The battle lines are rather sharply drawn. We’ve got two political parties, and one of them is falling into a dark pit of insanity, a distinction that is being constantly highlighted. The latest episode: the Republicans killed a bill that would protect our right to contraception. Are they planning something for the future?
The Senate on Wednesday afternoon voted not to advance a bill that would create a federal right to access contraception. The procedural measure, which required 60 votes, failed as all but two Republicans present voted against it.
The legislation would have prevented states from passing laws that limit access to contraception, including hormonal birth control, intrauterine devices and other methods that prevent pregnancy. Democrats introduced the bill, in part, to put Republicans on the record on reproductive rights ahead of November’s elections.
Obviously, it was set up as part of a political ploy by the Democrats…but it worked. The Republicans willingly hitched their wagon to the star of weird pronatalists and freaky tradwives and fundamentalist Catholics and evangelicals. That’s who you’re voting for when you vote for Republicans.
Excellent maneuver by the Dems. Bring out the worst in the Republicans, not that should be too difficult. With the exception of some strict religious nuts, it is very challenging for me to understand how people can vote for these intolerant conservatives.
I suppose they will claim they don’t actually oppose contraception, they just think it ought to be left up to the states. Screw them. Figuratively.
The GOP is following in the footsteps of Romania under Ceausescu.
The Romanian dictator Ceausescu tried that at the end of the 20th century. It didn’t work.
He decided for some reason that they needed more Romanians so he outlawed abortion and birth control.
The birth rate went up and then went right back down again as people found ways to evade the anti-human laws they didn’t like.
It ended up causing a Crime Against Humanity, the atrocity called the Romanian Orphan problem. People who had children they couldn’t care for transfered them to the state. The Romanian government couldn’t care for them either.
The result was something like 500,000 young children growing up in very deprived conditions. There was little followup but AFAICT, most of them ended up dying young. Many of them were infected with Hepatitis B and C and HIV from substandard medical care.
There is a happy ending.
The Romanian people had enough of the Ceausescu dictatorship and they revolted, and Ceausescu and his wife were executed by firing squad.
Some of them are for sure.
The trad Catholics and the fundies would outlaw birth control if they had the votes. They aren’t hiding anything. They say so often.
The GOP in general are all massive hypocrites though.
They all use birth control like the rest of us. It’s an essential part of modern life.
According to the CDC, birth control use runs around 99% among relevant cohorts of women. It’s 98% for Catholic women.
“Are they planning something for the future?” gives the current Republicans too much credit. Most of them can’t plan out the campaign they are in right now let alone plan for what happens after. As a group they can’t agree on what the party position should be and the best plan they have is ignore it. Trump flip flops on these issues because he tries to avoid the topic and when he can’t he answers to suit whoever asked the question.
This isn’t to say the Republicans won’t do terrible things. When not under campaign pressure they will end up doing what the religious fanatics want. Their near total lack of morality or policy beliefs means they will give in to the fanatics when there isn’t pressure to do something else.
“Leave it up to the states” is the key. Their main constituency is the wealthy, of course, so to gain enough voters to control the Federal government and stack the courts, the GOP has pushed social conservatism since the mid-60s. “States rights” was the battle cry of the 50s and 60s in the South following the Supreme Court desegregation decisions and the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Based on the Wallace campaign, the so-called “Southern Strategy” of Goldwater, Nixon and so on was built around “states rights”. Just as they have reversed Roe v Wade and given reproductive rights back to the states, we are a short step from reimposing Jim Crow in the parts of the country that think Black people need to be put in their place right down to separate schools and water fountains.
All of this is irrelevant to the wealthy, but it’s a handy ploy. It’s completely distracted the American publics attention from their real victories like Citizens United which gives the wealthy a tremendous amount of political power. So what if a few women die in unwanted child birth. So what if some Black people get put on work farms unjustly or murdered by cops.
It’s downright shameful.
Another example of how the filibuster type rules in the Senate are insane. A majority voted to move this along and lost. At the very least put the onus on the negative vote to show up: instead of 60 votes to pass the motion, force them to have 41 votes to deny it if a majority of the votes are for it. Then this would have passed or at least required folks to show up in order to block.
I would most like to eliminate the filibuster entirely but if that is not possible at least make the folks who are blocking legislation work for it. And make it public knowledge who is placing a hold.
I wonder how many of the people who voted against have ever used contraceptives. I wonder how many of them are using them currently. Or have children who are.
It really doesn’t matter whether this is a federal issue or state or religious. I don’t want anyone, save me and my partner making a decision on the use of contraception.
Worked for whom, exactly? Are you sure it will cost the Rs votes and not gain them votes?
Why on earth would it gain them votes? You think there’s a significant constituency out there that wants to ban contraception but doesn’t vote Republican? If so, who?
I wondered which ratfink Democrat voted against the bill, but it turns out I had overlooked a standard procedural tactic:
Per Roll Call, “Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., voted no in order to be able to bring up the bill under Senate rules at a later date.”
Still, we can expect a lot of centrist “pundits” to pooh-pooh any suggestion that Repub neotheocrats want to control our crotches.
People like this want to make me kill myself for being born a woman
I saw a video on youtube where a republican big wig complained about her party’s continual focus on abortion. She pointed that abortion was low on the average punter’s concerns and they need to focus on those other issues. The very next question she got was ‘does life begin at conception” and “What is god’s plan for the republican party.”
Wish I could find that clip.
Ah, drew, you drew the wrong straw.
The intent is obvious, as is yours.
Still, you did ask. So.
It worked, whether for one or for the other or for neither.
But it worked.
So, regardless of the answer you get to your attemptedly suggestive question, it worked.
And therefore PZ is correct.
It’s all about votes, for you, unless it’s inconvenient, when for you, votes matter naught.
That other things (like, say, the stiffening of the systems that were unprepared for the Republican Trumpification’s utter mockery of norms and standards) might also be considered a win is not in your conceptual horizon, is it?
Heh.
(Some people aren’t the best at rhetorical insinuations and techniques)
John @15, well said.
I would like to see some extensive exploration of system reform in light of current events.
afaict, god’s plan for the republican party is for them to either fade into irrelevance as their policy positions become less popular among a majority of voters and they begin to fail to engineer elections in their favor, or they finally succeed at a coup d’etat and establish Gilead. we’ll see.
Colbert also mentioned this show intro 55 seconds. Think it got a mention in his monologue there too..