SCOTUS removes Roe V Wade

[Nymrohd]

Because when your position on this issue is as abhorrent as those of conservatives, you have to pretend that everyone else is just as bad as you are.

It was more a comment because I see progressive people trying to justify things. They don't have to. There is nothing wrong with no restrictions.

[Endus]

It was more a comment because I see progressive people trying to justify things. They don't have to. There is nothing wrong with no restrictions.

Like I said; that's been the legal status quo in Canada for like 35 years now. Calling it "extreme" is laughable. Especially since restrictions that are so common have essentially no justifying rationale for them other than people thinking abortion is an icky subject that makes them uncomfortable, and that's not a reason for a law.

[Nymrohd]

Like I said; that's been the legal status quo in Canada for like 35 years now. Calling it "extreme" is laughable. Especially since restrictions that are so common have essentially no justifying rationale for them other than people thinking abortion is an icky subject that makes them uncomfortable, and that's not a reason for a law.

Oh the rationale is entirely political. Politicians simply do not want to anger the small parts of the electorate that are against abortion so they instead have a week limit and then add vague exceptions. The terrifying thing is that in most western states there still are restrictions and if someone does take a person to court for having an abortion the vague exceptions may not prove in their favor with the wrong judge. No restrictions to abortion is limited to Canada, China and I think one other country?

[s_bushido]

It was more a comment because I see progressive people trying to justify things. They don't have to. There is nothing wrong with no restrictions.

Well, that itself is just a reaction to how the pro-"""life""" side frames things. If they're calling you an extremist because you believe that abortion should be available up to the moment of birth (when you know full well that basically the only reason that would even be a consideration would be serious medical issues), it does make sense to at least try to justify/clarify your position.

[LilSaihah]

No restrictions to abortion is limited to Canada, China and I think one other country?

Not really fair, the Chinese restrictions are in the other direction

[enigma77]

No restrictions to abortion is limited to Canada, China and I think one other country?

Great company!

[tehdang]

It doesn't, because that's a flat-out lie. The reverse is not happening, as desperately as you want it to.

The basics on what makes you a creature of the left is that you believe the right is just too extremist on a host of issues, and the right's similar claims on the left are totally misplaced. I think rehashing this point isn't worthwhile to continue. Some left-right differences won't be solved on the internet.

Democrats won? No sir, the voters of Kansas won. That's who voted, everyone in Kansas who wanted to. Republicans, Democrats, independents, non-party affiliated, and probably some folks for fringe third parties too.

That they happened to vote to support bodily autonomy for girls/women, which also happens to be a Democratic platform position, is a happy coincidence.

And as a reminder: Kansas is a largely Republican state. Though again, this doesn't address the Republican fear of voters actually being able to decide on positions because Republicans know that their official party positions are deeply unpopular nationally, and often even within their own states.

Still not a word in here on what Democrats and associated groups used to sell the campaign against to the voters.

No, again. It just highlights how scared Republicans continue to be of actual voters. Because again, they know that even within red states, their party positions. Sure Kansas may have a fairly conservative Democratic governor, but a look at their legislature shows that it's 2:1 (or more) in favor of Republicans in both the House and the Senate.

Almost like they're relying on gerrymandering and property to enforce their ideology writ-large, even when their own voters don't support certain party positions like he current extremists position on girls/womens bodily autonomy.

You can't just choose direct democracy when you feel like it. Democrats have recently cheered for judges in NC reversing constitutional amendments that were voted on, and passed with majorities, by the entire public. You're showing an arbitrary method for when representatives vote on laws, and when they're sidelined. In fact, it's indicative of a failure to persuade voters of the importance of issues (indeed, an intentional dumbing-down of complex issues) when it comes time for electing representatives.

You used to at least seem like you had thought-out arguments for your positions on this subject, but the more time goes the more you simply resort to "nu-uh, both sides, also Democrats bad!" at every available opportunity.

I respond with thought to the manner in which I was addressed.

In this case, it was desiring me to admit extremism within two movements and my political party. I was aware that the author would obviously refuse to do so in his own case, and he happily obliged. Since we both think the other as trending towards extremism, the point was communicated to anybody reading. But feel free to go in depth on your stances on marital harmony when somebody asks you if you're stopped beating your wife.

I don't see how no restrictions is extremism. If your approach to pro-choice is deontological and based on the pregnant person's right to control their body, restrictions are irrational. You either respect that people have an absolute right to control their own bodies or you don't.

The abortion debate is over when there can or should be restrictions, from conception to birth. An extreme view on a pro-life side would be banning all abortions from the first day of pregnancy. An extreme view on the pro-choice side is standing for no restrictions up until the moment of birth. I've pointed out when politicians are asked if they can state any restriction they favor, and they cannot point to any. I understand the debating position that an extreme position on the issue is justified by the philosophical stance of absolute control of the second body by the first body through every minute of the pregnancy.

[Edge-]

The basics on what makes you a creature of the left is that you believe the right is just too extremist on a host of issues

I don't believe this, they are. And you've been shown extensive evidence of this extremism being a core component of the modern Republican party. Meanwhile, you don't have actual counter-examples and have to rely on vague whataboutism to attempt to argue that the GOP hasn't largely been taken over by nutters with extremist positions like, "LGBTQ+ folks are an abomination and many of us think they should be executed." and "We think a 10 year old girl raped by her father/uncle/brother should be forced to carry the fetus to term and risk her own health, plus the trauma of going through a pregnancy at such a young age."

Sure that's not representative of all Republicans, but it's representative of a lot of them. Including many that, despite saying otherwise at times, want to pass national bans on women's bodily autonomy.

Still not a word in here on what Democrats and associated groups used to sell the campaign against to the voters.

What did they do? You seem to know, you tell me.

Because from my PoV, it's largely a reflection of...what polling has been saying about the majority of the countries opinion on access to reproductive health care services and women's bodily autonomy. In that most don't take the same extremist, hard-line view most of the Republican party does and want to preserve fairly "extensive" access to abortion services that are more in-line with how the rest of the developed world lets medical professionals do their jobs.

You can't just choose direct democracy when you feel like it.

I never said you could. I simply said his comments were telling on the matter and on how unpopular his parties positions actually are with voters.

Democrats have recently cheered for judges in NC reversing constitutional amendments that were voted on, and passed with majorities, by the entire public.

You're gonna have to refresh my memory, are you talking about this?

https://spectrumlocalnews.com/nc/cha...ng-20-week-ban

The one passed by the state assembly? Or another one?

An extreme view on a pro-life side would be banning all abortions from the first day of pregnancy. An extreme view on the pro-choice side is standing for no restrictions up until the moment of birth.

Unironically, there's a large and vocal group of people withing the Republican party - party officials and elected members, connected groups with political influence etc. - that are strongly pushing for bans from the moment of conception, completely with, "Well if a 10 year old girl is raped and has an abortion that's not actually an abortion" (want the video? I can share it with you. It's from the same lady that thinks DC gets electricity by burning aborted fetuses)

And again, as stated repeatedly, there is no analog on the left within the Democratic party. You can find the occasional supporter for "up to the moment of birth" in the fringes here or there, but there is no serious support within the party for it as there is for the alternate extremist position within the Republican party.

Again, your "whataboutism" remains bad and factually inaccurate.

I've pointed out when politicians are asked if they can state any restriction they favor, and they cannot point to any.

You have? Most I've seen are largely in-line with fetal-viability being the cutoff as a compromise, with caveats about the importance of ensuring access to reproductive healthcare throughout the process both to prevent unintended pregnancies (which Republicans have proposed national bans on birth control, I'll remind you, as an example of their extremism) and to ensure they have access to end unwanted/unintended pregnancies well before they're anywhere near fetal viability. While retaining protected access when the health of the girl/mother is at risk, or there is late developed/discovered defect that will kill the fetus shortly after birth.

I understand the debating position that an extreme position on the issue is justified by the philosophical stance of absolute control of the second body by the first body through every minute of the pregnancy.

Still part of the woman's body, dude. I mean, the woman's body is literally controlling the life of the fetus.

[Paranoid Android]

Pssst! The Supreme Court was bought and paid for.

How a Secretive Billionaire Handed His Fortune to the Architect of the Right-Wing Takeover of the Courts

An elderly, ultra-secretive Chicago businessman has given the largest known donation to a political advocacy group in U.S. history — worth $1.6 billion — and the recipient is one of the prime architects of conservatives’ efforts to reshape the American judicial system, including the Supreme Court.

Through a series of opaque transactions over the past two years, Barre Seid, a 90-year-old manufacturing magnate, gave the massive sum to a nonprofit run by Leonard Leo, who co-chairs the conservative legal group the Federalist Society.

How much? Not much at all, only $1.6 BILLION. More shocking he is 90 year old rich asshole who swears by libertarianism, that he is the god king making his way thru the world, so eff everyone else. Thus, that's why his libertarian mind is to buy the courts.

[Rasulis]

Florida Judge Who Denied Teen an Abortion Because of Her Grades Was Just Voted Out

Sign of things to come. I hope.

[s_bushido]

I'm still waiting for one of these pro-choice "extremists" to run up to pregnant women and yell at them to abort their baby. Or blow up a pregnancy ward. Or whatever weird shit pro-life extremists have been doing for decades.

To be fair, I wouldn't be surprised if a pro-choice person has blown up/burnt down the office of some pro-forced-birth organization at some point.

[Edge-]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/202...site-rcna44808

Arizona Republican Senate candidate Blake Masters softened his tone and scrubbed his website's policy page of tough abortion restrictions Thursday, as his party reels from the U.S. Supreme Court's decision overturning Roe v. Wade.

In an ad posted to Twitter on Thursday, Masters sought to portray his opponent, Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly, as the extremist on the issue while describing his own views as "commonsense."

"Look, I support a ban on very late-term and partial-birth abortion," he said. "And most Americans agree with that. That would just put us on par with other civilized nations." (Late-term abortions are extremely rare, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tracker.)

Just after releasing the ad, Masters's campaign overhauled his website and softened his rhetoric, re-writing or erasing five of his six positions. NBC News took screenshots of the website before and after it was changed. Masters' website appeared to be updated after NBC News reached out for clarification on his abortion stances.

"I am 100% pro-life," Masters' website read as of Thursday morning.

That language is now gone.

Another notable deletion: A line that detailed his support for "a federal personhood law (ideally a Constitutional amendment) that recognizes that unborn babies are human beings that may not be killed."

The personhood effort is an anti-abortion rights pursuit that would grant the same rights and legal protections to fetuses, in some cases before viability, as any person. Those fetal personhood laws would make abortion murder and eliminate all or most abortion exceptions provided in states where the procedure is strictly curtailed, The New York Times reported.

In Arizona, a state law recognizing the personhood of a fetus from the moment of fertilization is currently blocked in court. Masters did not outline on his campaign site when in a pregnancy he thought personhood began, though his campaign pointed NBC News to recent comments in which he said he interprets such a federal law as applying to the third trimester of a pregnancy.

Additionally, Masters previously expressed support for "the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, the Born Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, the SAVE Moms and Babies Act, and other pro-life legislation." The Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act would make it a criminal offense for performing or attempting to perform an abortion 20 weeks after conception.

Now the website states he backs "a law or a Constitutional amendment that bans late term (third trimester) abortion and partial-birth abortion at the federal level" and "pro-life legislation, pregnancy centers, and programs that make it easier for pregnant women to support a family and decide to choose life."

Masters’ backtracking is one of the clearest signs of how much the Supreme Court’s decision to eliminate federal abortion protections is scrambling the political landscape, energizing Democrats to both turn out at higher-than-expected rates in some bellwether contests and to flood their candidates and campaign committees with small-dollar donations.

Masters’ campaign pointed to an interview in which the nominee expanded upon his abortion rights views with The Arizona Republic earlier this month, after he prevailed in a Republican primary that pulled all the conservatives rightward. The campaign did not immediately answer a follow-up question on why the website was updated.

In that interview, Masters, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump, said he believed a federal "personhood law" would work to ban all abortions in the third trimester, though, as the publication reported, he had in February expressed support for banning abortions earlier. Speaking to The Arizona Republic, Masters added Arizona’s soon-to-take-effect ban on abortions after 15 weeks — with exceptions only for the life of the mother — is "reasonable."

"The federal government should prohibit late-term abortion, third-trimester abortion and partial-birth abortion," he said. "Below that, states are going to make different decisions that are going to reflect the will of the people in those states, and I think most reasonable. I think that’s what most people certainly in this state and nationwide are looking for."

Republicans, finding out that their extremist positions on girl's/women's bodily autonomy is actually wildly unpopular, are attempting to erase their previous extremist positions and take more moderate positions instead.

I'm sure we'll see many more Republican hopefuls attempting to erase their extremist history on this position while doing nothing to explain why they are doing so. It's one thing to evolve your position on a topic, acknowledging that evolution and why you've changed your position. It's another to pretend you never held a position and to change it purely because you just learned it's bad electoral politics.

[gondrin]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/202...site-rcna44808



Republicans, finding out that their extremist positions on girl's/women's bodily autonomy is actually wildly unpopular, are attempting to erase their previous extremist positions and take more moderate positions instead.

I'm sure we'll see many more Republican hopefuls attempting to erase their extremist history on this position while doing nothing to explain why they are doing so. It's one thing to evolve your position on a topic, acknowledging that evolution and why you've changed your position. It's another to pretend you never held a position and to change it purely because you just learned it's bad electoral politics.

Big "Dog caught the car and now doesn't know what to do with it" energy.

[s_bushido]

Big "Dog caught the car and now doesn't know what to do with it" energy.

More like "dog caught the car and is now in danger of getting dragged to death down the street."

[Edge-]

Big "Dog caught the car and now doesn't know what to do with it" energy.

"Caught the car and thought they'd stop it, but instead they're getting turned into a meat crayon."

- - - Updated - - -

https://www.vice.com/en/article/k7b7...ation-of-minor

A man who worked as a political director for Texas Right to Life, the premier anti-abortion group in the state, has been arrested for the online solicitation of a minor.

Lucas “Luke” Bowen, 33, was charged with the second-degree felony on August 3. A minor, under that statute, refers to anyone who’s younger than 17 or who the arrested person believes to be younger than 17.

Bowen allegedly “knowingly” solicited a minor online “with the intent” of engaging “in sexual contact or sexual intercourse or deviate sexual intercourse,” according to a complaint filed by Montgomery County prosecutors obtained by The Courier of Montgomery County.

Note: The Right to Life organization is one of the larger anti-bodily autonomy groups around.

Sure makes you wonder how much of the motivation for some of these members their position is, because that way they can ensure there are vulnerable children for them to prey on.

I swear, we keep seeing Republican/conservative after Republican/conservative, often the types that are vocal about their desire to protect children, attempting to sexually abuse actual children and being arrested for it.

[Xyonai]

To be fair, I wouldn't be surprised if a pro-choice person has blown up/burnt down the office of some pro-forced-birth organization at some point.

I -think- there was a story earlier this year about a Christian 'Family Planning' center getting firebombed, but the damage was so contained and mild that a lotta folks figured it was a hoax to drum up sympathies. Aside from that and some odd protests? I don't think there's actually been any 'Radical Pro Choice' violence to speak of.

[s_bushido]

I -think- there was a story earlier this year about a Christian 'Family Planning' center getting firebombed, but the damage was so contained and mild that a lotta folks figured it was a hoax to drum up sympathies. Aside from that and some odd protests? I don't think there's actually been any 'Radical Pro Choice' violence to speak of.

I do vaguely recall seeing a picture of an office room with a broken window and fire damage. No idea whatever came of it, though.

[Milchshake]

"Caught the car and thought they'd stop it, but instead they're getting turned into a meat crayon."

- - - Updated - - -

https://www.vice.com/en/article/k7b7...ation-of-minor



Note: The Right to Life organization is one of the larger anti-bodily autonomy groups around.

Sure makes you wonder how much of the motivation for some of these members their position is, because that way they can ensure there are vulnerable children for them to prey on.

I swear, we keep seeing Republican/conservative after Republican/conservative, often the types that are vocal about their desire to protect children, attempting to sexually abuse actual children and being arrested for it.

Your daily reminder that "anti-abortion" is just cover for hating women.

The political director of Texas' largest anti-abortion group was arrested for solicitation of a minor - and Texas Right to Life *really* doesn't want people to know...



His face totally yells "stranger danger!"

[Dontrike]

I tend to mack the joke that I look like a recurring character on Unsolved Mysteries, but that man definitely looks like that.

[gondrin]

Your daily reminder that "anti-abortion" is just cover for hating women.

The political director of Texas' largest anti-abortion group was arrested for solicitation of a minor - and Texas Right to Life *really* doesn't want people to know...



His face totally yells "stranger danger!"

He totally looks like someone that Chris Hansen would like to have sit down and have a talk with.