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US Politics: Supreme Courting to insanity.


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26 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

It's been 50 years since Roe, in all that time, you think it would have been impossible for the Democrats to have enacted federal legislation to protect abortion rights?

They were going to do that very thing right around the time of Roe, but decided the issue was no longer 'pressing.'

https://19thnews.org/2022/01/congress-codify-abortion-roe/

 

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I was being glib with the Threat Level Bravo description of overturning Roe only starting to be a real threat during Dubya's administration - or more specifically, when O'Connor retired - but if we're going over the history I think it should be covered why it is that, as Zorral's link details, it simply was not a huge concern for presidents/Congress/the national legislative agenda until then.

Roe was decided 7-2.  The first person to replace any of those justices was John Paul Stevens in 1975.  No change there.  The second was O'Connor in 1981.  Again, not a problem (albeit that was a harbinger for Casey's qualifying of Roe, but that's not what we're talking about).  The next was Kennedy replacing Powell in 1988, again leading to Casey, but for Roe not a problem.  Then Souter in 1990, still pro-choice. 

Then Thomas in 1991.*  There, yes, the composition shrinked to 6-3.  But consider that from the alternative perspective for a second.  The current court we're all despairing about is 6-3 Republicans.  Are any GOP voters clamoring to legislatively protect the decisions of, says, Heller, or Shelby, or Citizen's United?  I mean, you could say all GOP voters are just stupid at this point, which, ok, but even if they weren't no one would be worried about that right now.

After that, Clinton appointed two more pro-choice justices and then we come to O'Connor's retirement, Rehnquist's death, and Roberts and Alito.

*ETA:  Just because I'm anal and want to be accurate here, when Thomas was confirmed it technically was 5-4 with Rehnquist, Byron White (who was one of the two original dissents), Scalia, and Thomas for two years until White retired and was replaced by Ginsburg.

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1 hour ago, DMC said:

If you mean the supermajority in 2009, there was no way they would get all 60 Democratic votes in the Senate on any significant abortion bill.  Look up the members of that Senate.  The Dems had two members from Arkansas and three from the Dakotas, along with Ben Nelson in Nebraska (as well as Byrd and Rockefeller in West Virginia, but granted both were so secure in their positions they didn't have to worry about reelection in supporting such legislation).  That supermajority - probably the last we'll see in a very long time, or judging by this thread's fatalistic posture, ever - was achieved precisely because it had Dem Senators in states where Democrats are now used for target practice.

I meant to mention that but omitted it for brevity's sake.

You didn't even include the most important detail, Democrats had 60 seats in the Senate for less than two months. Franken was seated at the beginning of July and Kennedy died in late August. This is a period on the calendar that has a sizable break in it. I would compare it to a three hour football game only having 9-11 minutes of action. The window to pass anything with 60 votes, assuming you could get all of the above to agree was extremely narrow.  

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Again, tonight, npr infested w/ interviews with exultant Oklahomians etc. crowing about how now they were free to provide diapers to the beautiful new babies who will not be murdered, and help to the moms, though no specifications there, other than, well, maternal health will go up because marriage will be more valued, and there will be um, contraception.  Just one after another spouting this bullshit. Even after Alito already said contraceptives are in his sights. They clearly had their oily, soothing snake oil talking points in place for today.

They really said the latter, with presumably not straight faces, since this is radio.

 

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1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

You didn't even include the most important detail, Democrats had 60 seats in the Senate for less than two months. Franken was seated at the beginning of July and Kennedy died in late August.

Well, to be fair, this isn't entirely accurate either, and is kind of disingenuously exaggerating the narrowness of the timeline.  First, Kennedy was replaced by his aid Paul Kirk as an interim appointment a month after his death in late September - which required a change in Massachusetts law engineered by Ted/the Kennedys themselves specifically to maintain that 60 vote supermajority btw - until the special election saw Scott Brown win and be seated in February 2010.

Second, just because it took so long for Franken to be seated does not mean the Democratic Senate couldn't theoretically start the legislative process on such a hypothetical bill in anticipation of Franken eventually being seated (which was at least highly likely starting when Franken won the recount back in January) and providing the 60th vote once the bill got to the floor for cloture.

ETA:  Oh, it also should be noted that the start of this timeline didn't really start with when Franken was seated -- it was actually Arlen Specter's party switch in April 2009.  Before that, even if Franken was seated and Ted Kennedy was still partying his ass off, the Dems were at 59, not 60.

That's the real timeline of the Democrats' supermajority window - from April 29, 2009 when Specter made the switch to February 4, 2010 when Scott Brown was seated.

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22 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

So you are saying there were about 9 months to do something about abortion.

Ha, yep, I almost edited in a joke about that too when I thought about the timeframe.

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5 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Especially with this starting point:

 

I’m always stunned to see how high the number is in Canada. The press here always compares us to most of Europe. We just roll our eyes at the US number, it’s so far above the rest of the industrial nations it’s unreal.

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22 hours ago, KalVsWade said:

For people who are actually considering it I did a bunch of research, and in general the best overall place to emigrate to for the next 25-30 years if you want English speaking was New Zealand. Good, stable political climate, best overall political system, good healthcare, relatively shielded from the worst of climate change issues, reasonably good cost of living. It can be difficult to emigrate - they have a skills-based quota system - and for us the big gotcha was having an adult son with medical needs we would need to cover out of pocket (he could come and be there, but he would not be a NZ citizen and not be covered under the medical coverage unless he got a job). But that's a relatively niche issue and would probably not be a problem for most others. 

Very kind of you. New Zealand does, however, have its share of issues. Most notably high food prices, low wages, and a nutty housing market. Also, petrol prices - New Zealand currently pays the equivalent of $US 7.19 per gallon.

(I should also note that in New Zealand, abortion - along with everything else - is decided by our all-powerful legislature. Constitutionally we are the Western World's Elective Dictatorship, par excellence).

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15 minutes ago, The Marquis de Leech said:

Most notably high food prices, low wages, and a nutty housing market. Also, petrol prices - New Zealand currently pays the equivalent of $US 7.19 per gallon.

Sounds like California, so that's do-able.

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Yeah, while NZ does have some cost issues (it looked like food and general things were about 30% higher with wages being in general lower) it isn't exceptionally bad or unworkable. I would have taken a paycut and a quality of life cut if I had taken the job, but it would still have been fine...except for the medical thing. 

Auckland in particular is tough from a housing and cost of living perspective but it was still viable, and nothing like the costs of say SF or new York or Seattle right now. 

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On 6/24/2022 at 8:16 PM, DMC said:

Well I think there's another infamous derisive nickname/moniker from American history that would spring to mind when describing Thomas, but let's just leave it at that.

Samuel L. Jackson is on it-

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/samuel-jackson-uncle-clarence-thomas-interracial-marriage-roe_n_62b76f85e4b04a61736b41b9

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10 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

Especially with this starting point:

 

I think it's even worse than the graph makes it look. After double checking this morning both Aus and NZ include suicide of the mother in the statistics and Aus at least includes domestic violence murders when the investigation shows solid evidence that the murder was related to the pregnancy. The US rate does not include suicide. I'm pretty confident that the country with greater access to guns and astronomically higher health care costs is not going to have less problems with maternal suicide.

And forcing women who would previously have had an abortion to carry a pregnancy to term is going to have an impact there as well.

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Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There’s never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one’s own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That’s made America the land it has become.
O, I’m the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home—
For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,
And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa’s strand I came
To build a “homeland of the free.”

The free?

Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we’ve dreamed
And all the songs we’ve sung
And all the hopes we’ve held
And all the flags we’ve hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay—
Except the dream that’s almost dead today.

O, let America be America again—
The land that never has been yet—
And yet must be—the land where every man is free.
The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME—
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!

O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath—
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain—
All, all the stretch of these great green states—
And make America again!

 

-Langston Hughes

 

That this poem is still pertinent, and that Les Miserable is still a work that is as well should be criminal. We have failed. What are we doing?

 

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Guns, Roe, this up on Monday. And it’s huge. Could gut the EPA, but that’s not all. I want to say nah, would they? Wonder what the odds are.

 

 

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1 hour ago, JGP said:

Guns, Roe, this up on Monday. And it’s huge. Could gut the EPA, but that’s not all. I want to say nah, would they? Wonder what the odds are.

Yeah this is the one that's really worried me (not that Roe didn't worry me, just, I already accepted it was dead).  Reviving the nondelegation doctrine is absolutely insane and a huge power grab by the Court.  Here's a good article that breaks down why:

Quote

And even this description of the West Virginia litigation doesn’t fully capture the stakes. The most aggressive arguments against the Clean Power Plan wouldn’t just apply to environmental regulations — they could also fundamentally alter the structure of the US government, stripping away the government’s power on issues as diverse as workplace safety, environmental protection, access to birth control, overtime pay, and vaccination.

In this scenario, hundreds of laws could be weakened or even deactivated. Many of them would be gone for good, and reenacting any of these laws would require passing legislation through a bitterly divided Congress. [...]

In the worst-case scenario for the Biden administration, the West Virginia case could make President Joe Biden the weakest president of the United States in over 80 years, and it could give a Supreme Court dominated by Republican appointees a veto power over huge swaths of federal policy.

 

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