, It is about disempowering the fragile male ego.
A disability that balanced, self assured, liberal males don't have. These poor saps on the right wing, can only feel like men, when women are disempowered and submissive.
You can take a clue from our four legged relatives. Males who lose out on the mating rut, experience low T, a drop in testosterone, biologists call them bachelors. They lose their sex drive, are not able to erect and copulate.
In the animal world, sexual intercourse has all of the hallmarks of force, that s what we call rape. Females are made receptive by an influx of hormones and they go into estrus (heat),, human females are endowed with a clitoris, a g spot and an orgasm, to make them not only receptive but desirous.
Males that can't dominate a female, find it difficult to erect and thus penetrate, PhRMA has a pill for that Viagra, it is a psychological emotional condition remedied by the miracle of chemistry.
The anti abortion movement is of the same origin, it is a rejection of the male and the male seed, the oh so precious seed that creates a mini me. It places the woman in charge of creation, not the man, and in the Christian mind an affront to their god, who made man and said that he had dominion over everything including the female.
Religion, life, al of it is just an excuse, for public relations purpose, and it has worked. Liberals have been calling Prolifers hypocrites, and they know it and laugh up their sleeves, because it is not and never has been about life,or the life of "unborn babies" except maybe the low IQ emotional ninnies, who really believe the propaganda.
It is all about male supremacy, which we call by another name. misogyny, They really don't hate women, they simply want to dominate and control them, as it is a hormonal driven biological imperative and too many homo sapiens sapiens are still not sufficiently evolved and let their hormones and basic drives rule them.
All of the above.
Yeah, really, huh?
Thom you are a 100% accurate again in my humble opinion! I think the Supreme Court is also delaying whether ex-presidents can have absolute immunity until after the election and Trump wins. Both these issues will be put on hold until after this fraud election that should never have happened if Garland was doing his job.
As long as the rich own the media and social media, and there are phoney religions, the cult leader will be able to do their thinking for them. Trump and the media tells them what to think and they actually listen to them? I guess just as long as it is not the truth and something they don't want to hear, that's okay with the cult.
The cultural war is getting right wingers all worked up over trivial issues while letting the important issues go neglected. After frying the right winger's minds on religion.
Do you think Trump -- Trump himself -- is capable of thinking clearly enough to tell anyone else how to think? I don't. My best guess is that it's the other way around: those who are so generously supporting Thomas and Alito (and Leonard Leo, and a cast of thousands) believe that they'll be calling the shots. Trump is essential because he can rile the masses and win votes, but he's a means to an end -- or so they hope.
Susanna, I saw Trump telling his cult what to think on television just the other day. I will paraphrase it. This is right after he was found guilty of 34 felonies, "the radical left wants me dead and they want you dead also"!
Whether Trump thought that up himself or was told to say it to his cult, I'm not sure. But I have to agree with you, he's too stupid to be a godly leader or janitor.
By the way, the reason the GOP wants to control women in my opinion is because the right wingers, thrive on chaos. Liberals want law and order, while greedy rich people and churches want chaos and suffering, so they can weild more power and control. When the government takes care of the social ills, church attendance and donation goes down. With hungry humans looking for a job the price of labor goes down for the fascists also?
Some right-wingers certainly thrive on chaos for its own sake, but it's worth remembering that clever right-wingers use chaos, real or rhetorical or imaginary, as a means to an end. Mussolini did. Hitler did. Franco did. They used "chaos" as an rationale for suspending civil liberties, constitutions, etc., and taking over.
Trump followed that playbook with his "I alone can fix it," which he couldn't do, but he was posturing as a dictator wannabe.
My take is that for the white right "chaos" doesn't necessarily mean violence in the streets -- it means a multi-racial, multi-cultural nation where white Christian men aren't running the show. I'd put Viktor Orbán on a continuum with all of the above, and it's no secret how much the upper-level Republicans admire Viktor Orbán.
Yes, it does seem like chaos is one tactic by which fascists regimes take control--along with fear and despair. They dismember the social order that would be the means by which they would be resisted. And in an atmosphere of chaos, the populous will accept authoritarianism as a means of reestablishing an order. Thus, Hitler directed his Brown Shirt militia to attack gatherings of the Left. When the Left responded in kind and there was brawling in the streets, the German people said, "Do what you want, but get u peace in the streets." Hitler got Martial Law, started arresting his enemies, and it was all over. When those attacks come here, we must respond non violently. Any violent response will be used against us.
They will find a way to eliminate you, if you don't toe the dictator's line.
Hitler did a masterful job of that. Big brother watched every movement an individual made.
The belief that Trump is stupid, is, I think, questionable. My ten years as a teacher in a maximum security prison, taught me that sociopaths are not stupid. They are highly intelligent because their thinking is not slowed down by considerations of morality and empathy, and they can be moves ahead. They are, however, consummate actors, feigning human emotions they don't feel. They can, therefore, act stupid if they are trying to attract a following of people who pride themselves on being "anti-intellectual" or to fool their enemies. But intelligence does not translate into "good." Not able to feel empathy, their behavior is routed in the quest for power and to use their intelligence to find the loopholes in social laws and norms through which they can slip through to gain power. However, it's a moot point. Either way, Trump is evil.
Shea, very well said!
I don't think he's stupid. I think he's canny, very canny. He's also telling people what they want to hear, so he doesn't have to persuade anybody. Long-range planning is not his strong suit, however. He also seems to be somewhat flummoxed that the tactics that have served him so well this far aren't working quite as well now. It's a very dangerous moment for the country.
Bob, what tRump said after his 34 count conviction was a subliminal message to his cult followers. They want you dead, therefore beat them to it and murder as many of them as you can. He has mastered the art of projection!
My daily habit is to scroll down the Google News menu. I have never been so appalled at the headlines as on this one. Thom throws in " -media headlines notwithstanding-!" I was already suspicious because I had picked up on the standing issue. Seeing the bugling of some great allowance for mifepristone, even all the "mainstream" usual suspects, I was amazed how far I had to poke down to get confirmation: yup, they copped out on standing. What a project to figure out who owns what headlines on this one! The idea would be to lull some suckers into a sigh of relief; "they" aren't THAT extreme, yadayada.
A minor savinug grace for the corrupted SCOTUS is that the court is (finally) under scrutiny for their transgressions. This decision does not resolve or stop stop the issue, but to many, it will appear that it does. Gets some of the heat off. The court is smart, calculating, sceaming, and playing the same delay game that they are helping Trump play. If permitted to delay until the voting, they will win. The SCOTUS' will be the chief enabler to a coup. The death of American democracy will be on their hands. The key is the law.
Furthermore, it's an awfully convenient decision indeed before this election. The Republican Justices have likely colluded when it comes to the strategy you have presented, Thom. I believe they are that bad and that bold. They lied to get there and are not the least bit interested in ethics.
Republicans' use of "the abortion industry" language was no mistake. They have to create that foul language to cover their real intent. They intend to and are putting women at risk while they deny them the health care they need to save their lives.
These creeps and zealots will ruin lives with the stroke of a pen. And, for some they will be signing their death warrant. If you know anyone that doubts that, recommend they watch the ABC Special "On The Brink". The brave moms tell exactly what the change in laws has done to them and their families.
Excellent parsing, but this SCOTUS speaks gut English, with its own ideological dictionary. They will find a way to ignore your common sense analysis and go for overreach, as opposed to the mind-numbing mental gymnastics in which they indulge when strictly “construing” any remotely progressive language in the Constitution or a statute. The only upside to the war on women in this country is the likely explosion of poor, overwhelmingly non-white babies, who will grow into young men and women with little education, massive resentment against a society that scorns them, and easy access to guns. It requires little imagination to see where that will take us. Every day brings some new bit of horrific news making a blue victory in November both more essential and somehow, unbelievably, less likely thanks to the boldness of the forces of evil and the disorganized timidity and frankly, the media suppression, of the forces and voices of those seeking to preserve some vestige of this country and its aspirational values.
Another reason for yesterday's decision may be that the politicians on the court reasoned that the ruling is best left until after the election.
No kidding! (What I actually said out loud when I read your first sentence had the f-word in the middle.) It was so obvious that the plaintiffs had no standing -- hell, even Kavanaugh recognized it! -- that SCOTUS should have passed on this case, but, well, we are where we are.
Same goes for the N.Y. Times. They know better, but they are what they are, so I'm not surprised.
Yeah. The Times, too. I am somehow disconnected from "likes" but here's to ya.
There is only one cure for misogyny and that is that the women of America, and men who aren't scared charades of men, to rise up and vote every last one of this mother effers out of office.
I will do my part.
Glad you pointed out Thom that this was a pyrrhic victory based on standing, not merit. It means nothing, except that the court wanted to reduce the heat under its own ass given Alito / Thomas' extraordinary malfeasance. Alito, in particular, always finds standing for conservatives, so this is a tiny little victory in that regard, but this makes me worry about the insurrection ruling coming out soon.
So no Viagra by Mail? No drug plans run by Health Insurance companies that send your prescription medications by mail? When will those Insurance companies and Big Pharma start to squawk?
Comstock argued for prosecuting anyone who helped others get an abortion. That included anyone who provided abortion medication. The Comstock Act was never officially taken off the books; it was superseded by Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed the right to abortion. Learn more about the Comstock Act and Project 2025 in this podcast.
https://thedemlabs.org/2024/04/29/project-2025-uses-1873-comstock-act-for-nationwide-abortion-ban/
It was incredibly frustrating to read/hear the mainstream media headlines/reporting that SCOTUS had upheld access to mifepristone when all they did was kick the can down the road, waiting for a claimant with standing. Why is it that the media has become so completely inept at reporting the facts?
Because the billionaire owners of these Press outlets want Donald Trump as president. They want more tax breaks…
ultimately, isn't the issue whether or not a man has possession of his wife, just like any other chattel? I'm a retired psychiatrist and spent much of my 42 yr. practice treating women for the stress, oppression, and powerlessness baked into modern marital practices. Fundamentalist Muslims have taken this culture to its ultimate conclusion: no education/work for women, breeding on demand, and total domination by their husbands, and death by stoning for stepping outside the marriage. Marija Gimbutas, mother to the "Goddess Culture" and author of a number of relevant and well researched books, determined from the archaeological evidence that men on horseback rode down out of the Eurasian Steppe about 3,500 BC, if I remember correctly, and transformed the earliest European peaceful matriarchal small villages into the patriarchy we have inherited today. What could go wrong? Everything?
The GOP is smelling blood and may in fact get their way because the pathway exists. Obama took off some laws that were on the books he should have left alone. I think the time is too short for them to accomplish this goal but the GOP never lets go of meat with blood for their voters that love to make other people experience pain especially by having some small direct act in doing so. The ongoing mental illness of this part of peoples goes on. They use to be ashamed to show it openingly until Trump.
When it's convenient, liberal pundits and their minions go on and on about women's rights. But it was Barack Obama and the Demoratic Party who dropped the ball on codifying Roe V Wade in 2008 when Obama PROMISED Planned Parenthood that the Women's Protection Act would be his first legislative action when he got into office. The FIRST. But then he never mentioned it again until a year later when asked by a reporter, and he said it was no longer a priority. https://medium.com/@barrykaufman/roe-v-wade-democrats-cry-wolf-one-time-too-many-4aa22af92412
Now Biden continues to make certain Netanyahu can slaughter women and children in Gaza. He has helped to starve children in Yemen. He did virtually nothing at all when the Dobbs decision came down, and for decades he supported the heinous Hyde Amendment.
There are two parties. Both lie and deceive their oblivious base while blaming the other side, all the while assisted by their echo chamber media. . You can see where that dynamic has gotten us.
If you are looking for "perfect," don't look in politics. It will always be "the lessor of the two evils," because there are always two parties, and they will always both contain some evil. And don't start with the advantages of a third party--which managed to elect Bush over Gore and then Trump over Clinton. No matter what you say, the world would be a drastically better place ,with thousands less dead, if Gore and Clinton had been our presidents. The way to accomplish change is to 1) Get active in the Democratic Party and force change from within; and 2) Exert pressure from outside through political organization and action. In the meantime, we vote for whom we must. Actually, I don't know if any meaningful change has ever been accomplished without non violent, direct action--like the civil rights sit ins, the HIV obstructions, union strikes, etc. My sister was a Freedom Rider, went to jail for change. But you know that Dr. King still supported voting for Johnson. Write to us from jail about all your moral purity and maybe it will mean something.
I haven’t studied the case law under the Comstock Act but, I do note, that the act prohibits mailing of any “obscene, lewd, lascivious, indecent, filthy or vile article, matter, thing, device, or substance … designed, adapted, or intended for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral use.” But drugs that induce abortion are not themselves obscene, lewd, lascivious, vile etc. by today’s generally accepted moral standards. How can they be, when even the right to an abortion within the first two trimesters was for 50 years in shrines in the constitution? And even the Act doesn’t say abortion itself is an “indecent or immoral use,” as it doesn’t place the word “other” in front of “any indecent or immoral use.” So, originalists, read the text. Had Mr. Comstock wished to outlaw all devices or medication‘s used to produce abortions, regardless of their “morality”, he certainly could have said so.
Dear Mike. You have to understand that many of our fellow citizens actually believe that sluts use abortion as birth control. This goes back even to when abortion meant physically getting your innards scraped out. I know because "slut" was a favorite word of my master-degreed mother in this context. If you scan YouTube comments on the subject, you will see the true underbelly of the thinking creep out in the form of a steady smatter of recommendations for her to "just keep her knees together."
This is off the subject, but would it be considered "not politically correct" to call Clarence Thomas "Uncle Clarence Thomas." Just wondering.
Wow. Your inquiry contains quite a synchronicity. Somewhere in these comments I've gone off on "Other Powers" by (serious historian!) Barbara Goldsmith, and sure enough, a major character in that historical stew of impending Civil War abolitionists, suffragettes, spiritualists, abortionists and, yes, the abominable Comstock, is Henry Ward Beecher, father of the author of "Uncle Tom's Cabin." His career somewhat reflects that of Trump. The most famous preacher of the era, he was also the most prominent lecher, but his profitability to the congregation, combined with the general disregard of females, protected him from disgrace to the end. Only his female victims suffered. As for "Uncle Tom," I'm not sure his fictional memory is not insulted by comparison to Injustice Thomas. I read the book as a kid, but I think the whole point of "Uncle Tom" was coping with powerlessness in a kindhearted way, the which would certainly be the opposite of Clarence Thomas.