Cody just wasn’t angry enough for this one (that’s an odd thing to say), so I’m glad Katy Stoll stepped up the righteous fury.
OK, she mispronounced “pellucida”, but I don’t care.
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
We are going through the 3 stages of Outrage.
“Hiss if it hurts stage.”
“The GOP/christofascists took away our reproductive rights, so let’s beat up on the Democrats stage.”
We are now in the, “Where do we go from here stage” also known as, “Deal with it.” stage.
Setting up the Underground Airlines to get poor women from slavery states to free states.
Locating and setting up supplies of the abortion drugs RU-486 and misoprostol.
Waiting for the Red states to set up their Zygote Police, the ZyPos. It is no accident that they will look a lot like their forerunners, the Gestapo, Stasi, FSB, and KGB.
Yes, how dare anyone be outraged at the people who positioned themselves as the ones responsible for defending our rights. We might as well not be mad at the Uvalde police because a mass shooter killed all those elementary school kids while the cops sat outside for over an hour handcuffing concerning parents and scrolling through Instagram. After all, it wasn’t the cops who did the mass shooting, so all that outrage directed at them over their inaction is just misguided and doesn’t help. If only they had a bigger budget, that would fix things.
So enlightened. Very helpful.
Oops, Left out one of the stages of Outrage.
After beating up on the Democrats when >90% of the blame is on the GOP/Christofascists, let’s beat up on the people actually trying to..Deal with It.
Starting a flame war on some forum and tossing out a few meaningless insults is as you say, very enlightened and quite helpful.
You are an idiot.
At what point ARE we allowed to bring up the bungling, naivety, and duplicity of the Democrats? Can we EVER criticize them, or has the Overton Window swung so far to the right that the Dems have adopted their own rendition of the Rethug’s “Eleventh Commandment?”
Just WHAT are those tasked with dealing with it doing to… deal with it. Pelosi gave us a poetry recital. Some Dems started a sing-a-long.
Yeah, that will show ’em.
Meanwhile, the right, when they didn’t get what they want, staged an armed insurrection, last year on Jan 6.
Just sayin’, they’re winning.
That is a good question although I doubt you’ve thought it through very far.
It is so much easier to just beat up on the Democrats.
They may even deserve some of it but guess what? It isn’t going to fix anything!!!
Here is a partial list of how people are…Dealing With It.
.1. Donate money to women health care providers and the Red State fugitive pregnant women funds.
There are many such travel funds for poor women to get to Blue states.
.2. That is the subject of the other post today by PZ Myers.
It tells you how to perform a DIY abortion.
“Nora Reed has compiled a list of abortion information at abortion.cafe.”
Did you read it? Even if you never need that info, you might be able to point someone else toward it.
This is commonly done already in the USA and just became a whole lot more common.
.3. The christofascists are already trying to outlaw the abortion drugs.
We are already fighting to keep them legal and available.
.4. The christofascists are already trying to make escaping a Red state while pregnant into a felony, possibly a death penalty crime.
We are already fighting them on that. Several states have said they aren’t going to extradite women to Red states.
.5. There is a lot more to do and that can be done.
Just getting effective birth control to at risk women is going to go a long ways towards preventing female arrests and felony convictions for abortions or end up giving birth to unwanted babies they can’t take care of.
We have to Deal With It whether we want to or not. It’s our new reality.
I would also argue that sitting around lamenting the (in)actions of the Democrats only buys the right more offensive capital. They’re loving it.
The few people on this thread are still stuck in let’s hiss if hurts, whine a lot, and start pointless flame wars.
Meanwhile in the Real World, people are Dealing With It because that is how adults live their lives.
There is a lot that can be done to get around the GOP/christofascist disaster.
There is a lot that will be done to get around the disaster.
There are around 800,000 abortions a year in the USA.
1. Over half of those occur in legal Blue states.
2. Of the rest in Red states, women will evade the law by either traveling to legal states or going the DIY route.
Estimates based on demographics etc.. are that in the post Roe versus Wade world, there will still be 700,000 abortions. The reduction in number will be 100,000**. Meaning that 100,000 unwanted babies will be born to women who will almost all have huge problems taking care of them.
That is just the beginning of this disaster.
A lot of those 100,000 unwanted babies will live in poverty and have short, unhappy lives due to violence, drugs, neglect, etc..
**That 100,000 might be an overestimate.
It might be closer to 0.
In Romania with their abortion ban, despite Draconian laws and the Zygote Police (they actually had something like this), the birth rate quickly went back to what it was. People just evaded the law en masse.
They’re the party we can effect change in what with us being the ones who vote for them. What you call “beating up” is what real adults call “accountability.”
You started it, dude. Like, you literally started it. You didn’t have to make your first contribution to this thread an unnecessary sideswipe against people upset that the Republicans got away with murder because the Democrats refused to do anything to stop them despite them campaigning on a platform that boiled down to “vote for us so we can stop Republicans being evil.” You chose to do that.
@ 7
Oh, whoopie. We’re saved. (eyeroll) If you’re so keen to heap all the blame on the Bible-fuckers, let me point out that none of the things you list actually deals with them.
@ 8
So we’ve got our own Eleventh Commandment. Great.
raven @9: First, good on ya. Second, there are always people who, presented with the choice “whine or do something” will always choose “whine”. It’s all they know.
This isn’t the third grade.
I’d say grow up but that is beyond you.
Not going to waste any more time on a stupid troll.
You didn’t even read what I wrote much less think about it.
We are dealing with the christofascists right now out of necessity.
They are the ones trying to outlaw abortion drugs and extend their state laws to other states.
Keep beating up on the Democrats. It won’t solve anything but it will make you feel better.
This is what I mean about Dealing With It.
The Red states are trying to extend their state laws to the Blue states so their residents can’t travel out of state for abortions.
The Blue states are already pushing back.
Massachusetts governor won’t cooperate with Red state law enforcement.
California won’t recognize civil liability from Red states.
New York won’t cooperate with Red state law enforcement or civil liability claims.
The stakes are high here.
In the Red states, getting an abortion is or will be a felony, Murder 1. The penalty is life in prison or the death penalty.
I remember when Ted Kennedy was demonstrating against apartheid, and got arrested along other demonstrators.
I remember the speaker “Tip” O’Neill.
Why are there no current representatives of that caliber?
(“the squad” seems safely marginalised)
Re: raven @ #14…
As regards felony first degree murder for an abortion, toss that into the teeth of the “pro-lifers” (aka forced birthers). Do they really think that executing a woman for getting an abortion is “pro-life”? And how does that work, anyway?
In general…
I am fortunate that I live in California, and my closest relatives live here, New York, Oregon, or Massachusettes. California legislature is working on a state constitutional amendment to explicity make abortion access legal in California.
Action is being taken here. What I would like to see is a ballot proposition to specifically repeal Prop. 8 and it should be done before the current SCOTUS overturns Obergefell.
In the mean time, I’m dealing with a much more personal matter. My wife of 51 years died yesterday due to ALS. So pardon me if I have trouble properly engaging with wider concerns.
Yes, we are angry. My organization offers a video that shows what we are angry at:
http://omnigma.org/heroicheretic/harshrealitiesjune2022.mp4
Please view and share
Thanks,
Sherman Jay and the Omnigma Organization
They don’t care.
This isn’t hyperbole either.
The Georgia law, already passed in 2019, has abortion as punishable by up to the death penalty.
Similar laws have been proposed in Idaho, Ohio, and Texas.
Oh.
Sorry to hear about your loss.
And, we take action by contributing to true PROGRESSIVE candidates and causes. But, until we can escape, we are marginalized by living in Scarizona.
@11 — My point was that it fixes nothing. The right is having a grand old time with the left’s navel-gazing. We all know there’s no secret cabal of closet Democrats ready to leap into action once Pelosi has been subjected to enough ridicule. We also know there’s a good chance the dems won’t even exist in a few years, outside a handful of state governments still on the official fascist “still to be usurped” list. Stomping our feet about them terribad dems is for naught. America’s new authoritarian government won’t give a shit. The whole apparatus is fucked from top to bottom.
Well, that’s all that seems to be happening in this thread. I hear “beat them up” and “exonerate them.” Neither option changes anything.
What we can do is to vote in primaries (or however your state or county selects nominees) and vote in people who are more interested in reversing these trends than in keeping corporate donors happy. Here in the NYC area, a number of Republican-lite state senators and US congresspeople have lost primary challenges to more activist candidates, e.g., Alexandra Ocasio-Cortes beating Joe Crowley, Mondaire Jones replacing Nita Lowey, etc. In my assembly district, the Democratic apparatchik lost to a challenger in yesterday’s primary. Oh yes, and donate to the campaigns of the people you want to see in office.
But it’s going to take a while to replace enough corporate-lackey Republican-lite Democrats to make a real difference, so we need to be in this for the long haul. The “tea party” (now Trumpkin) folks have worked hard for at least 4 decades infiltrating every level of government.
We also have to pay attention to every elected office — school boards, village, town, county, city, and state offices, not just the presidential race — and make sure we get our kind of people into those offices. In places that have elected judges, pay attention to who is nominated.
One of the big mistakes that progressives, pro-choice activits, LGBT activists, etc., have been making is to rely on the courts to enact progressive changes. Once Roe v Wade was settled, there wasn’t as much attention paid to changing laws in every state, at least not until lots of anti-abortion laws started getting enacted. After Obergefell, a number of LGBT [sic] rights organizations simply closed up shop, because in their mind, they’d won.
@whheydt “My wife of 51 years died yesterday due to ALS ”
Very sad to hear that. We certainly know ALS must have been difficult to deal with. And, you must focus on that as so intimately personal a loss.
Our organization hopes to escape Scarizona to return to California, where our progressive efforts will be more effective.
whheydt @16: So sorry for your loss.
“We should all be angry enough to punch holes in walls” – Don’t try that at the Schott Barn.
raven:
The “blue state” and “red state” terminology was a cable news invention for presidential elections, where it’s already confused and misleading as it is. None of this stuff depends on the electoral college map from 2020 (or earlier).
If you want to beat up on Manchin, he is the sole Dem who consistently votes with the GOP.
Mitch McConnell is a more deserving target, as are the rapist and liar that he got confirmed to SCOTUS. Impeachment of several people and or criminal charges are definitely something We The People should be screaming about.
Just because the billionaire owned media needs to blather endlessly about both sides in some bizarre notion of fair and balanced, doesn’t mean you should join them in blaming Dems. Try blaming the people who are actively fucking us over first. (And second, and third, with assists by the rat bastard from West Virginia)
https://sign.moveon.org/petitions/clarence-thomas-must-go
Seth Meyers:
“Corrupt Republicans shredded the supreme court’s legitimacy with Roe ruling”
https://youtu.be/RGS4-7WMWhI
or
https://youtu.be/RGS4-7WMWhl
-Late Night With Seth Meyers presents even bad news in a humoristic way, making it possible to absorb it without getting paralysed by despair.
@wwheydt
My condolences on the loss of your wife. 51 years is a long time, I hope you have people there to help you through the next few weeks.
Thank you to all those who have expressed condolences. I–was we–live downstairs from my (our) daughter, son-in-law and their son. Though at the moment, my daughter is off to an SCA event in Oregon. I told her not to change her plans and to have fun. Since she works for a lawyer that does estate planning, documentation for everything is in pretty good order. I just keep breaking down every time I look at the empty bed, wishing she were still there…
And, yes, 51 years is a long time. We were 22 and 28 when we married in 1971. She turned 80 earlier this month. At the risk of some criticism, her writings are on her web site, http://www.kithrup.com/~djheydt for anyone interested. There is one more, very short, work that needs to be added, which she wrote while hospitalized about a week ago.
Re: Tethys @ #29…
It’s not so much the next few weeks. I promised her I would do my best to live long enough to care for her cats until they die of old age, and see all the grandchildren to be adults. It’s going to take 20 years. I’ve got a chance. There are ancestors that lived into their 90s (including one who lived from 1843 to 1946 and that included being in a Confederate Cavalry unit and going through two train derailments as a conductor).
Right now…just doing what I can to take it one day at a time.
@wwheydt
Oh dear, I’m sorry. My condolences.
The party who are inconsistently good are ALWAYS better than the party who are consistently evil.
Also, Democrats aren’t trying to destroy our democracy, so we can vote for so-so Democrats today, and thus keep our ability to vote for better Democrats tomorrow.
whheydt
I am very sorry för your loss.
Seems to me, as a foreign observer, that all the efforts of Blue states to ensure continued access to abortion are ultimately futile.
In 2024, or January 2025 at the latest, abortion will be a federal crime. Welcome to Gilead.
In the meantime, just for fun, shall we just call Red states “Slave states” and Blue states “Free states”.
Well. Biden is making deals with McConnell to appoint an anti-abortion extremist to a federal judgeship.
https://twitter.com/joesonka/status/1542261342220029958
You know, there are two things the Democrats have to learn.
1. At some point, you have to hold the line and tell Republicans they’ve gone too far.
2. Never make “a deal” with McConnell. He’s only going to betray you, unless the deal is so good for him that it’s basically Democratic surrender.
Lawmakers aghast after crisis pregnancy centers caught lying to women about basic medical facts.
https://www.rawstory.com/texas-lawmakers-crisis-pregnancy-centers/
Don’t forget that St. Hillary’s last veep choice was a fetus fetishist. Don’t forget that Pelosi endorsed an anti-choice candidate over a pro-choicer. Don’t forget that the Dems squandered every majority they had to enshrine R v W into law, but decided not to.
Say what you will about the Republicans, but they believe in something and they try to deliver. Their litmus tests create candidates their base WANT to support. I can’t never say the same about the Dems and their fucking “Big Tent” where human rights are contingent on the latest polls. .
Re: birgerjohansson @ #37..
That’s news-that-isn’t-news. California tried to make them post signs stating basic facts (like what services the state provides and whether or not the center has any actual medical staff) and got shot down by the courts.
Paywalled article. I note the weasel phrase “apparent deal”, and rather doubt Biden is doing any such thing.
Seriously Akira, I don’t want you in my tent. Your raging bull routine is just toxic masculinity at its finest.
This falls under the Deal With It strategy.
90 elected DAs have already pledged not to prosecute women who have abortions.
Including the DA for Austin, Texas.
Two thirds of the US population want to keep abortion safe and legal.
It is turning out that…we aren’t entirely powerless.
I keep saying, we outnumber those 6 Supreme Court judges by 55 million to 1.
PZ, #36:
The party establishment will never give up shit like that. They don’t “learn.” It’s just not their style.
Just recently, they fought against a pro-choice candidate, Jessica Cisneros, in the primaries in favor of Henry Cuellar, who has plenty of other crap views (and FBI raids) where that came from, in case that’s not enough for you.
And instead of John Fetterman, their preference was again for Conor Lamb, who voted with Trump’s position more often than not and was one of the corporatist Dems pushing (successfully) to gut Biden’s infrastructure bill for the sake “bipartisanship.”
And it’s not just about reading poems or supporting anti-choice Dems or dismissing all proposals that would actually do anything to address the problem. Pelosi’s also taking trips to Rome so she can get communion and meet with the Pope, like Biden did last year. In their minds, that’s the sort of news that must have conservatives shaking in their fucking boots. Either that or they are a bunch of lying sociopaths who are only in it for themselves. (Probably the second one.)
What the Supreme Court has done is set the Red states against the Blue states in a Cold war. Their ruling isn’t just going to wreck millions of lives, it is going to go a long way towards wrecking the USA.
.1. The Reds are trying to outlaw the abortion drugs RU-486 and misoprotol.
The Blues are trying to keep them legal since abortion is still legal and these drugs have other uses as well.
.2. The Reds are trying to keep their female slaves from traveling out of state for abortions.
The Blues are offering services and sanctuary.
.3. The Reds want to extend the reach of their laws over their state’s borders.
The Blues aren’t buying it and won’t extradict women who had a legal procedure for murder.
.4. Here is another front in the Cold War.
A lot of people behind the lines in the Red states are actually siding with the Blue states.
The state of Texas isn’t going to just be fighting California. It’s also going to be fighting their own capital of Austin.
FYI.
Women in Red states should be careful how they pay for abortion services.
Prosecutors could subpoena those financial records and use them against you.
And oh yeah.
If you go the DIY route and end up in the ER, never, ever, admit that you took abortion drugs.They can’t tell if you did or you are having a miscarriage.
In some places they will lie to you and claim they can tell the difference. They can’t.
Once again. …never, ever, admit that you took abortion drugs.
(Don’t you just love the new world the Supreme court has made for us. They have turned a majority of the population into potential or actual felony class criminals.)
@ 40
Well, I sure as fuck don’t want you in mine, you spineless wiggler.
Proud boys doing stuff they are proud of. Behold a segment of the Republican base.
https://youtu.be/NCRiVEICBzs
whheydt- very sorry to hear of your loss.
Re: Matt G @ #47…
Thank you. I’ve updated her web site to include her final written work. The URL is upstream somewhere, or just do a web search on “Dorothy J. Heydt.”
For everyone…if I fail to post specific thanks for condolences offered, it’s not meant to slight anyone, it’s just that I’ve done enough derailing of the thread as it is.
I can not really put in nice words with all the rational steps included but I am having doubts about the sincerity of the of this being about the children since there is dam little legislation concerning the welfare of children that is not resisted by the conservatives. It is about sex and sexual activity which is being judged as wanton sexual activity and it goes without saying it is other peoples sexual activity that is being judged. It is often left unsaid but there is a lot of resentment that abortion just enables sexual activity with out consequences
whheydt, ouch. 43 years for me (living together; married, only 36).
Best wishes for you, in your desolation.
@16 whheydt
I am so sorry for your loss. There is a world of difference between knowing that the end is coming and “today’s the day”. And the added horribleness of diseases like ALS, Alzheimers, etc., that take the person before they finally take the person.
I am glad that you are living with people who loved her and will remember her too.
I didn’t realize that I probably read at least some of her works in the various Bradley anthologies until I clicked on the link upthread. Wow.
whheydt: So sorry for your loss. Take care of yourself however you need to, and best wishes.
whheydt>
I’m sorry. I’m glad you have support nearby, but I realize that’s a small consolation. Her bibliography is pretty impressive, thanks for sharing it.
I’m trying to respond in groups, as it were, so this doesn’t become a D J Heydt memorial thread.
Thanks, everyone.
The bibliography doesn’t include her fan fic (Star Trek), work on the early version of the Star Trek Concordance, or work on a Vulcan conlang, which originated the term “ni var” which has (fairly recently) become part of actual productions. (Not, so far as I know, with any credit, but the fan sites have tracked the origin back to her).
For several of the Friends of Darkover stories, she would Bradley’s “I won’t buy stories that….” and then write one which Bradley would inevitably buy. One of the notable ones was when Bradley said that nobody could bring Jaella back (apparently a popular thing in fan fic). Dorothy told her what she intended to do and Bradley relied, “I want to read it, but I won’t buy it.” She bought it.
@15 “the squad” are lightweights and dilettantes. When they arrived in DC, the first day of actual work, as in the first day of the new legislative term, they spent the day playing “where in the world is Carmen San Diego” with Mitch McConnell. NOT WHAT YOU WERE ELECTED TO DO LADIES. YOU WERE ELECTED TO GET SOME REAL WORK DONE IN CONGRESS.
And we’ve seen how well that’s worked out. Having a bunch of showy media/press conferences and actually getting some work done in Congress are two different things.
@5 While I generally agree with your assessment, complaining without actual action or a plan is just whining.
@14,18 For all their yapping about their alleged concern and love about babies and the unborn, all the Congress critters that voted against baby formula relief were Republicans. It was NEVER about babies, children, etc. It was only ever about vitriolic misogyny from a bunch of 13 year old whiny edgelord incels trapped in aging bodies. Who happen to hold Congressional seats.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/05/19/republicans-baby-formula/
All the governors you mentioned are in blue states and are terrified of being primaried out of office. If you get the “get out the vote” call for a particular candidate, tell them NO and tell them why. The volunteers staffing those phone lines take notes, especially when you tell them NO for an actual reason (you didn’t support the environmental legislation, not LGBTQ+ supportive, etc.). Unless the winning candidate wins by a landslide, the candidates are interested in the data. Especially if they lose the election. Not getting the phone calls? Go online & go to the comments section on the candidate’s website. (There will be one.) Either state why you aren’t voting for the candidate or else announce your support but only IF they support/continue to support [thing]. Data collection is a thing with these people for a reason.
@36 Because six Federalist judges aren’t enough? wtf?!
@42 “And instead of John Fetterman, their preference was again for Conor Lamb”
Well, isn’t that what they do best? Seizing defeat from the jaws of victory? In this case, literally.
@44 I posted this on another thread but it probably bears repeating.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-target-figured-out-a-teen-girl-was-pregnant-before-her-father-did/?sh=35f3d4c06668
You should probably not be doing anything online except in privacy mode. And strip your browser of cookies regularly. That article is more than 10 years old, which means that the algorithms have only gotten better.
Also, that is really bad medical advice. Doctors are tasked with saving your life. If you are sick enough to need to go to a hospital or ER, you will need to be clear and upfront about what you took, otherwise doctors could give you a treatment that would otherwise be contraindicated. Doctor-patient privilege and HIPPA prevents doctors from giving out medical information without your express SIGNED permission. Cops and courts can subpoena your actual tests in some cases (mostly DWI and illegal intoxicants, etc.) but as you pointed out, the abortion pills don’t necessarily register on a drug test. Depends on what kind of test is being performed, especially if it’s a “present/not present” kind of test, rather than quantity (like with a blood alcohol content test).
Doctors are a protected class, like clergy. You can’t force clergy to testify either–it’s the whole “seal of the confessional” thing. They can CHOOSE to testify but legally, you can’t really force them.
https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/ethics/medical-testimony
Just don’t go to a Catholic hospital if you are a woman. They will throw you under the bus without a second thought.
This is so wrong that it could get someone killed.
There is no way to tell a spontaneous abortion (miscarriage) from an induced abortion using drugs.
The treatment is going to be the same either way and what is being treated are the symptoms. The cause is long gone by that point.
In a criminal investigation, HIPAA is going to do exactly zero to protect anyone.
These records are easily obtained by law enforcement with a court order.
The stakes are high here. In Red states, abortion is or will be a felony, punishable by life in prison or the death penalty.
Whatever you do, don’t give out information that isn’t needed for treatment that is going to put you in prison for life.
Tethys @ #40:
Naughty as I am, I used a method to bypass paywalls. The part about the deal is real: Biden’s making it theoretically in exchange for McConnell agreeing not to hold up future federal nominations by the White House. But there is an important piece of information from the article that is being left hidden behind the paywall, making the whole thing at least a tiny bit misleading:
So basically, Biden’s seems to be trading a nomination in an unspecified future for unobstruction today (after all, if McConnell tried anything funny before the vacancy popped up, the deal would be off). Perhaps they know exactly when that seat is due to become vacant, perhaps not, the article doesn’t tell so we can’t be sure, but as it stands right now even if the deal is struck you wouldn’t immediately have the anti-abortion judge nominated for the position, and in the best case scenario the sacrifice would give Biden the chance to put forward a greater amount of favorable nominations elsewhere.
silvrhalide @55,
Is there anyone better around?
@56 ” Presenting as” is not the same thing as “there is no difference”. Pharmacologically, there is a really big difference.
https://go.drugbank.com/drugs/DB00834
Route of elimination
Fecal: 83%; Renal: 9%.
Half-life
18 hours
Somehow, I doubt the metabolites for mifepristone are going to show up in a fecal sample of a spontaneous abortion.
“Fewer than 3% of people self-managing an abortion with pills require further medical care.”
What’s the overlap in the Venn diagram of “people who used birth control correctly but had it fail” with “people too stupid to use birth control in the first place and are now somehow shocked that they are pregnant” with that 3%? I have to deal with the public, usually at arm’s length (happily) and the public is, by and large, stupid. So the idea that everyone will use abortifacient pills correctly is pie in the sky.
“There is no way to tell a spontaneous abortion (miscarriage) from an induced abortion using drugs.
The treatment is going to be the same either way and what is being treated are the symptoms. The cause is long gone by that point.”
NO.
Miscarriage and abortions can have many different causes. You treat the cause, not the symptoms
https://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/mifepristone-oral-route/precautions/drg-20067123?p=1
That is a f*ckton of medications and contraindications.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2760893/
“Contraindications to mifepristone medication abortion include hemorrhagic disorder; concurrent anticoagulant therapy; inherited porphyrias; chronic adrenal failure; concurrent long-term systemic corticosteroid use; confirmed or suspected ectopic or molar pregnancy; allergy to mifepristone, misoprostol, or other prostaglandin; and unwillingness to undergo a vacuum aspiration if needed.26 If the woman has an intrauterine device in place, it must be removed before treatment. Women with serious systemic illnesses (eg, severe cardiac, renal, or liver disease or severe anemia) should be evaluated individually to determine which method of abortion is safest.”
https://www.acog.org/clinical/clinical-guidance/practice-bulletin/articles/2020/10/medication-abortion-up-to-70-days-of-gestation
“Medication abortion is not recommended for patients with any of the following: confirmed or suspected ectopic pregnancy, intrauterine device (IUD) in place (the IUD can be removed before medication abortion), current long-term systemic corticosteroid therapy, chronic adrenal failure, known coagulopathy or anticoagulant therapy, inherited porphyria, or intolerance or allergy to mifepristone or misoprostol ”
Basically, the links all say the same thing. So, if you are on blood thinners, taking asthma medications, taking steroids for certain autoimmune diseases, have kidney or liver issues, etc. RU-486 may not be for you. You may have to stop taking medications for mifepristone to work–assuming you have the time, steroids take a long time to clear–or you might need monitoring or hospitalization.
But you’re going to treat the symptoms. Not the cause.
Good for you.
By that same logic, I guess we can just treat cancer with aspirin. Because it’s treating the symptoms. Which, after all, may present the same as a headache.
I’m not the one who’s going to get people killed.
FWIW. Legal Eagle now has his clip on teh end of Roe vs Wade here albeit it goe sfor 2 7 minutes and must admit I havem’t seen it myself in full yet. (But he is pretty good usually.)
Also we have AOC interviewed onColbert -part 2 of a 3 part interview here plus this :
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/democrats-pressure-biden-to-take-executive-action-on-abortion-rights
PBS discussion here.
20 something me would have burned something down over this. 40 something me is much more calm and calculating. There has to be a chink in their legal armor. Some small place to twist the knife. I’m looking for it. Protests and marches are all well and good, but when they only happen in blue states none of it matters.
Something that’s been running back and forth in my head is the Vagina Monologues. That came out when I was in college. For now, Amplify and spread women’s stories. It’s critical that people understand how devastating forced pregnancy is. It’s slavery level bad. I am not exaggerating, or belittling chattel slavery. Many slaves were forced to “breed” to make more slaves.
This decision from the SCOTUS makes women less than men. This is a fight we can NOT lose.
Yeah, you are.
Except no one in the right mind is going to pay the slightest attention to you.
They are going to listen to the people who have experience in providing drugs for DIY abortions.
DIY abortion in Red states isn’t just a medical procedure. It’s also a felony punishable by up to death.
What letter of the word death, don’t you understand?
In the real world, in Red states, you will interact with multiple people in the ER if you are that 3% who have complications. Some of those doctors, nurses, techs etc.. are going to be fundie xians, Catholics, and other religious fanatics. They may work closely with law enforcement or turn you in for a suspected abortion. Religious fanatics are how we ended up with this problem.
Don’t trust your life and freedom to strangers for no good reason.
Does this happen? Yes, it happens a lot.
In countries where abortion is illegal and they prosecute for it, quite a few women end up in prison for spontaneous miscarriages.
Because you can bet the police will be watching for miscarriages in the hospitals and they can’t tell the difference between a spontaneous miscarriage and a DIY abortion. Unless you tell them.
They are already sending women to prison for miscarriages in the USA. This case happened in 2020.
This woman Brittney Poolaw didn’t even have an abortion.
She had traces of methamphetamine in her system.
That wasn’t a good idea.
That is how she ended up with a manslaughter conviction and 4 years in prison.
There is no evidence that the methamphetamine actually caused the miscarriage.
In Red states, the police and prosecutors are going to be watching the hospitals for women with miscarriage type medical problems.
This won’t be the time or place to admit that you just committed a felony.
Think the hospitals and/or their staff won’t call the police on you?
They can and will sometimes do exactly that.
““The officer had a large automatic weapon pointed at me and a K-9 [dog],” Becker, now 28, recalled in a recent interview.”
” Becker’s attorneys argued there was no evidence that substance use caused the stillbirth and California law did not allow for this type of prosecution in the first place. Still, she spent 16 months in jail awaiting trial before a judge dismissed the charges.”
She beat the rap though. The crime they tried to prosecute her for doesn’t exist in California.
This is where we are at right now.
Ceausescu outlawed abortion and contraception in Romania in an attempt to increase the population.
…women who miscarried were investigated for suspected abortion…
… many Romanian women turned to backyard abortions, and tens of thousands died in the process…
There is sort of a happy ending though.
The Romanian population rose up in revolt and Ceausescu and his wife were executed by firing squad.
@55
The Squad are six members of the House, four of them elected in 2018 and two more in 2020. Why do you think these six people should somehow have accomplished more in 2-4 years than the entire rest of the Democratic party in Congress has in… let’s see, Pelosi has been in the House since 1987, Hoyer has been in since 1981, Clyburn has been in since 1991. Weird that you would hold these young newcomers to a higher standard than you would the entrenched career politicians who’ve had longer than I’ve been alive (in Hoyer’s case, at least) to pass legislation to protect reproductive healthcare rights and medical privacy rights. You might want to look into why you have these different standards for these young mostly women of color.
Hahahahaha! “Betrayal”: Biden cut deal with McConnell to appoint “extremist” anti-abortion judge, Democrat says
Another crap (6-3) Supreme Court decision today, West Virginia v. EPA. From Gorsuch’s concurring opinion:
But he really seems pleased (whenever it suits him) for the court to prescribe such rules, rather than the legislature.
From Kagan’s dissent:
…. And will you look at that? We get one more crap decision today in Oklahoma v. Castro-Huerta, 5-4 this time. From Gorsuch’s dissent:
The Scathing Atheist 489 Death Roe edition.
In this episode, Noah, Heath and Eli swears a lot so I don’t have to.
https://youtu.be/EC-6hS_aoW0
Just in.
Joe Biden to nominate anti-abortion federal judge for lifetime appointment
https://youtu.be/s3eKP8mPA7g
This is Biden’s brilliant idea. He will appoint an anti-abortion judge for life and in return Mitch McConnell “promises” he will not stop Biden’s judicial appointments.
Biden has truly lost the plot.
@ ^ birgerjohansson : What the ..? You’;re kidding right? You’re not are you? Expletives. Fucking hell Biden.
.*
No suprise but now official. The Treason SCOTUS strikes for its regressive masters again. :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-07-01/us-supreme-court-imposes-limits-on-joe-biden-emission-reduction/101199554
This illegitmate court needs to not only go in disgarce (& in many “Justices” cases directly to jail) but it also needs to have alli ts rulings ruled invalid and be reversed. .
Hate to tell you this, but it’s entirely legitimate.
Nope. It does not need to.
Fuck due process, right? Fuck rule of law. Let’s just play Monopoly.
“need” — I do not think it means what you apparently think it means.
(So… who will do the ruling?)
—
(Cue Silentbob to snipe by and tell me how I’m such a troll)
@58 Tammy Duckworth hit the ground running (so to speak) when she got elected. And John Lewis was a giant in the House and in Congress in general. Stacy Abrams would be a giant in whatever legislative/executive position that she was elected to.
@66 I have the same standard for The Squad (original or expanded version) as I do for everyone else.
Do you get stuff done. Y/N
Unfortunately, the answer for The Squad is mostly “no”. I’ve included two links for Duckworth and AOC but the links can be used to look up anyone’s Congressional legislation record.
https://www.congress.gov/member/tammy-duckworth/D000622
https://www.congress.gov/member/alexandria-ocasio-cortez/O000172?s=2&r=18
The Squad mostly sponsors or cosponsors each other’s legislation and that’s all they get. And the legislation goes nowhere, because no one else in Congress has signed on or is backing it. It’s not effective in furthering progressive goals.
When Duckworth and Abrams lost their initial races, they didn’t let it stop them, they just kept on keeping on. Duckworth continued to fight for veterans’ issues and women’s issues and Abrams flipped Georgia BLUE. That’s the difference between a contender and a lightweight.
And yeah, someone needs to check Hoyer for a pulse. He’s indistinguishable from a standee of Generic White Guy.
As far as all the other members of Congress you mentioned, I’d like to point out that quite a lot of them did in fact get progressive legislation passed. Legislation like marriage equality, LGBTQIA+ rights, rights for women and minorities. You know, all the stuff that the Supreme Court is busy ripping away. But some of those pols had to fight to pass them in the first place. Pelosi is basically Machiavelli with boobs but she also started out representing a district with a large LGBTQIA population and has always come out swinging for her constituents’ rights. It is beyond disappointing that the squad isn’t exactly picking up the baton and running it further.
@62 That’s quite the Gish gallop you’ve got there.
FYI, the reason so many Salvadoran women go to jail is because their legal code is based on the Napoleonic code, which, among other things, means that there is no presumption of “innocent until proven guilty”. In criminal cases, the presumption is that you are guilty unless you can prove that you are innocent. The basis for legal system for most Central and South American countries is the Napoleonic code, not British common law. Thanks Portugese and Spanish colonizers!
I mentioned the Romanian antiabortion laws from Ceausescu several threads back. And the outcome of having all those disaffected unwanted children raised in state orphanages.
By the way, what do either of those things have to do with the Supreme Court striking down Roe v. Wade? Other than the generational cohort in Romania leading the rebellion, it’s apples and oranges.
Do you even link? Or post URLs? To any legitimate source? “Forbidden knowledge link” (which isn’t an actual link) just sounds like some 4chan troll typing in his mother’s basement.
“Your symptoms, complications, and the treatment you’ll receive will look exactly the same as if you were having a natural miscarriage, which doctors treat routinely.”
You clearly have no idea what you are talking about. I suggest actually reading the links I posted upthread. The ones that link to peer-reviewed articles/sources.
I also notice that you don’t link to full articles, with the exception of the abc link. Is it because you only cherry-pick the parts–taken out of context–that will support your ignorant statements?
Do you think that maybe the police were called to deal with Brittany Poolaw because she was high on meth? Hospitals do that with violent or threatening patients. Not that anyone will know because there’s no access to the FULL article. Although the case does sound suspiciously like some local wannabe politician or law enforcement trying to beef up a resume to get elected or a promotion by punching down.
“Chelsea Becker, prosecuted for murder after her stillbirth, spent 16 months in jail: ‘Why did the hospital call police?’” and ““The officer had a large automatic weapon pointed at me and a K-9 [dog],” Becker, now 28, recalled in a recent interview.”
” Becker’s attorneys argued there was no evidence that substance use caused the stillbirth and California law did not allow for this type of prosecution in the first place. Still, she spent 16 months in jail awaiting trial before a judge dismissed the charges.””
I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that maybe the police were called because she was high on meth? And possibly violent? To the hospital staff? Which might explain why the cop had a gun pointed at her. Or it’s just possible that the cop was tanked up on his own self-importance. Again, no full article, so no real way to know.
If she spent 16 months in jail awaiting trial, it was probably because she couldn’t make bail.
“She beat the rap though. The crime they tried to prosecute her for doesn’t exist in California.”
Either she hit the jackpot in the public defender lottery or she actually has money to hire good attorneys. Which kind of begs the question as to why she didn’t make bail.
Also, if the ER doc thinks that the patient is coding because of an overdose, they can and will do a toxicology screen to determine what the problem is and how to cure it.
So your big argument boils down to “women in El Salvador” and “women high on illegal drugs sometimes go to jail”.
“What letter of the word death, don’t you understand?”
I understand it just fine.
Why are you so strangely comfortable with women dying from treatable complications from abortifacients but the possibility of a death sentence is the line in the sand? Are they somehow less dead if they died for the “right” (ie., your) reasons?
And make no mistake, the lack of alternatives WILL drive women who are otherwise unsuitable candidates for RU-486 into taking it anyway. When surgical abortions were an option in the red states, patients for whom mifepristone is contraindicated could be directed to surgical options. Now that in red states the pills are the only option other than travel to a blue state, people will take them anyway and suffer the medical consequences. Which don’t have to be deadly but will be if they follow your advice.
Far as I know, Spain maybe used the Napoleonic code during its occupation by France, but not otherwise. It uses its own code, based on its long history.
(Spain is no more French than it is Central or South American; it’s Spanish)
—
BTW, in Spain proper (as per Wikipedia) “Abortion in Spain is legal upon request up to 14 weeks of pregnancy, and at later stages for serious risk to the health of the woman or fetal defects.”.
Nothing to do with Napoleonic law. And not the same as its old-timey colonies.
@ 72 John Morales
Lol. Looks like I’ve got under someone’s skin. :-)
Yes how silly of me to say you post not to make a coherent argument, but to pick a fight.
Anyway please tell us more about how “this court needs to go” is not a literally true statement, and therefore Stevo should be more circumspect in his phraseology, Mr totally not a troll.
X-D
Silentbob:
Either that, or you’ve become so predictable I can predict your future actions.
You need to calm down.
(Tell me more about how “You need to calm down” is not a literally true statement)
[I do like pedantry, but]
The concept of need only makes sense in relation to a desired goal, that is, to achieve X one must do Y type of thing. Like, to stay alive you need to ingest nutrients.
—
FWIW, here is a crossposted comment I earlier made at Abe Drayton’s blog:
—
Being Australian, I almost certainly don’t get the subtleties of the processes in the USA — and yes, the USA is the largest single economy in the world.
Still, one thing I notice is this 6-3 split. Keeps coming up.
So: this article from 2020 seems prescient:
https://theconversation.com/3-ways-a-6-3-supreme-court-would-be-different-146558
If the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is replaced this year, the Supreme Court will become something the country has not seen since the justices became a dominant force in American cultural life after World War II: a decidedly conservative court.A court with a 6-3 conservative majority would be a dramatic shift from the court of recent years, which was more closely divided, with Ginsburg as the leader of the liberal wing of four justices and Chief Justice John Roberts as the frequent swing vote.
As a scholar of the court and the politics of belief, I see three things likely to change in an era of a conservative majority: The court will accept a broader range of controversial cases for consideration; the court’s interpretation of constitutional rights will shift; and the future of rights in the era of a conservative court may be in the hands of local democracy rather than the Supreme Court.
—
In short, my perception as an outsider is that the USA Supreme Court is a political body; its job is clearly to rationalise whatever interpretation of the (rather vague) constitution suits its political leaning.
(Shorter, even: it’s not an apolitical body, evidently)
—
(There’s an insinuation there, but it’s not overt)
@ Morales
I’m impressed you resisted the urge to tell me I’m not subcutaneous. X-D
But seriously, I find it immensely pleasing that when I’m away living my life, I am nevertheless alive in your thoughts. It’s touching Juan. I’d return the compliment, but the best I can say is that when I call you out I find your subsequent flailing thoroughly amusing.
Keep it up.
[OT]
In passing, it’s a good blog. I may nitpick this and that, but I also think Oceanoxia is worth checking out for anyone interested in an ecological/social perspective.
(But one doesn’t need to)
Upstanding, that’s me. Erect.
BTW, it’s notable that you’re indulging in DARVO tactics towards me.
I was saying quite some time ago that we should be fighting the right For Real while we could, because eventually we wouldn’t be able to. I was saying that Joe Biden was the wrong choice for President because his whole claim to fame was that he “works with Republicans”. (That was literally why he got the VP nomination in 2008.) I warned that Biden would refuse to take any substantial steps to block the right wing.
I got called an accelerationist, and I forget what else, and a tool of Trump.
Hey, Democrats: Biden is doing exactly what he always does. This is the President you wanted. You aren’t going to be able to change course now; the Supreme Court is going to rule that state legislatures can overturn election results, next, (the case is already on the docket) and that will be The End. (Of course, they’ve already basically guaranteed that we’re going to die from climate change anyway, with their EPA ruling, so maybe you don’t care.) This is why you chose Biden. Don’t complain, sit back and relax. This is what you always dreamed of, even if you didn’t realize it. I wish I believed in a hell, because every single person who supported Biden — and Hillary Clinton before him — deserves to go there. You extinguished the last hope. Thanks a bunch.
The Vicar @81: You’ve never explained how not voting for Biden would make things better. Trump would be serving a second term, and…somehow all the bad things you mentioned wouldn’t happen?
Re; The Vicar @ #81…
I didn’t vote for Biden. I voted against Trump in the way most likely to defeat him. But the, I registered “decline to state.” The primary reason that I vote for Democrats is because they are not Republicans, as the later have gone completely RWNJ for some decades now, and it’s only getting worse.
The best outcome I could see would be for the Republican party to fragment into separate parties for each of their mutually-incompatible factions.
It doesn’t sound like things are working out so well. What to do when right-wing nutjob Dems have power — who have it “because they are not Republicans” — as is the case now for instance?
Re: consciousness razor @ #84…
Biden is far from ideal, but he’s not completely off the rails the way Trump was.
Fortunately for me, at the state level, voting in California has a good chance of a choice between two Democrats in any given race so it’s internal Democratic differences that can drive the general election, freezing out the extremists at the primary (and often, the Republicans altogether). The best example I can think of was when the choice for US Senator came down to a race between Kamala Harris and Loretta Sanchez. I considered them both to be good choices and wasn’t very concerned over which would win (Harris did and I would have loved to have seen Sanchez chosen to fill out her term when Harris was elected VP).
cr @84:
I don’t know! Feel free to share your thoughts. It would be nice if one of the American (or Dutch) habitual whiners/gloaters around here offered some constructive criticism. Or do you see your role as moaning until someone else comes up with ideas?
One thing that would be constructive in threads like this is if we didn’t act like right-wing nutjobs only come from the Republican party, as if merely having “(D)” next to a candidate’s name represented genuine resistance to that crap. Often, the best that some people can come up with are dull phrases like “far from ideal.” It’s definitely not much to work with, but maybe we can build on that.
What’s your role, Rob? The impartial referee, I suppose. Has that been constructive?
cr @87: That’s pretty rich. My impression is that there are more comments here about Democrats who are incompetent and/or rightwing than there are about Republicans. Apart from a few notable exceptions, it’s an endless parade of Chicken Littles and Private Hudsons.
The rulings issued by the right wing federalists of SCOTUS this week amount to-
Screw all humans with uteruses.
Screw Native Americans.
Screw the Environment.
More regressive rulings on LGBTQ issues have been promised.
Screeching about Dems not preemptively preventing the judicial branch from making these rulings is as helpful as cutting off your nose to spite your face.
My entire slate of federal elected representatives are progressive Dem women who are currently being out voted by the likes of Lindsey Graham, Mitch, and other assorted pardon seeking members of the GOP.
They are the individuals who are to blame, and voting them out of office is the logical and legal action that is necessary to effect any sort of leftward change.
Rob Grigjanis:
I responded to a specific individual comment, as is common practice, not to a proportion. You routinely do the same by disagreeing with a comment, no matter how prevalent other comments like it may be. This of course doesn’t mean you’re wrong to do so. I’ll be generous and not even call this a double standard, since I’m pretty sure you’re just feeling a little cranky (or more than usual). That’s probably all it is.
So … how many? I don’t care. Aren’t most of those comments responding to a roughly equal number of others which wrongly suggest that Dems aren’t incompetent and/or right-wing? It seems like it to me. There are definitely tons of examples. But it also just doesn’t matter.
If there were many more comments here attempting to sugar-coat (or even deny) the problems of the Democratic party establishment, it would make this place a cesspit, in which case we shouldn’t waste any more of our time here. And if you think the ways I express disagreement with that sort of thing is “not constructive,” then do it yourself. I’m not stopping you. Try it out.
cr @90:
OK. Run for office. Dog catcher, sheriff, state rep, whatever silly things you Americans vote for. People like you, or the many other moaners around here, seem to know what’s wrong, so fucking fix it!
Oh, and if you can’t run for some reason, you could seek out people who want to run, and support them. Maybe you already do that, but I don’t remember you ever mentioning that, or recommending it. Maybe that’s just my bad memory.
I can’t afford to do that. Maybe the ones already in power should think about addressing inequality at some point too, but, you know … only if they really feel like it and can get over all the “moaning” they’re forced to endure. In the meantime, do you have a giant pile of dollar bills that I could “borrow”?
Sure, I’ll just seek out my rich friends…. Be right back, LOL.
It’s nothing to do with your rich friends. You’re really unaware of progressives running in your county, or anywhere?
Vicar, Biden was supposed to be the dirty dishrag you used for a tourniquet to stop the hemorrhaging while the actual progressives got their shit together and organized, he was never supposed to be anything more than the “let’s not die right now” candidate.
If you’re now whining that he didn’t do more than his role, that’s on you – all he was supposed to do was buy you two years to organize before DeSatan becomes president for life.
Rob, it would at least do something if you apologized for “whiners/gloaters,” “moaning,” and so forth, in this one and in tons of previous threads. An “I’m sorry” would not do much, to be perfectly honest. But in case you don’t already understand this, your credibility on these issues is zero with me, and it will be at least until you cut that shit out. So, if you think you can skip right over it or pretend like it’s no big deal, that doesn’t actually work for me, just so you know.
Are you really unaware? I’ve said lots to support people like Bernie Sanders, AOC, Ihlan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Jamaal Bowman, Cori Bush, as well as somewhat milder progressives (although all of them are pretty mild) such as Pramila Jayapal, Ro Khanna, Katie Porter, Elizabeth Warren, etc. I remember just recently talking about Jessica Cisneros, in connection to her primary race against Cuellar. I also brought up John Fetterman, who was running against Conor Lamb.
Those are just some who are fairly well-known on the national stage. Most local races for me are not (hardly ever, if at all) a topic of any FTB threads, and that’s understandable. The national/international group of people here are not really the audience for it.
Anyway, if you need links, I could give them, but I don’t think it should be necessary. So, do you really think I’ve never even mentioned or recommended any of them or the policies they’re supporting? If so, your memory really must be shot. I find that very hard to believe, so then what are you talking about?
Sorry, it’s “Ilhan” not “Ihlan.”
Guess I’ll have to live with that.
@72. John Morales :
Really? When you look at how 3 of the “Justices” lied to get their jobs and another is linked with the Jan 6th Attempted Coup that came close to destroying American Democracy and killing Congress people including the VP? A coup where lives were lost? When you look how ACofB was appointed – & Garland wasn’t? I strongly disagree. I think SCOTUS had lost its legitimacy.
You don’t think so given the massive harm they are doing and ther scale of the pain and suffering they are inflicting on innocent people? Are you happy with their regressive verdicts that are undermining the courts authority (such as it has left) and ruining real people’s lives?
Nah. Monopoly is a shit game which I don’t play and no, I never said without due process.
Read Trump’s perjurer and seditionist “Justices” their Miranda rights (or not given one of their recent verdicts said it was okay not to properly do?) before arresting them for their crimes and sending them to jail. I’d refuse them parole and keep them in custody until their trials because of the seriousness of the charges and their involvement in conspiracy to destroy Democracy. Bring the Federalist Perverters of the course of Justice – attempting to install their own favourable judges and bribe them with positions of authority in exchange for following their ideology -.into the cells alongside them too. Then have them properly tried and convicted under due process and whilst they are in jail insist on their resignations and / or impeachment. Oh & those of the seditionist Repug Congressreps too.
What meaning do you think the word “need” means? Language how does it work?
Trump’s treason SCOTUS is doing serious damage to the United States of America and is set on doing a lot more. They need to be prevented from doing more damage with their regressive, urepesentative, unjust and unethical rulings for the sake of the Amercian people. Who. I remind you chose in majority to have HRC not Trump as POTUS and who do NOT agree with most of the recent treason SCOTUS rulings.
Which ruling are you meaning?
Apply and enforce the law regarding perjury,and contempt of Congress ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contempt_of_Congress ) and sedition to the Trump SCOTUS’es who lied and who are linked with the Jan 6th Coup. the police should do their job and should have done it imemdiately really.
Biden and Congress should change the method of SCOTUS appointments and number of Justices to avoid or at least reduce the chance of anything like this happening again and appoint immediate replacements for every one of Trump’s treasonous picks. The new legitimate SCOTUS should then make legitimate rulings possibly revisiting the Roe vs Wade etc ..cases where the treason SCOTUS incorrectly made their ruling based on illegitimate seditionist perjurer members. Those “Justices” (Gorsuch, Thomas, Kavanaugh, Amy Comey OfBarrett) votes should not be counted since they were NOT there legitimately.
If emergency executive orders or legislation is needed to do this then it should be passed. Biden and senior Democrats need to do so and stand up strongly explaining what they are doing and why here to the American People. Then they need to scrap the Electoral College stand do other things too but first fix SCOTUS and end the current treason SCOTUS. As somone – Sam Youngman I gather – wrote online :
I agree & will add that unprecedented acts of betrayal of office and sedition like Trump’s and his “Justices”” require unprecedented measures and responses to remedy them.
Also the USA’s political system is terrible and needs reforming and fixing. Exhibit A : the entire Trump Presidency and how the Electoral College has denied the winner of the popular vote repeatedly. If not,well, we can see how the USA is already sliding into compeditive authoritarianism* if not outright fascist theocracy.
.* See : https://johnmenadue.com/democracy-in-decline-australias-slide-into-competitive-authoritarianism-a/
If Oz can avoid this fate then so can the USA.
@81. The Vicar (via Freethoughtblogs) : The 2020 United States Election was a choice between bad and worst. (Yes, worst not merely worse.)
We got the bad.
It could’ve been worst.
You – as I recall – wanted worst.
I don’t think many people here if any wanted or voted for Biden.
Most here (who are eligiable to do so obvs) didn’t want and voted against Trump as #83. whheydt has already said.
Most here I think wanted Sanders or Warren but sadly the progressive side was split between the various options whereas the more right-wing regressiver faction of the Dems was united behind Biden and fell into line and did their work for him instead of fighting amongst themselves.
My opinion FWIW i.e. very little? Sanders shouldn’t have run for the 2020 nomination but rather backed and supported Warren instead and the progressive side should have fallen in behind Warren from the start and made her – instead of Biden – the Dem nominee. Then maybe Warren would have won the election rather than Biden or Trump though there’s no guarantee that would have worked out either.Too late now of course so all we can do is learn from it.
Sadly, given the utterly absurd, undemocratic, shithouse electoral system the USA has – no preferential voting, voter suppression, the Electoral College, gerrymandering, no compulsory voting, ad nauseam it was a binary choice at least after the primaries. Is Biden infuriating and disappointing? Yes. Would it be far, far far worse if Trump had won and the Repugs taken Congress and Senate instead? Absolutely.
But then you know this already right?
Anyhow.
Its history now so where do we go from here and what can we do to fix and change things? Your suggestions are ____ ? Your actions from here and now to make things better are or will be _______?
StevoR:
Then let’s base what you’re learning on what actually happened. Warren was doing worse in the primaries (wiki summarizes the results here), eventually getting third even in her home state of Massachusetts. That was on Super Tuesday, her best result out of all 15 of those primaries in terms of the percentage of the vote. She was even behind fucking Bloomberg in more than half of those (Alabama, American Samoa, Arkansas, Colorado, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas) and only narrowly ahead of him in the others (California, Maine, Minnesota, Utah, Vermont, Virginia).
In the races before that, she was behind:
– Sanders and Buttigieg in Iowa
– Sanders, Buttigieg and Klobuchar in New Hampshire
– Sanders, Biden, and Buttigieg in Nevada
– Sanders, Biden, and Buttigieg in South Carolina
There is no way her campaign didn’t know how badly things were going for them, even if you might have been largely unaware of it (then or now).
Anyway, you’re correct that the Dem left wing needed to be unified, which is what I and many others were saying at the time, to no avail. However, you have the two names swapped for no good reason. (Maybe she is or was your personal preference, but that isn’t a good reason. See above.) Warren is the one who should’ve dropped out in order to immediately endorse Sanders, as a bunch of establishment Dems did for Biden, since Sanders was already in a better position and had a much better chance of winning the rest of the primaries and the general election.