You do realize that the ten years from 1854 she wrote about, ending with the rededication to the fundamental rights, is the period leading to and then into the Civil War, yes?
In thirty nine years of medical practice, I've only had one patient who used abortion as a form of birth control. No one else I've ever met really wants an abortion. The decision is always serious and difficult. Clearly, being able to prevent unwanted or unplanned pregnancies is a better way to go. Unfortunately, many of the same people who don't want others to have abortions also want to block their access to effective birth control. This contradiction clearly demonstrates that their ulterior motive is to control and oppress women and is not about the fetus. When, as a species, are we going to grow out of such stupid, inhumane behavior?
When a woman starts to have children and how many she has needs to be her decision. And, lest you keep fooling yourself, parenting is full of life-and-death decisions you have to make for your children: to vaccinate or not, when to let them cross the street unsupervised for the first time, when to let them ride their bikes across town, when to let them go backpacking by themselves, just to name a few.
Thank you your wisdom bred of real life experience. ....One thing that bothers me: why call terminating a pregnancy: Abortion? It has some very negative connotations..ABORTION meanings:
A: a misshapen thing or person : A MONSTROSITY...............
B: informal + sometimes offensive : something regarded as horrifically or disgustingly bad........................
C: arrest of development (as of a part or process) resulting in imperfection..........................
I took, as an NP, only have had one patient who used abortion as birth control, no matter how much education she was given on the dangers of future conception using this method of BC. And this was an Ivy League University.
I hear your argument about "their" hypocrisy regarding abortion and birth control. But the Rastafarian who wrote "Legal murder, they call abortion" wasn't one of them. What is the general argument that abortion is not murder?
In general, the issue of abortion is complicated. What about the 10-year old Ohio girl who was impregnated by a rapist? What interest, if any at all, does the state have in telling/controlling a female what she can and can't do with her own body? It's complicated. What's next, the state controlling our thoughts, what we can and cannot read (Florida under the Fascist Republican Party, for example?) The white Christian nationalists are now carrying the torch of the old KKK, though now its called MAGA. I equate them to the Islamic extremists, same cloth, American Taliban.
She established the local chapter of an organization dedicated to breastfeeding and natural childbirth. She wanted to become a midwife, but cancer cut her short.
I never had a chance to ask what she thought about abortion.
So now I ask around here, and people seem to have trouble answering.
It may be hard for you to get a thoughtful answer because people no longer give you the benefit of the doubt. You often troll, you are often insulting to HCR and her commenters. You and yours are described by you as semi-heroic and noble.
I think people have a ‘why bother?’ attitude even when you ask a seemingly serious question.
I really don’t think that anyone really wants that. Another civil war, that is. Although some rabidly anti-choice states are trying to create their own version of the Fugitive Slave Act, by trying to prevent women from crossing state lines to receive reproductive health care unavailable to them at home. Or attempting to punish providers in other states who help these women. Or demanding their confidential medical records, so that they can be prosecuted at home for breaking these laws.
Yep. Sounds like the Fugitive Slave Act to me. With a twist.
I think the Nazi right absolutely wants another civil war. They threaten it, and hold their guns and bibles close to their hearts. Religion is and always been used to justify murdering the "others". What is the Supreme Court doing except indulging the othering of half the country? Look at Israel/Hamas and what Putin is doing to Ukraine.
When you say "they" and "them", who are you referring to? How are you going to limit secession just to the people you think are seeking secession, without considering the impacts on the people living there who do not want secession? The second group are likely the majority of the residents in those states- remember that these are the same states with voter suppression. Sometimes it is ok to be flippant, but unless we take a hard look at the actual consequences of our flippancy, we reveal the shallowness of how we see things.
It is tempting to permit secession, but would be a disaster for democracies around the world if the military/economic power of the U.S. were diminished. The U.S. is the strongest guardian of democracies.
The MAGA/KKK extreme white protestant nationalists are fueled principally by racism with a call for Christianity to be the official U.S. religion. Rational discourse and reasoning are not possible in the vast majority of cases. They simply must be defeated, preferably at the polls.
I wonder if we shouldn't call the bluff of those anti-choice states. Give them the option to leave America. Bring it to a popular up or down vote, requiring a vote from each of the residents of those states--not their Representatives and Senators. Let's see how serious they really are.
There is a lot more Blue in these states, even in Texas, than are getting the opportunity to be heard in our elections.
That is a brilliant analogy, Marla. And inherent in the analogy is the unspoken belief that women are lesser beings who must be controlled by their superiors.
As many of the top brass who worked behind the scenes to stop Trump and now saying it out loud, any President would falter. It never ceases to amaze me having not been born here is that this country cannot get past the Civil War. The people of Germany are massing together against the far right in huge numbers. They remember well what happened to their country. People here are far too complacent about Democracy.
Good luck with that if the worst happens to get back in the Oval Office. Using the military against the American people is just one of the things he promised to do as Dictator For A Day!
It's a very apt analogy. Women are being treated as property as were slaves. As property they belong to their husbands or, if they are, god forbid, unmarried, they belong to the state. A new underground railroad will develop and the Supreme Court will resurrect "Dred Scott!" to force free states to return these errant and misguided women to Texas et al.
The 13th Amendment abolishing slavery should be used as a legal basis for the right to an abortion. Restrictions on abortion and the resulting forced pregnancies are disturbingly suggestive of involuntary servitude: forced pregnancy requires a woman to provide continuous physical service to the fetus in order to further the state's asserted interest. Indeed, the actual process of delivery demands work of the most intense and physical kind: labor of 12 or more grueling hours of contractions is not uncommon.
Abortion prohibitions violate the Amendment's guarantee of personal liberty, because forced pregnancy and childbirth, by compelling the woman to serve the fetus, creates "that control by which the personal service of one man [sic] is disposed of or coerced for another's benefit which is the essence of involuntary servitude." Such laws violate the amendment's guarantee of equality, because forcing women to be mothers makes them into a servant caste, a group which is held subject to a special duty to serve others and not themselves.
Having a right to life does not guarantee a right to the use of another person's body -- even if one needs it for life itself.
While the pregnant woman is not serving at the fetus' command -- it is the state that supplies the element of coercion -- she is nevertheless serving involuntarily for the fetus' benefit, and this is what the Court should have said that the amendment forbids.
If I remember correctly, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg advocated for reproductive rights based not on the right to privacy but on the 13th amendment. She didn’t think the privacy argument was strong enough to withstand appeals.
I have argued for years that—since the civil war—there are two instances where the government sets aside bodily autonomy and seizes the person of an adult. The first is when it sends someone to prison. The second is when a woman becomes pregnant. My question is not whether the 13th or 14th amendment is more germane. My question is how the state ever forced its way into this decision.
I suppose it’s a part of the time when American society considered women as chattel. But surely, as that has changed, we should take a look at removing this issue from examination by judges, legislators, or any other external authority.
Well maybe it is sexist of me to say this, but women fight differently than men. We must decide we will not tolerate this oppression. Think more Harriet Tubman and less Gen Grant.
GOP Nihilists without a plan other than rewrite the constitution, a version based on hate, fear and greed. Add religion and the support base grows in self rightousness.
The majority has work to do to prevent the overturn of our democracy.
For sure, but it does well to recall that the Northern states were more like a coalition of various views, with slavery pro and con a bit of a mixed bag. This was likely why, having "won the war", northern politician gradually caved in Reconstruction more esp, post. Initially, Lincoln emphasized he wasn't trying to eliminate slavery in the South, just prevent its expansion, and that was a clarion call for secession in the South. Lincoln lost electoral support after his anti-slavery proclamation in the summer of 62 - then came 1863 and later, with black troops augmenting the Union armies.
Do you realize that by 1854, the majority of Americans had understood for ten years that their country was headed to war with itself. Give credit where credit is due. Remember the Alamo.
Trump's mad, disheveled mind is old-hat. HCR is often as a Yankee, press officer distributing Biden points without much reference to his bearhug of Netanyahu's destruction of Gaza and more than 25 thousand deaths of mostly Palestinian women and children as well as Biden's approval of the massive Willow oil-drilling project on Alaska’s remote North Slope.
The US' binary choice between the disheveled fascist and the old-fashioned, do-gooder is in a below, sorry-state condition.
The questions for me are of and by the people. How many Americans would actually vote for Trump, and how many of them would fight for him? What is the data and the analysis of the state of the people? May we go further away from Trump in the coming months? How many of the American people has he captured?
HCR's loyalty to democracy has been for me a single-vision via Biden, without the capability or scope to dig for a sense of the country's disheveled populous.
How may this population be reached? So far, neither Biden's team or the Democratic Party have their messages about Trump and their own missions ready for prime time -- a sorry state, indeed!
Fern, While I expect HCR fully is aware of the urgent causes and actions that demand our attention, I also expect she recognizes that our work, in large part, both must be guided by, and also must call upon us repeatedly to amplify, a fundamental truth: Whatever one’s first issue of concern, rising up for freedom and democracy had better be one’s second. Because without preserving our constitutional republic, progress of any kind is far less likely.
Your expectations and beliefs in HCR's understanding are not the same for all of us. I'm not aware that my comment questioned preserving our constitutional republic. You seemed to me to have mushed a bunch of principles together in your support for an infallible HCR, whom I believe to be accomplished and admirable.
Fern, To be clear, I sense that Heather’s LFAA is the product of a system of prioritization that has led her to prioritize values that in her mind would best serve the greater good, given the potential undoing of the revolutionary promise of the republic.
Your persistence, Barbara Jo Krieger, in representing what you 'sense' to be HRC's priorities, cannot match her own account of them, but thank you for your efforts.
Barbara, with further consideration of your 'textual interpretations' and 'extrapolations' of HCR's Letters, it is as though the Letters are prescriptions for how we, subscribers, of this newsletter '...would best serve the greater good, given the potential undoing of the revolutionary promise of the republic.' to quote you. To my mind your interpretation invests enormous belief in HCR's foresight and, perhaps, not enough of the independent thinking and judgement we bring to the table.
Fern, The Letters hardly are prescriptive nor do they preclude independent thought. As stated, they simply, in my view, lay the groundwork for a fundamental truth: namely that preserving our constitutional republic is preservative of every other opportunity.
I think Biden's embrace is of the idea of Israel, certainly not Netanyahu. There is no love lost between those two, and while he does regrettably not make a lot of public noise about the rift, I think he is pressuring as best he can. Given that Netanyahu (and Putin) --not to mention freaking Jamie Dimon--long for the return of the trumpanzee, this is going to be an ugly tightrope that has to be walked.
"Biden's embrace is of the idea of Israel": we all had an idea of the ideal of Israel. That was the romantic origin story; that is/was in the past. Israel has become a nation out of control with the support of the most powerful country in the world. They have become arrogant and selfish, on their way to being hated in that region and beyond. The USA has stepped into a mess that could force us into WW3.
Under Dimon, his bank over the years has paid several billions of dollars in fines for bad business practices, yet he continues to reap tens of millions of $$$ in bonuses!
Makes no sense that he is perceived as the wizard of banking!!!??
There are levers, in addition to the bear hug of Netanyahu, that may be used by Biden, other than talk. People within the administration, including the department of state, have found fault with Biden's lack of action with reference to Israel's conduct of the war.
I don't know what Jamie Dimon is up to. He may be eyeing a political life for himself as Biden has not come close to capturing the approval of even a small majority of American voters.
I think Biden enjoys a larger measure of approval than is generally appreciated.
Jamie Dimon? He's just another rich whore who lies tax cuts for the very wealthy. I think he'd have a far smaller chance in politics than Bloomberg did.
I agree and I think you can be forgiven for not providing footnotes and formal attributions. This is a very good Comments section, but it doesn’t have to be a place for academic precision. If it was, there would be very few posts here at all!
Many of the people disapprove of Biden for many different reasons. His age, his inability to control Netanyahu. That the price of a Snickers Bar is still too high, and that his DOJ didn’t put Trump in jail two years ago, will probably vote for him as Trump continues to get meaner and crazier. The Dems have to make sure the people who voted for Biden before vote for him again.
It's not up to the US President to do any "action" in regards to Israel's conduct of the war, as abhorent as Netanyahu's actions have been. To cry for the Palestenians who (1) allowed Hamas to take control, bring in weapons, built a bunker under the hospital and (2) started the war, is a cry against war itself. Neither side is innocent, but Israel had the right to protect itself. Netanyahu needs to be promptly voted out by Israel's people and negotiations for peace need to be started.
Any guess how long that will take? And, by then, in Gaza?? Will they all be dead from killing, untreated wounds, disease or starvation? Israel will suffer no consequences....just get more land for settlements.
Israel suffered consequences when hamas attacked in the first place -- hitting a festival of mostly young people. Cold hearted, and knowing Israel would counter attack and hamas having no regard themselves for what was going to happen to the Palenstinians. War sucks.
Yes, Frankom, the growth of billionaires in the US has been rich!
'The collective fortune of America's 741 billionaires has grown to $5.2 trillion at the end of November 2023, the highest amount ever recorded according to an analysis by Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF)' See link below.
'The 400 Richest People In America ; 1. Elon Musk. $251 B ; 2. Jeff Bezos. $161 B ; 3. Larry Ellison. $158 B ; 4. Warren Buffett. $121 B ; 5. Larry Page. $114 B' (Forbes)
Progwoman, Because people both here and abroad are hopeful that the case against Israel brought by South Africa before the International Court of Justice will have a positive outcome, pre-planning already is underway for global standouts to mark an unprecedented moment in history when Israel is held accountable before the world.
Folks in Israel have known since day one that their government does not give a damn about hostages. On day one, Israel started bombing; did they know or care where the hostages were? No and no. Hostages are better dead than alive which then leads to negotiations over their release.
Israelis are guilty of wanting to live without terrorist attacks. The Palestinians have had many opportunities to live in peace but chose to terrorize Israelis. The two states can only exist with a guarantee of security for both. Hamas has had no interest in helping their own people instead of building tunnels and arming themself for they are committed to eliminating Israel. Which makes negotiating with Hamas impossible. As for the argument of land that is occupied and should be returned. No country has ever returned lands once taken over. Should the American indigenous people get their land back? The Palestinians have paid dearly for their constant terrorizing of Israelis. Israel's reaction to being terrorized has cost them their international reputation. There could be a coalition of Arab States that could back a Palestinian State and provide security for both the Palestinians and Israel. Maybe something good from something terrible.
What nobody seems to be acknowledging is the impossibility of a non-contiguous Palestinian state. We have only to look at how that worked with Pakistan and what became Bangladesh, to see how important it is. I see no way for a Palestinian state to exist in two separate places separated by 50-100 miles, which is precisely Israel’s intent, to divide and conquer. If that assumption is correct, then the only solution is a one state combination of Israelis and Palestinians, but that would necessitate Israel ceasing to be a religious state and become an all encompassing secular state, where all parties interests are protected. It doesn’t matter what god you pray too or even if you pray to one at all, all people deserve the right to live their lives without fear of persecution, the situation we are watching unfold there is testament to the failure of the state to support that idea.
Can you imagine them getting along after all this? There is probably no Palestinian who has not had a close family member slaughtered in this "war". The Israeli's have been taught from a childhood that Palestinians are dirty animals. What is going to happen with all the very established settlements in the West Bank? Will those Israels just hand them over? Where in Israel will Palestinians live? Can they afford a house or apartment? Most of the working age men have no jobs, therefore no wives. There are no solutions. That is what Israel wants. NO solutions. Ever.
Oh, please! Israel has attacked Palestinians and built illegal settlements on the minimal territory allotted to Palestinians after they were driven from their villages and urban areas. Gaza is/was a concentration camp controlled by Israel. The Palestinians are not animals to be penned up and held in inhuman conditions, even if Israelis have been taught that they are. Israel has always wanted and planned for them to be all dead and gone. Some object to this with violent actions. Wouldn't you?
As far as giving American Indians their land back? Too late for that. That was the past. This is NOW.
'There are so many brush fires and so many players with matches in the region that it is not hard to imagine the conflict deteriorating into something even deadlier. Israel continues to hammer Hamas in Gaza while exchanging fire across the Lebanese border with Hezbollah, taking on two groups backed by Iran, even as American troops fight with Houthis in Yemen and militias in Iraq and Syria. Iran blamed Israel for an airstrike on Damascus, Syria, on Saturday that killed five Iranian military figures. Iran for its part has fired missiles into Iraq, Syria and Pakistan, prompting Pakistan to mount its own airstrike against Iran.' (NYT, excerpt(
'Mr. Biden’s team is trying to manage all those flashpoints at the same time it is trying to find a way to press Israel to scale back its war against Hamas to a more surgical operation with fewer civilian casualties. So far, according to Gaza health officials, more than 25,000 people have been killed, some of them Hamas combatants but most of them women and children.'
'A senior Biden administration official was leaving for the region on Sunday to seek a new agreement between Israel and Hamas to release some or all of the 120 hostages still believed to be held in exchange for at least a pause in the fighting, according to two American officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because of diplomatic sensitivities.'
'The official, Brett McGurk, the president’s Middle East coordinator, planned to travel to Cairo to meet with Abbas Kamel, the chief of Egypt’s General Intelligence Service and widely considered the nation’s second-most-powerful official. As part of the trip, previously reported by Axios, Mr. McGurk will also head to Doha, Qatar, to meet with the country’s prime minister, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani.'
'At the same time, administration officials said they were worried the conflict in the region might be getting worse, not better.'
“We have to guard against and be vigilant against the possibility that, in fact, rather than heading towards de-escalation, we are on a path of escalation that we have to manage,” Jake Sullivan, the president’s national security adviser, said last week during an appearance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.'
“It remains a central locus of our strategy,” he added. “Try to ensure that we manage escalation across the Middle East to the maximum extent possible, taking every possible measure that we can in that regard, and ultimately get on a path of diplomacy and de-escalation.” (NYTimes) Sorry that a gifted link could not be provided.
Fern...I've read several of your comments and I would like to suggest that only now has the full extent of Netanyahu's extreme right wing administration brutality and genocide been uncloaked by the Hamas attack. And that the US support of Isreal is ingrained in decades of US foriegn policy that cannot be turned on a dime. I am sure you've been paying attention and have seen media reporting of Blinken and Bidens effort to pull back that brutal response and their part in negotiating humanitarian aid. And I am sure....they are much more demanding behind closed doors, than is reported.
This is not nothing! It is big! Our support of Isreal, this time, is different. We have ignored Israeli encroachment and unlawful attacks on Palestinian citizens for decades. Furthermore, Biden and Blinken alone are not solely responsible for US response to the conflict as Congress is the only body that can fund aid, and I'm sure you have noticed it has become a divided body on that issue.
What is it that you would like the US to do? Rather than blame....contact you respresentives...protest. Help with humanitarian aid from the US. Contact agencies and entities fighting for a two state solution.
Hamas brutally murdered over a thousand people as part of their explicit aim of wiping out Israel and all Jews. They acted on behalf of their stated genocidal aims, filmed it, and announced they would do it again. They are thugs who have been brutalizing the people of Gaza for 15 years.
Susan, thank you for your attention to this crucial subject. My comments are generally supported by journalistic reports and analysis. Venting, accusations and blaming are not features of my content or style. Salud!
Fern, Thank you for providing this detailed, blow-by blow account underscoring how violence is spinning out of control in the Middle East. That said, I find Jake Sullivan’s remedy noted in your final paragraph so generalized as to be virtually useless.
In my view, de-escalation in the region starts with a regional compact, with the U.S. playing a vital role, such that Palestinians have a path to freedom and can see that an ethical resistance, not what happened on October 7th, but an ethical fight for its rights, is working.
The fact that a gift link was not provided means that NYT reserves the right to reprint. This is copyrighted material. I don't think you mean to break the law, but simply to pass along info. But that is the law. If NYT is aware of it, they are simply giving you a pass (or they may look at this as free advertising, or not worth the trouble). But if they do decide to take action, you would be liable of illegally reprinting their copy. Word to the wise, Fern. You COULD paraphrase and attribute to the source with a full citation.
You are correct, however, Biden DOES recognize where much of his campaign money comes from, hence, his support for the destruction and genocide taking place in Gaza.
So, world peace might be threatened but Biden's campaign contributions are NOT.
Mike S. I get your point and it is depressing that Biden may not be perfect as he may be our last chance to keep a democracy. November 24 is coming soon.
You say Jews are controlling the government through money? Your Klan membership and white hood are in the mail. Does it even occur to you that there may be factors you are not considering?
Half of Israel had been in the streets weekly for months, protesting the right wing government.
Hamas interrupted all that with its brutal slaughter of 1200 civilians, including rape, and taking of hundreds of hostages, babies to eighties, who have been kept in terrible conditions and sometimes murdered. Neither the UN nor the International Red Cross have lifted a pinky to object to any of it or visit the hostages. The stated and restated mission of Hamas, which is the government of Gaza, is to destroy Israel and kill all Jews worldwide. That mission is openly genocide. Their actions of October 7, mass murder in dehumanizing ways, acted on it.
Israel has a right to defend itself. Too much of the world has an attitude that terror and military attacks on Israel are no big deal, murdered Israelis are minor, there’s only a problem when Israel fights back. If some group took over Mexico and launched an attack that killed more than a thousand people across the border in Texas, what do you suppose would happen next?
Hamas is an odd choice for progressives to defend. Hamas hides in 350 miles of tunnels it built and supplied with materials stolen from humanitarian aid sent to Gazans. No civilians are allowed in those tunnels. Hamas hides behind civilians, shoots civilians who decline to be human shields. After Hamas won one election, they proceeded to throw their political opponents off buildings. They do the same to gay people, and to women who act differently than they prescribe.
I see a discussion that includes Hamas and Israel. I see nothing that suggests that progressives are defending Hamas. I do see posts that speak of the torn feelings about the Israeli response being out of proportion and the concern that Netanyahu is prolonging the war for his own purposes (staying in power). Not every post about those things needs to also mention Hamas- though I do see many posts talking about Hamas not representing the interests of Palestinians, and concern that Israel is adding to their excesses with more destruction and killing of civilians. This latter is a perspective shared by a large share (if not the majority of Israelis). The argument is not whether Hamas is a problem. It is what the heck do we do in order to bring this to a state where we can move toward stopping this madness.
When I say "we", I am talking about the roles that each party plays in moving to cease fire and what lies beyond. Part of the discussion is the appropriate role that the US, a third nation among others, plays, and how Biden interacts to hopefully create a political buffer to moderate reactionary actions on both sides. That is not the same thing as "defending Hamas", something you seem to have read into the complexity of opinions being expressed as we struggle in our conversations to understand what is going on.
Now hopefully, we can remember that all these comments are taking place on Letter From An American, during the muddle of really awkward reporting about an ever more off-the-charts weird primary season just getting underway.
Perhaps the posts demonizing Israel and support for Israel didn’t strike you as they did me. One person referred to the Hamas massacre of October 7 as an action they approved that supposedly ‘uncloaked’ Israeli genocide. Mass murder reveals that the people killed were genocidal? There’s more, I’m not ‘reading in’ to see it, but I have no stomach for repeating more of it. There is also thoughtful discussion, including from you, for which I am grateful.
Thank you, Joan. I jumped over most of that thread so I probably missed the posts you are referring to, which I agree are disgusting and offensive. I think that whole thread was out of place and inappropriate. Today those were at the top of LFAA by the time I came in, and they grew rapidly tiresome, so after posting that post, I just wheeled down until I got to letters actually responding to Heather's column. I value LFAA and wish people would remember what it is about (American history and it's influence on current American affairs), and respect it by sticking to the theme of Heather's Letter of the Day. I read a lot, and people who want to get extensively into other topics should perhaps find one of the many substack columns where that is the topic of discussion.
I am giving thought to what I am subscribed to, and though I appreciate being part of the LFAA community, it has gotten repetitive and time-consuming and too often just petty. When half of it is off-topic, I don't get much out of it. I'll continue to read the letter, but I'll let my paid subscription go when it runs out in March. More of my stuff is being picked up elsewhere now, with some direct requests coming in. I'm getting started with action too, and it's time to focus more on getting out the vote and raising awareness.
Though I'm not fond of Facebook, LFAA has a great community there too. Many of the people I most appreciate here are also on other substack columns I frequent too (such as Hubbell and Vance and Simon Rosenburg). It's been a hard decision to make, after being here from the beginning, and there are people I'll miss. You are one of them.
I'm advocating that the democratic government of the United States of which I am a citizen place restrictions upon our aid to Israel until it restrains from wholesale slaughter of people in Palestine and restrains from annihilation of Palestinian settlements in Gaza and the West Bank.
Fern, you know that you have my respect and admiration.
But the phrase Biden's "bearhug of Netanyahu's destruction of Gaza" is a misrepresentation. It is not consistent with the president's continuous efforts to get Israel to address the Hamas problem with minimal civilian casualties.
And perhaps we should mention that the administration has been stressing the need for a two state solution for Israel and Palestine. Insisting over and over.
Joseph Biden is not the president of Israel. Bibi the butcher is. His government betrays the peaceful culture of most Israelis. His coalition of ultra orthodox, ultra bigoted Muslim haters is his only way to stay out of jail.
And the elephant in the room? As long as Hamas exists, rockets will be fired into Israel. Civilians will be running into their safe rooms as they have for decades. Bombs will be exploded in markets. Jews will be hunted as they have always been hunted.
I completely agree that the devastation and deaths in Gaza are wrong. But I have yet to hear anyone come up with another solution to the fact that Hamas is committed to the deaths or expulsion of all Jews in Israel. It's as if Hitler had been reborn and regrouped in tunnels under hospitals, schools and refugee camps. How do you combat such behavior?
Maybe all those smart folks in the UN could cobble together a force that could enter Gaza and somehow magically find the originators of a genocide against Jews? Oh, but wait, that won't happen, because Russia will veto it. Russia, who partners with Iran who funds the Hamas cowards who hide behind their own children.
Ultimately, if we zoom out and look at Israel, we see a nation, that is in the view of many, over reacting. But I hear crickets when it comes to what MUST ultimately occur if there is to be peace in that region: the complete dismantling and/or removal of Hamas. An organization that Arab nations do not want in their countries. Has Egypt welcomed Gazan civilians while all this has been happening? No! Why? They fear Hamas.
Bibi is a brutal monster wannabe dictator. His destruction of Gaza is criminal. Hamas is an organization with a manifesto that would welcome another Holocaust. It can't be allowed to exist.
Anyone here who has some good suggestions on how all this can be sorted without bloodshed, please weigh in.
Thank you, Bill, for the reminder that there are no simple answers in this situation that has been stewing since the establishment of Israel. My heart breaks for those on both sides who want to live in peace, and I am filled with anger at the leaders on both sides who are willing to wreak such destruction while keeping themselves and their family tucked away in safety.
I agree with you. It is easy to moan about what Biden is not doing. I too hate the destruction of war. If there was an easy solution to this vexing issue it would likely be resolved. Playing arm chair quarterback is not helpful.
I can't imagine a path forward especially with the media in such shambles.
A fine analysis! One sits and wonders , why oh why do some need so much power and need to fuel it with hate?
In the 70’s I was lucky to be hand picked to oversee the Press Plane that carried a marvelous group of journalists to accompany President Carter while he and Begin and Sadat hammered out the peace agreement between their countries. The final agreement was signed on my birthday in 1979 at Camp David. Sanity prevailed.... how the world bounced back and forth and back and forth since then mainly for the whim of men in need of power!
When I say men I do not exclude women. Look at the “pro-choice” movement being denigrated by so called Godly women. It isn’t enough that these power hungry and angry people have” choice”, they seem to need to dissolve that same “Choice” for others.
My husband and I just watched a powerfully well done film called”The Serpent Queen” shown on Starz.
As my husband says, in response to my anger and frustration.... the more we change the more we stay the same.
Is this what being a “human animal” means?
Just going from how to destroy ourselves and others in the name of power and hate?And the irony of finding someone(“God” )to blame it all on.
I wish I were so magnificent as to have an answer that would be heard. Until then stand together in sanity and in being about survival, not destruction!
I write in response to your invitation to “weigh in.”
Paraphrasing commentary from scholars whose names, regrettably, I don’t recall, I have become increasingly convinced that U.S. leadership’s acceptance of a ceasefire largely will rely on its recognizing that the only way Hamas ultimately will be weakened and made an irrelevant political force is if Palestinians have a path to freedom and can see that an ethical resistance, not what happened on October 7th, but an ethical fight for its rights, is working.
Considering U.S. leadership, after Hamas’s brutal attack, had repeatedly underscored America’s hopes that Israel not repeat our mistakes, perhaps enough of those at the top might be receptive to the advantages of viewing the situation through this restructured lens.
Yes. But as long as Netanyahu refuses to consider such ideas, he will be a blockade to peace. His "toughness" and his brutality is weakening Israel. I hope Israelis will send him packing soon.
What if Israel immediately invited the UN to assist Gazans in establishing their own governing body sans Hamas. Chances are Hamas would attack their own.
Bill, Seeing Netanyahu says he opposes the creation of a Palestinian state after the Gaza war, I concur with progressives in Congress who say the U.S. should “reset relationship of unconditional support” for Israel. Moreover, notwithstanding support from Markey and Warren, I can’t accept the U.S. Senate voting down Bernie Sanders’ resolution to freeze U.S. military aid to Israel if the State Department failed to produce a report on whether Israel was committing human rights violations in Gaza.
I voted for Bernie. I am aligned with him on many if not most issues. And I see the logic of trying to use freezing aid to Israel. But I believe it's much more complicated than that. Any Israeli military weakness will be seen as an opportunity for Hamas to continue firing rockets at Israeli cities - it's still happening! and nobody mentions this! Israeli weakness could escalate their efforts at extermination. And simultaneously, Hezbollah has been and could increase further it's incursions and rocket fire from the north.
There is a lot that the right wing extremists in Israel are doing that should be condemned. The attacks on Palestinians by "settlers" in the West Bank make me furious. The land stolen from folks who have lived there for generations should be returned.
But stepping back and looking at the bigger geopolitical picture, I see only one democracy in the Middle East. And I see forces from multiple directions pledged to it's demise.
A world where justice ruled would have seen a neutral UN with boots on the ground in Israel and the Palestinian territories.
Judith, Were you to read the full exchange between me and Bill you would find my perspective entails 1) conditioning continued U.S. military aid to Israel upon agreement to a ceasefire and to the creation of a Palestinian state and 2) launching a Middle East regional compact, with the U.S. playing a vital role, such that, as stated, Palestinians would have a path to freedom and could see that an ethical resistance, not what happened on October 7th, but an ethical fight for its rights, were working.
Briefly stated, in my view, resolution boils down to U.S. leadership exerting leverage that currently is being withheld.
I don’t know the exact history but haven’t US presidents sent highly qualified men over to find a way towards peace. And, haven’t the Israelis just continued to build more settlements in the West Bank? It seems that Israel is resolute in its determination to take over every square inch. It was a terrible thing to send some and then all Jews to a country inhabited by another people. The colonizers just played fast and free with the non-western countries they controlled.
Your defense of Biden's ineffective talk, talk, talk and lack of action with reference to Israel's conduct of the war as it has played out in Gaza as well as attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank is as effective as Biden's, Bill. Their has been strong criticism around the world and the UN as well as in the United States of Biden's positions with reference to Israel. You have strong opinions. I am not of a mind to provide you with oodles of links to reports on Israel's conduct of the war; you are able to do that yourself; seek more and you shall find.
I hear you. And I would like to hear from you and anyone else what the Americans and the American president should do now.
How does an American reign in someone like Netanyahu? And how does America simultaneously guarantee the safety of Israeli Jews and Arabs who have been coexisting peacefully and only want to survive and help their children thrive?
Last I heard 75% of Israelis want him gone. Why they are waiting so long must have to do with fear of losing continuity during a war. But the war has no end in sight.
There should be an election now, and Bibi should be a citizen who can be charged with corruption. No more hiding under the covers of power.
Vivian Silver was a friend of friends of mine. A Canadian who moved to Israel as a young woman, she lived in a farming community and devoted decades to working for peace. Vivian was a cofounder of Women Wage Peace. She was missing after October 7 and presumed a hostage - until her DNA was identified from a bone in the ashes of her home.
How should Biden and the Democrats get their word out? Not in the NYT obviously, nor even NPR, their negative Biden bias is astonishing. Many local TV stations are owned by conservative Sinclair, the rest are primarily entertainment pretending to be news. Most people don’t read the local newspapers either. Put Biden ads in blue states so we can see they are doing something? That would feel good, but be a waste of dollars that needs to be spent in red and purple states. The Biden ads coming out in those states are remarkable and pull no punches. See Robert Hubbell’s substack, he often links them. The word has to gets out from all of us. Speak up, vote, help register voters, work with GOTV (get out the vote), write postcards, give money etc. Democrats are historically notorious for not voting, where Republicans do vote.
I’m struck by the Democrats who are so distraught they can’t feel joy, already looking for the exits if Trump gets elected, the ones who refuse to hear, or discuss, any unpleasantness. Most Americans are good people who care deeply about our country. I think we’re tough enough to get engaged and do the work of saving it.
Frankly, I'm afraid to talk to my sister about the threat our country would be under if that beast gets even near the Oval Office! I love my sister, (wife of a high-end CPA) and don't want to lose her. Also, I'm afraid of the MAGA's out there because they're so loud, mean, and nasty. Plus, they have guns! There's got to be more than MSNBC, PBS, and CNN. At least David Muir on World News Tonight tells the truth in facts. When I drove cross-country last year, nearly every hotel lobby had Fox News on, and I had to go on a deep search to find MSNBC in my room. I'm happy to write & send postcards, but isn't that preaching to the choir?
Not at all. You’d be encouraging Dems and left leaning Independents to GO VOTE. Right now Santos seat in NY is up for special election. A Democrat could win that seat, maybe flip the House blue, if people actually turn out and vote.
Fern McBride (NYC), “Let she who is without sin…etc.”. Above, you asserted, without attribution, “People within the administration, including the department of state, have found fault with Biden's lack of action with reference to Israel's conduct of the war.”
I agree that Biden’s actions can be criticized by reasonable people such as yourself, but I worry that we’re underestimating the limitations he’s subject to. Mehdi Hasan whom I trust and respect has said, “Biden could end this war with a phone call.” Apparently, past presidents have been able to do that, but in these times Biden may not have that option.
And I agree it’s good to back up what we say, but posts in a Comments section, even if it’s an unusually good one like this is, don’t have to be ready for rigorous, exacting review, do they?
With little time to spare, here are some links for you, Alan:
'Dissent, and a generation gap, inside the Biden administration over the Israel-Hamas war
When civilians began dying in Gaza, said one U.S. official, “we all know the tools they used to kill them,” referring to Israeli weapons supplied by the U.S.'
Thanks. I’ll read these, but I wasn’t asking for proof. Just saying, “What’s good for the goose….etc.”. You might’ve been holding other Commenters to a standard you don’t always follow. Admittedly, my point is not that big a deal. 😀
Be careful with the use of the word genocide, regardless of South Africa's claim. One can condemn Israel for the huge loss of life, but calling it genocide it is not.
I think Biden’s trying to keep blood off our troop’s hands. You know? The humans who do combat and die, so that you can safely type on Heather’s comment section and bash Biden
Heather has often stated that she is not an expert on the Middle East. She is an historian of these United States and, particularly of the Republican Party. As such, she doesn't feel qualified to speak on Israeli policies.
There are plenty of low integrity so-called journalists and pundits willing to share their thoughts without a good foundation of facts. That's called having an agenda.
Dear Nora, we have all felt alone during this very challenging and dangerous time. I felt that way today as I pointed to what I believed to be HCR's completely uncritical view of Biden. I am a supporter of his, but consider it strange of that sometimes the forum feels to be a cheerleading squad for whatever HCR or Biden presents. With admiration and gratitude to them both, they cannot be infallible. It is part of our role as engaged citizens to aware of the strengths, attention, inattention and weaknesses of our leaders, so that we may be heard and encourage their best.
I am not a fan of Biden mainly his foreign policy which I find abhorrent. I think the Democrats could have a much better choice and he is too old. His polling and approval rates should terrify people. The two times she interviewed him she had such wimpy questions and just completely avoided foreign policy if I remembering him right. I keep hoping a better choice will come up. I am not worried about myself but am very worried for the future and my son and nieces and nephews. Thanks for being able to comment and disagree in a respectful way.
Nora, we are in sync about being thoughtful citizens, not automatons ruled by the positions of people we respect or not. Biden has accomplished a good deal as president in support of most Americans. He seemed much more in the hands of cooperate interests when he was the senator representing the state of Delaware. Biden's behavior as head of the judiciary committee during Clarence Thomas' confirmation hearing, along with Anita Hill's accusations against Thomas was abysmal. He has come a great distance.
I have appreciated this exchange with you, thank you.
Who do you read who is currently doing what you propose HCR should be doing? Anyone else on Substack or another analyst of who does the balancing from today's news with "the capability or scope to dig for a sense of the country's disheveled populous?" Or, are you suggesting that HCR should change her focus or pose clearer opinions on where these bits of in-process history she brings in her daily post should or could go? To you concern, she has been doing this reporting steadily for several years. Are you wanting her to interpret that history now? Change from recorder of significant happenings in this multi-year period and become a shaper of a course toward saving our democracy? Curious.
Fred, your questions to me are very worthwhile. I do not have time tonight to answer them but may find the time tomorrow and or on Wednesday to give them some of the time they deserve.
Generally, I have begun to believe that given the dire need for us to find ways to secure democracy in the US, HCR was falling back in using Biden's policies as the default position of some recent letters. Any weaknesses or faults in Biden were either not recognized or addressed in the letters. There seemed to be scant attention to the American people and very frequent us v. them Letters that I found repetitive. I have and will support Biden for the presidency, but I thought that HCR has been addressing his work with an uncritical eye. The letters sometimes read more like the thoughtful notes of an advocate than one by a historian.
On occasion the forum has the feel of a cheerleading team for Biden and HCR. and or a venting assembly. A friend recently wrote, '... the comment section is drowning in flowers.' Historians Timothy Snyder and Anne Applebaum are two of the writers that I follow. I have a high opinion of Ishaan Tharoor, a columnist on the foreign desk of The Washington Post, where he authors the Today's WorldView newsletter and column. In addition, I subscribe to The Atlantic Magazine, The New Yorker and the New York Review of Books. I must say goodbye for now, Fred.
The 13th Amendment abolishing slavery should be used as a legal basis for the right to an abortion. Restrictions on abortion and the resulting forced pregnancies are disturbingly suggestive of involuntary servitude: forced pregnancy requires a woman to provide continuous physical service to the fetus in order to further the state's asserted interest. Indeed, the actual process of delivery demands work of the most intense and physical kind: labor of 12 or more grueling hours of contractions is not uncommon.
Abortion prohibitions violate the Amendment's guarantee of personal liberty, because forced pregnancy and childbirth, by compelling the woman to serve the fetus, creates "that control by which the personal service of one man [sic] is disposed of or coerced for another's benefit which is the essence of involuntary servitude." Such laws violate the amendment's guarantee of equality, because forcing women to be mothers makes them into a servant caste, a group which is held subject to a special duty to serve others and not themselves.
Having a right to life does not guarantee a right to the use of another person's body -- even if one needs it for life itself.
While the pregnant woman is not serving at the fetus' command -- it is the state that supplies the element of coercion -- she is nevertheless serving involuntarily for the fetus' benefit, and this is what the Court should say that the amendment forbids........................
Thank you. I think the comments are correct. Its legalized slavery.
I believe control by government of what one chooses for personal health and safety and well being is expressing the state’s ownership of all three of those individual rights as a human being.
This control is enslavement.
We do “control” badly and painfully inadequate in our efforts.
A government that can enslave an American pregnant woman can expand that with such legalese to other challenging situations involving women. This is the big fight!
Enslaving another person strips away what’s most dear from a human being.
Because men control the world and make the rules. From the get-go they made the rules in religions. And, in governments.
Only in our short little equal rights times did we women start to think we had equal rights. Guess we were wrong. And, the women who are against the right to an abortion, they have just drunken the Kool-Aid ladled out by men's religions.
As I have posted here: Women should collect DNA and ID from every sex partner and then take them to court to support and raise (or keep!) the human they were forced through involuntary servitude to bring into the world. Why aren't law firms taking up this challenge?
If it were the case that if a woman choses to become pregnant and then changes her mind: I might say: whoa-Nelly! That would feel very wrong to me. Against the law? Not sure. But, a sex act that leads to an unwanted pregnancy, esp. with a contraception that fails" of course she should be able to "get rid of it".
I feel that the Supremes decided that I was a partial citizen - like 3/5ths. They are now putting the health, life and liberties at women are at risk. I consider them murderers
Carolyn, nobody that I’ve talked to wants to be forced to donate bone marrow to save a life. When I’ve asked what’s different in having the government tell a woman to put her health and life at risk to continue a pregnancy to save a life, I get silence. One person said that it is because an unborn baby is without sin. My counter was to ask if they wanted the government to require bone marrow donations to save children. Everyone has ended up saying that they’d never thought about it that way.
Arguing “my body, my choice” can too easily be corrupted by antiabortion people to seem to promote irresponsible sex. Putting it as the government forcing you to put your health at risk takes the sex out of the argument.
[Edited] Thank you. This is a variation of the statement I make when the subject arises: in no country in the world can you be forced to donate any part of your body, not even blood, not even to save a life. Yet the forced birthers demand that females donate their bodies for 9 months and their lives for at least 18 years, no matter what. The fact that men are 100% responsible for all pregnancies is not considered part of the equation.
Also, it's quite ironic that the forced birth crowd is also the anti-science crowd that wouldn't be able to enact their draconian bans without the advances of science that created transabdominal ultrasound.
Perhaps Kazuo Ishiguro was prescient about the direction the United States is headed under an extremist right wing government in his book “Never Let Me Go”. If forced birth is accepted, why not forced organ harvesting? Is this what we have to look forward to? That may sound hyperbolic, that is until you consider recent stories, like that of Kate Cox - who ever thought that could happen? Others controlling the medical state of our bodies without consent for the benefit of someone else, born or unborn.
The worst part about the government controlling the medical state of our bodies is that it's being done by people with absolutely zero knowledge of medicine or science. You'd think that being parents, which most of them are, would have taught them a thing or two about anatomy and physiology but they clearly thought all those babies were just god's little miracles /s/
Agree with you that men make women pregnant, yet bear no responsibility, unless through legal marriage. My suggestion to our esteemed politicians: create laws that require the biological father to financially support their child for 50% of rent, food, healthcare, education through college, sports, summer camps, toys, books, haircuts, etc, etc. Those who call themselves “Christians” are so pro-life, but they don’t give a damn for the child once they’re born. Republicans want to take away Medicaid, food assistance through SNAP, public education in poorer communities is terrible, affordable housing is impossible to find. In the end, it’s all a ruse to keep women second class citizens and away from financial independence and power.
You're on the right track. In November 1986 Reagan's White House Working Group on Family, led by that "good Christian," Gary Bauer, posited that it was welfare that led to childhood poverty and their solution was to not provide it for unwed mothers under 21 who did not live with their parents. That is NOT a typo. They said that families should have more children to guard against eventual depletion of the Social Security Trust Fund and a shortage of recruits for the armed forces. They also wanted states to rescind laws that made divorce easy. I know all this because I was so shocked that I cut the article out of the paper and kept it in my little box of keepsakes.
Holy Smokes! Too bad it isn't in todays papers where one can link, or C/C. I'm going to try to find it.
I totally believe some/many "good Christians" think this way. I decided a couple of decades ago that somehow the Christian label was a bit negative. Boy, was I right.
There are laws on the books to force biological fathers to support their off-spring. But that doesn't address the fact that it's the woman's body and life that are taken from her.
As for not giving a damn about the fetus once it becomes an actual baby you'd think.... Well, if we've learned one thing the hard way it's that they believe that all women who want abortions are sluts and the deserve to be punished. As the child was conceived in sin it is therefore undeserving of societal support. Or so it seems by their behavior.
If a woman cannot have dominion over her own body, what right is safe? Speech? No. Religion? No? Association? No, as we see from the attacks on those who help child rape victims. Dobbs and its progeny are about much more than abortion. They are about the most basic rights. And that’s what the fight is about.
Women have to go to WAR!!! Every woman should get their male sex partner's ID and DNA so they can sue for lifetime support for a pregnancy she is forced to complete. AND, women should consider other forms of sexual gratification...including other women. Make the men suffer almost as much. I say almost. because there is no way a man can pay the enormous price for that unwanted pregnancy. Why is it just about what women have to do to have autonomy?? I say go full-bore to make men miserable about this bullsh*t law.
Many more potential allies. *edit > Just scanned that article Ed, and thanks. That's how I've seen that decision myself as well. Isn't confirmation a grand feeling ?
Maybe the “father” of the zygote could be required to contribute half his salary for 18 years to the state for support. Probably could get an abortion at Jiffy Lube if that were the case…
Women should collect DNA and ID from every sex partner and then take them to court to support and raise (or keep!) the human she was forced through involuntary servitude to bring into the world. Why aren't law firms taking up this challenge?
Boy, would that result in one hell of a blowback. Males have been able to hit and run for eons.. How convenient that females are left holding the "bag." I do know of a situation or two where the guys were "used" and did the "right thing." But definitely a minority...
Because I was very active at the local level in 2018, when GA Republicans were passing the Heartbeat bill in anticipation of SCOTUS overturning ROE, I participated in protests held in support on abortion rights. To my dismay, some the crudest messaging I saw was trumpeted by Planned Parenthood. I couldn't believe how ignorant that organization was of how propaganda works. It was if they wanted to provide ammunition for pro-birthers instead of maintain reproductive rights for women. "Abortion on demand!" was the most prominent message on buttons. If you're a pro-birther, that sounds like an advertisement for promiscuity.And to top it off, many of the protesters who were given a bullhorn were obviously not straight and often sounded like they had an ax grind against patriarchal society in general instead of securing reproductive rights for childbearing women. I can't blame them, I do too, but I think Planned Parenthood should have used that time to educate the public on how abortion care is medical care often out of necessity to save the mother's life.
I believe abortion needs to be on a continuum of reproductive health care, not a standalone issue. The media have shown what happens to women’s health when the choice is abortion or not. I guess I’m saying when some ppl hear the word abortion, they hear “elective abortion,” not women’s health care.
I always open the argument on the basis of "what about the man?"
If women are required to give birth, then the product of that gestation is to be genetically tested and the man responsible for the pregnancy must put up a $500,000 bond for the care and education of that child. If he cannot, his wages are confiscated. He is also to be chemically castrated so he cannot irresponsibly father more children.
No one likes thst either, but it's hard to argue it's unfair.
I wonder what men would do if they were subjected to forced vasectomy? If a woman of say over 50 years of age can not or should not bring a child into the world as she is too old, why not say at age 50 all men must be forced to not bring children into the world also?
(I am not meaning to argue ages of mothers, just using this as an example.)
What if every newborn was required to have it's DNA tested to ensure that the biological father assume financial responsibility for 18 years? That the mother must provide a name of possible fathers to ensure that the father was identified?
Ah that magical phrase ‘irresponsible sex’! All too many so called pro life champions desire to dictate with whom and how two people have consentual sexual intercorse!
The forced bone marrow question chillingly puts the Dobbs issue into perspective and reminds me of the provocatively disturbing book “Never Let Me Go,” which is not too far of a stretch from our current forced birth environment where others control the use of our bodies to benefit another, born or unborn.
It seems to me from Heathers interpret the first change noted was because of ( Nixon) wanting to sway the votes ie political. When actually Drs brought the cause front n center because of the risks/death to women ie wanting safety first. No political, no religiosity.
Sanctity of life .
How that transfers to the Israel/Palestine issue to me seems equally ...
Sanctity of life..
Convenient confusion arises when politics and/or religion enters per se..little regard for the majority afflicted -women and children-the sin/no sin is entirely upon the action of politics or religion ...
Sanctity of life...is dead?
Killing how many Jews? How many Nazis? How many blacks? How many Indigenous? How many_ _ _ _s ? ... (fill in ‘their’ hated race/color/origin/religion/affiliation/party) does it take for sanctity of life to be #1 priority....
“Arguing “my body, my choice” can too easily be corrupted by antiabortion people to seem to promote irresponsible sex.”
But what is their definition of “irresponsible sex”. For the “Christian Right” the definition is a woman having sex when she is not married. It’s that simple! They believe allowing abortion promotes promiscuity in unmarried women ….(and in teenage girls too)! They may mention men too but their focus leans heavily on women.
Their primary view on abortion is not about being pro-life. Yes, that sounds contrary to everything we’ve been told and read for years. They see abortion being a “get out of jail free” card for women. Abortion allows sexual activity outside of wedlock. Thus the Christian Right see Liberals as have no morals when it comes to sex. You get pregnant, hey no problem, just have an abortion. Be as promiscuous as you want.
I can’t stress this enough. Do a simple search. Type “sexual promiscuity and abortion” into your favorite search engine and see what comes up. You might be surprised to see what you find.
You explained exactly what I was trying to get across. The antiabortion movement doesn’t talk about mothers who have too many children to take care of—their focus is on seemingly promiscuous single women (while celebrating equally promiscuous men as “players”, “studs” or “young men sowing their oats”).
I love the fact you point out that women are now only partial citizens. To reduce our power, they needed to hamstring us. 3/5ths a citizen seems to calculate out right. And just like before it’s a stain on our country we must add to the other foolish decisions made in the arrogant pursuit of power.
I consider five of them to be part of the party of death and a couple have corruption issues as well. Then there's beer Bret. Not a stellar group on the regressive side.
They certainly don't care for how doctors may counsel expectant mothers and their families.
In this disdain for the expertise of doctors, and the personal panoply of concerns mothers and their families variously face, the dictators on the court may easily morph into the murderers which dictators often (or always?) do.
This imperviousness to expertise, to the roles of physicians and other health personnel, may remind us now, too, of the Chevron precedent this same far-right ideologue court seems also on the verge of killing.
These who are gnawing to get rid of the Chevron precedent hate experts, expertise, as much as MAGA cultists hate elites from doctors to environmentalists. They just want a blunderbuss mentality to push all Americans into simplified life dictates, the way MAGA hates democracy, hates free elections open to all -- and wants orange, diaper-wearing dictator instead.
Yes, Carolyn, but let's look at one other consideration to go with your good one regarding the latent murderousness on the court and abroad the land.
This is what our Heather refers to here, too, as the connections between the southern enslavers of the past, and today's ideologues, dark money rulers, and corrupted violence stokers.
Democracy, anyone? A higher literacy which lets us admit and enjoy complexities, differences, and the skills to see, inhabit, and bless them?
The so-called Chevron deference is like a ticking bomb that would remake America — for the worse — if overturned. But how many people have even a clue that the Supreme Court heard arguments about it last week? Or its monumental ramifications?
You could call the issue the holy grail for the right-wing extremist justices, who want to kill the Chevron deference. Overturning it would vastly limit the power of Congress and the Executive branch and increase judicial authority. The issue doesn't get much attention because it's complex and deals with the mechanics of government.
Great take on Chevron, Michael. This quote really got me:
"The conservative super lawyer Paul Clement, who was arguing against Chevron deference, promised this wouldn’t happen, but his reasoning was hypocritically thin. He said courts would still respect the precedents that happened under Chevron, even as he was arguing out of the other side of his mouth that the court should ignore the very precedent set by Chevron." Respect the precedents? Ha! Just like they respected Roe v Wade, ya think?
Morning, Ally! Of all the things there is to fret about, SCOTUS tops the list IMO. I understand Pt. Biden is against expanding the Court. I never heard him say why.
The same men that pay Judges on the court for their outcomes, are the same men that wrote Project 2025. It's all right there in print...how they will own us. The Chevron ruling to come has Charles Koch excited. He has spent billions to make this happen. Again, we are just collateral damage for their cause.
Thanks for this. Sen. Whitehouse captured some nuances I wasn't aware of and, of course, nailed the essence of the where the court appears headed: "hogwash."
I listen carefully to Whitehouse, who gave a short course on dark money and the SC to Amy Coney Barrett during her confirmation hearing.
He mentions, in your clip, the Major Questions Doctrine, which I had to look up and then found a fascinating article in the Harvard Law about ways to make the MQD " less like the Voldemort of administrative law". This learning is why I love this Substack and its smart commenters! Thanks.
Yes - murderers - when they put the life of a fetus equal to the life of a living, breathing woman and without a medical degree - or a uterus - believe they have the right to take that woman’s right to life away from her and give it to the body inside of her - they are murderers. We have been here before as Heather’s piece described. Those justices knew what hell they were bringing and they did it anyway. Murderers of living breathing women
Jeri, that has ever been the case, that the men walked away leaving women to deal with the consequences. The forced birthers reveal their true intentions when they refuse to help provide a safety net when the children come into the world.
Yes! Yes! Yes! Back to the liberal “arts,” which includes the sciences. History, civics, language, foundational skills, the floor on which we must stand if we are to reason and be reasonable.
I've offered that 3/5ths assertion here before. What riles me is that generally, folks are failing to recognize that if I sit still when your fundamental, unalienable rights are taken - mine and everyone else's are potentially next. They are murderers, and of more than life, but also the rights that make a life worth treasuring and savoring. Another Lincoln quote worth mentioning right here, is this. > "Accustomed to trample on the rights of those around you, you have lost the genius of your own independence, and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises." -- Abraham Lincoln.
Carole: When I finish reading, etc. (yes, I'm one of those that reads 'all the comments, lol) I want to come back to this contribution of yours; 'poke me' - please, if it slips my mind.
See Martin Niemoller's "First they came for the..." poem.
For levity (showing that Officer House from the Grammar Police has a sense of humor):
"First they came for the verbs, and I said nothing because verbing weirds language. Then they arrival for the nouns, and I speech nothing because I no verbs." -Peter Ellis.
It's a misogynistic world out there. Misogyny kills a woman every 6 seconds.
Phyllis Shaflay was angry because her husband wouldn't let her have a career in politics. So, she goes on a rampage ripping working women apart. This woman carried the misogyny flag for her husband. The war on women never ends. We can't even walk alone into a parking lot at night without fear.
I was 52 years old when I learned that my deeply Catholic mother had had an ectopic pregnancy when I was just 18 months old, and my brothers were 4 and 7. She called her friend Ruth saying she was bleeding profusely. Ruth left work, picked my mom up and took her to the emergency room at the Catholic hospital where I was born. They refused to treat my mom, saying she should go home and rest. Instead, Ruth took mom to the University Hospital (where Ruth was the Dean of the School of Nursing.) They admitted my mom, and just four hours later, my mom was in the recovery room, awake and talking with my dad.
My dad died when I was 28. My mom died when I was 51. I never heard anyone in my family discuss the "family" secret - my mom was given life-saving surgery when I was barely a toddler and hid it from everyone because she was Catholic - and my parents might have been excommunicated for their "sins." Literally, kept a secret because their community thought that the surgery performed on my mom was an abortion. And my brothers and I only learned of it because Ruth thought it was important. Well, yeah, it is!
Ectopic pregnancies are never viable. Never. All the doctors at St. Mary's did was send my mom home to die. As they do now in some states in this country. In 2024. Unbelievable.
I am grateful so many of my fellow Americans get themselves to the polls to vote for those who will protect women's access to healthcare. Period. As others have said, time for history to repeat itself! Time for the minority opinions to be put in their place. Time for women to again determine their own healthcare and family needs.
Your mom was lucky My dear Friend’s mother was left to die leaving 3 children under the age of 7. My friend being 2 ½. To me what they did to her mother was EVIL.
“There is no procedure to reimplant an ectopic pregnancy,” said Dr Chris Zahn, vice-president of practice activities at the American College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. “It is not possible to move an ectopic pregnancy from a fallopian tube, or anywhere else it might have implanted, to the uterus,” he said.
“Reimplantation is not physiologically possible. Women with ectopic pregnancies are at risk for catastrophic hemorrhage and death in the setting of an ectopic pregnancy, and treating the ectopic pregnancy can certainly save a mom’s life,” said Zahn.
That's insane. Someone explain to me why dimwitted uneducated politicians make medical laws. The no-science politicians are making our health care decisions. Stupid people elect stupid politicians. There is not one active brain cell between them.
I called my local representative and asked them if they would accompany me to my doctor appointment because they knew more about medicine than my doctor did. And that their input was necessary so that my doctor would know how to proceed. They didn't know what to say to me. So, they hung up the phone on me. I keep calling.
Lisa59, I love what you are asking when you call your elected reps offices! That brilliantly points out the absolute absurdity of the times we are living in. If you’ve ever seen “Roe vs Bros” on instagram you’ll witness the terrifying lack of knowledge by the average person in America on how female reproductive systems work. Those people vote. And some of those people run for office and get elected. We have to keep calling it out!
State legislators making laws are looked @ regarding their constitutionality is what I understand to be the procedure. When passing legislation re medical care, they should be looked at by the Medical community. In both cases sometimes they get passed anyway , happens in MT
JL, my mom was a science and math teacher who understood exactly what was going on with her pregnancy. She would scream loudly were she still alive. Such incredible ignorance of basic physiology!!!
Thank you so much for sharing all that Sheila. I have similar tales to recount; hope I remember after I rest a bit; I'm in EST and flagging a bit. How sad was that; they sent her home to die, in untold agony for all concerned, to carry all their days. It makes me so sad that she carried those 'secrets' for such terrible reasons.. Secrets like those, keep us sick. I crave 'sunlight' on all things. Peace sister...
The Catholic hospital that used to be here—and most of them I expect—have ethics committees that look at individual cases. The sisters who sat on the committees had empathy, but everyone was afraid of the bishop. Google the case in Phoenix where the archbishop, Olmstead, injected himself and demanded every future case be approved by him (not an MD need I say). He also excommunicated the Sister of Mercy who gave the okay. If I recall the patient already had four children and it was either remove the fetus or she died.
Family secrets are complicated. I learned a couple of decades ago that a priest impregnated a 16 year old girl in the early 1900s somewhere in my family line.
I have a friend who was raised Catholic. Her mother had an affair with a priest. Another priest (close friend) faked his death because he couldn’t have his mother knowing that he left the church and married. Sick, sick, sick.
Incredible story and your poor mom kept that secret “under wraps”. My mom, on the other hand, was born and raised in Berlin. It was there that she had two abortions in a back alley establishment. She arranged for her older sister to have one too. In those days, an abortion was $50. Quite a high price to pay in the early 30’s. My sister and I did not find this tidbit out until after our father had died in 1997. Bless her, she lived until the age of 89!
Sheila, and the TX bishops conference lauded the 5th Circuit’s decision that a woman like your mother was not entitled to life-saving care in any state that prohibited “abortion” (an all-encompassing word). They are—you know—“pro-life.” That tipped me over the edge.
MLM, pro-life, my &ss! When I think about how long it took for my mom to recover from that surgery while still caring for three young active kids, I wonder frankly how she even survived. And my dad was a helpful man, not the kind that expected to be waited on. Grateful my daughters live here in MN. They have access to good medical care - including abortion. Glad to have the time to help get out the vote!
With Heather, all the dots are always connected, the I’s dotted, the T’s crossed, and in such a lucid and informative way. Thank goodness for this body of work. Its influence on the future of our society will be immeasurable.
My fervent hope is that issues like overturning Dobbs can be what galvanizes opposition to everything the GOP currently stands for as we head toward this election. As seems imminent at this point in time, the election will come down to T***p/Biden 2.0. (With DeSantis bowing out and all the GOP now seemingly capitulating to The Orange Jesus, this looks even more certain -- implausible though it still seems to be!) Though it is still really early on and a LOT can happen before November (my gut feeling tells me there are all kinds of scenarios that can happen between now and then), I sincerely WANT to believe that by November, when/if the American people are confronted with a choice between these two, the choice will be pretty obvious. More than that, though, we have to vote against the MAGA/fascist cult all the way down to local level ballots. Maybe Dobbs can be the "fire-bell in the night" that helps people realize what's at stake and what could happen if we don't stand up and fight this NOW!
Yes, they have caused some real problems around here. Right now in the city more progressive people are the majority on the council and the school board. The county is a different story because the people in Salem forget that they are part of Marion County.
I am a routine weather tracker with Windy, my favorite app. Us old duffers have to keep busy somehow. With the election roaring down on us, there is much more to get involved with. Jessica Craven keeps me pointed in the right direction. We're looking at rain and 53F here in So Cal.
I once again expected a serenity picture and here we have a wonderful history lesson bringing together two issues in our history and how they influenced the vote.
Thank you, Heather. Let’s hope the majority will regain the right to rule over the radicalized minority right wing. We’ve got our work cut out for ourselves to get out the blue vote up and down the ballot in November.
“MAGA Has Devoured American Evangelicalism,” (NYTimes about a week ago)
The question has arisen for me: Could it be also said that “MAGA Has Devoured much of American Catholicism? “
Much of the writing about Trump and religion focuses on Evangelicalism, witness these two opinion pieces. But the hypothesis occurs to me that much of American Catholicism, including the majority of American Bishops, having supported former president Trump in 2016, will likely support him in the upcoming election, if he is not disqualified to run. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops recently selected abortion as its number one 2024 issue. [Why not warfare and violence as the most significant issue?] Is this a thinly veiled institutional Catholic strategy to encourage or mandate that Catholics cast their support in Trump’s direction, who during his presidency opposed abortion and successfully saw to the selection of three anti-abortion Supreme Court judges, two of them Catholic? Also, upon investigation, it turns out, not by coincidence, that numerous officials high up in Trump’s former presidential staffing graduated from elite Catholic universities and law schools. Even now, affiliated with Trump are Catholic individuals such as Chris LaCivita, currently a senior advisor to Donald Trump's 2024 presidential campaign; Leonard Leo, hugely instrumental in Trump’s selection of three anti-abortion Supreme Court Justices; and the Napa Institute, at which many Catholic bishops wine and dine with influential politicians and business leaders. Some priests have even gone so far as to state from the pulpit that it would be a mortal sin to vote for Biden, a more faithful practitioner of his faith than Trump has ever been. These same bishops and priests influence many Hispanic voters. Equal to or a close second to American Evangelicalism, does “MAGA American Catholicism” warrant more attention as a significant factor lending Trump power?
Absolutely agree, George. There is an online petition going ( see below). May not stop the rogue priests and Bishops though.
"Faithful America, which backs social justice causes and opposes "Christian nationalism," urged Catholics to condemn bishops who "boost the Christofascist campaign of Donald Trump" in a recently launched online petition that had been signed by over 12,500 as of Friday afternoon." ( Newsweek, Jan.19, 2024, Thousands Sign Christian Petition Urging Bishops Not to Back Donald Trump, Aila Slisco)
You are right Carol….and it’s not the first time we have agreed! And George is right too!I worked for many years within the Catholic structures..have been a guest of the national bishops in DC and of the good nuns at NETWORK….ALSO IN DC. The Catholic Church is a very complex institution…currently think it is safe to say that the US hierarchy ARE pro-Trump ….the old platitude was the bishops were reps the priests/people more apt to be Dems….definitely simplistic but some truth to it…in my view, right now it’s really serious for the very reasons George outlined so well…I personally think any ‘Catholic encounter’ relative to the campaign should explicitly ask said Catholic how in Gods name they can justify supporting such a profoundly gross candidate…(and there’s ample data to cite)…I would cut these guys no slack at all and it might not be a bad idea to quote Genesis on ‘selling one’s soul for a mess of pottage’…..
The USCCB has been aggressively “pro-life” (misapplication of the word in the extreme) for at least the last 3 election cycles. “Faithful Citizenship,” their publication on how to think about politicians and their positions, used to be somewhat reasonable (for bishops). But now there is a majority that insists abortion be their “preeminent” priority, even as some others want the conference to consider other pressing issues. Like everyone, bishops have truly enjoyed their positions of power and have been courted and co-opted by republicans, especially obscenely rich ones like Leonard Leo and Timothy Busch. (It was Pat Buchanan, for one, a fanatic Catholic, who persuaded Nixon to rope in Catholics to make this a religious line in the sand.) Most recently Cardinal Dolan, an attention seeker if there ever was one, is the subject of a Faithful America petition.
The US bishops ‘pre eminent priority’ currently abortion assumes that because they have ‘taught it’ ..it is so…
They consistently ignore the ‘primacy of personal conscience’ issue which indicates that one’s personal conscience (right or wrong) is the last position before God and takes ‘moral precedence.’ And I’d argue that a woman’s ultimate personal decision on abortion is clearly in this milieu….conservative bishops are still fighting a pre Vatican 2 understanding of these issues…they want power/control/authority……
No ‘moral authority’ that I can see rather ‘civil authority’ …..
The reopening of the ‘statutes of limitations on abuse’ in the individual states have forced accountability….in California there are a large number of dioceses in ‘bankruptcy’ due to their ‘abuse’ claims costs….the dioceses of San Francisco, Oakland, Santa Rosa and Sacramento …so far…..and ‘bankruptcy’ is the choice many take to get a ‘handle’ on the abuse claims filed.
Comparing Biden's practice of his faith to Trump's is meaningless, since the latter's practice is non-existent. As a Catholic myself, I have seen evidence that Biden is a more faithful practitioner of his faith than the majority of US Catholics.
The sanctity of life argument does not hold up when applied mainly to abortion while overlooking capital punishment, war and lack of gun control. When the Catholic and Evangelical “Christian’s”are as vigorous in their opposition to these atrocities they can use the sanctity of life argument. Until then it is the repression and control of women that they are so vigorously advocating.
I'd say so. Although I don't think "The Church" has much of a mandate any more. Not since birth control really. Then the pedophilia racket.
I also think Trump should get zero credit for packing the Supreme Court with 3 more mediocre Federalist Society trained and indebted, extreme Catholic judges. Trump was given a list of judges to choose from, I believe by the Heritage Foundation.
He probably just took an aid's advice and went golfing. Although maybe he complained after the second male and asked for a female, and photos. And now we have Aunt Lydia, but prettier.
I believe Machiavelli's best student, Mitch McConnell, deserves the credit, for all his exquisitely painful manipulation of every lever of power in the Senate, including Abolishing The Filibuster (gasp!) to railroad the Senate into a blind advise and shotgun consent.
THAT was the actual coup, and we sat and watched it on TV. Beer breath and all.
He gets no credit from me. Leonard Leo, however, is the evildoer. He and the Federalist Society members manipulated putting three unqualified jurists un those spots. Mitch just accommodated by doing what he does best by being a clever devil.
While I do not begrudge the Catholic Church's anti-abortion position, I do begrudge the increasing misogyny it mixes in therewith, along with the ludicrous condemnations of Catholic politicians who exercise their individual conscience here on our troubled temporal plain.
The demonization of those who support abortion rights while disdaining abortion is ghastly, almost as bad as the blindly cruel backhanded and sometimes forehanded misogyny, sadly long apparent.
Yep; I've got a current issue with 'exactly that' Ally. When I get back to others (and you !) who related in that vein, I have zero doubt that you'll relate again.
When the all male bishops’ primary attention is on abortion,
while in war fellow humans are outwardly and intentionally killing each other (one might see them as “grown up fetuses”), and not express continuous outrage, there is something amiss. Mosque, Temple, Church, are all next to each other in Jerusalem. God is One, so to speak,
Our, Our Father/Mother/Creator.
Not at all pleased with their leaving their places of “Worship” and then killing each other of the other tribe “group.”
I hate to be cynical but there have been more than 80 priests in MA that have been accused by the Catholic Church for pedophilia. These Bishops and Priests fantasize about sex with children -- and most with impunity. And these are just the few the church has made public.
But yet, right to life and forced birth for all women in all circumstances. And one Biblical references to abortion and that was when a Rabbi said it's ok for a husband to abort his cheating wife's fetus.
Pope Francis is far more modem than these bishops. He is human, and understands climate change and overpopulation, both of which are heretical to these medievalists, who haven’t caught up to Galileo.
The evil Catholic Church - isn’t that the same institution that opposes the death penalty, has been active on social justice issues, and educates many youths from low income families and where some of the public schools are at best, inadequate? I may disagree with their adamant stance on abortion, but their stance on abortion has some logical consistency within their overall pro-life philosophy. Also, it is far less monolithic than many on both sides of the political spectrum think.
No it doesn’t, if they agree a woman should die rather than get treated for life-threatening complications in a state that bans all abortions. That’s not pro-life; that’s pro-fetus. And the repubs don’t believe in social services for that woman and baby after birth. That’s also not pro-life.
Stephen, yes less monolithic, and,yes, lots of good work and outreach ( usually by lay men and women and the Sisters and religious order brothers and priests who are left-- all the church). But the discussion here seems to center on the leadership of the U.S. church and there is a serious point to be made about how politically partisan the U.S.Bishops are as a Conference. Some are punitively and vocally far right and often actively anti- Pope Francis. A handful are moderate. Most ( and IMO this is the worst sin) are silently protecting their ecclesiastical careers. The most partisan depend on the financial resources the Leos and Buschs provide. They have become players in the dark money network whether they will admit it or not.
Their largely unrevised document on Citizenship definitely says they cannot tell Catholics how to vote ( tax issues, right?) but there are many ways to sway ( and punish) a congregation without naming names ( though some of them do that too!)
The women here who have recounted the reproductive horrors in Catholic hospitals, where fear of the wrath of a Bishop rules, are right. The Bishops are largely pro- birth, not pro- life or they would put significantly more budgetary and pastoral resources into helping women and children survive. But that takes us into the arena of the deep seated misogyny of men who are not parents and who have been actually trained to avoid and fear entanglement with women and who are encouraged to think of themselves as cultic superiors. No, not all priests; no, not all Bishops. But, it seems, our current crop are a critical mass of the wrong stuff.
Like Joan Leslie I have an up- close and personal experience of the institutional church and stay with it because I do believe that all of us Catholics are the church. But, at the moment, partisanship and dark money have resulted in a serious institutional leadership problem in the church in the United States. And I say that fully aware and highly appreciative of the thousands of Catholic men and women who are unselfishly, and in some places at great risk, living real Gospel values every single day across the world.
Carol as I reread your very prescient comments I’m particularly struck by your description of the majority of US bishops….”Most, (and IMO this is the worst sin) are silently protecting their ecclesiastical careers”. I am very very struck by the parallels between our dear bishops and their Republican elected counterparts who are NOT dealing appropriately with the gross Trumpian behavior for exactly the same reason….I was horrified the evening of January 6th when 147 House Republicans voted NO on certifying the state presidential results of one of the most accurate elections in our history! These guys give a whole new meaning to cowardice and corruption….
I agree with the almost everything you say and in the other cases for example, dark money, I will confess to ignorance on the issue. I was responding to the rather strident anti-Catholic posts. As you point out, many of the bishops in the US have slid from religious conservative to political conservative. But within the US, policies and practices tolerated or promoted in one diocese may be prohibited in the next (Boston MA versus Worcester MA). As you state, while many of the Bishops of the Church are questionable, many of the priests, nuns and laity are forces for good even if they sincerely and thoughtfully disagree with us on specific issues.
Good replies, all. I am aware that the church is a spectrum and concur with Carol’s comments. “it’s not all like that,” is one I share with Stephen. However, at the institutional “power” level, aren’t many Catholics giving Trump a free pass, morally, (the end justifies the means), when they really would not want him to be principal of their children’s elementary school? Weren’t there a million ways (in dollars certainly, he used the presidency for his and his family’s self-aggrandizement,
rather than the common good? Is Mar A Lago an apt symbol of one’s alignment with working people?
AND I very much support ALL Carol’s comments…my own experience was primarily in the Catholic Charities/Social Justice end …served on State Boards etc…know well just how decent and effective such efforts have been. But sadly at this time the ‘institutional’ Church does appear to have made choices I can NOT personally support. And George’s conclusions I think are useful.
A good friend of mine who was an ardent Democrat told me that Choice was the number one issue for the country. I felt so bad for her that she passed away just after Trump's election.
Your comment reminds me also that a good friend, similar to yours, and who enthusiastically participated in the nationwide Women's March right after Trump's inauguration, I believe (or was it after his election) passed away shortly thereafter also. She was so actively engaged.
My friend was super active in politics and all the women's issues. She was so smart, actually a relative of Winston Churchill; his American mother was the sister of her great grandmother. or, great great... Horrible that I can't call her any longer.
Your friend sounds like a rare individual, the two of you blessed knowing each other, and her early reaching the trail head very sadly earlier than expected, leaves you missing her physical presence as your companion and fellow traveler on our earthly Camino … though may she be with you in spirit..
Yes, she is sorta with me in spirit but it ain't same..I do not have her extensive political experience or her amazing brain. Her 1st daughter is my god daughter and although I don't do religion, I have been able to be a good 2nd mom to her after the nasty situation with her step dad rejecting her big time.
As Heather noted, whenever abortion rights are on the ballot, the measures pass overwhelmingly. Dobbs, however, is just emblematic of a desire on the part of some to encroach on the rights of the many, so we must remember that the right to an abortion is just one of many rights--the right to vote, the right to form a union, the right to have clean water, the right to love and marry whom we choose--the list goes on and on--that we must preserve if we expect to preserve our democracy.
AND Clarence Thomas has expressed an interest in re-looking at SSM and birth control. But not interracial marriage, no surprise, whose existence does not appear in the constitution either.
He mentioned three of the four "companion" cases to Roe: Griswold (contraception), Lawrence (decriminalizing same sex sexual conduct) and Obergefell (same sex marriage). He tellingly left out Loving, which does permit interracial marriage.
For sure!!!!!!!!! We must all be involved even if it's calling Democrats and/or Independents. Write letters to the editor, talk to your neighbors, friends or who will ever listen. GET INVOLVED! We can not sit this one out. Too much is at stake!
The 7 justices in the majority were nominated by FDR (Douglas), Eisenhower (Brennan, Stewart), LBJ (Marshall), and Nixon (Burger, Blackmun, Powell). The 2 dissenting justices were nominated by Kennedy (White) and Nixon (Rehnquist). It seems amazing now that 5 of the 7 justices in the majority were nominated by Republican Presidents. Then, as now, only 3 justices were nominated by Democratic Presidents. I WANT the Dems to be more strategic and play hardball. For example, RBG should have retired in 2012, so a DEM could appoint a 40-something successor. If either Kagan (age 63) or Sotomayor (age 69) have even the slightest health concern, they should retire now so Biden and the Dem majority in the Senate can approve her successor. We have probably already seen the last time a Republican majority will approve a Dem-nominated Supreme Court Justice. If Biden is reelected and faces a Republican majority in the Senate (possible or likely), he will be unable to nominate ANY Justices. The Senate will stonewall him, regardless of the time remaining in his next term. And by the way, a Dem majority in the Senate (also possible) should stonewall anyone nominated by a Republican President. Fight fire with fire.
I couldn't disagree more with your otherwise passionate and good faith argument, John.
RBG was correct to stay on the Court, as long as her diminutive yet courageous body held breath. Nobody knows the outcome of elections beforehand. And the entire purpose of a lifetime appointment is just that, to allow a reasonable and sufficiently wise Justice to dispense equal justice under the law, irrespective of fear, favor or access to cigar smoking vacations with billionaires, and above all else, above the fickle winds of politics.
It wasn't her fault that a perfect storm hit, McConnell's Machiavelli-on-steroids refusal to provide Garland even a hearing, Comey, Putin, and HRC's refusal to campaign in Wisconsin and blithely assuming that her sense of entitlement and historical place would usher her to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
We know what happened thereafter.
None of us can responsibly argue to turn the Supreme Court into another fully political arena, simply because the MAGA-ites and their ignorant mob do so.
The real answer here, in my opinion, is to expand the Supreme Court so that it actually represents America and Americans. The fact that we have as many Supreme Court Justices as sat bewigged when Washington was present, is absurd at best, dangerous at worst
I agree that RBG was correct in staying in the job and doing her job. And lest we forget, Hilary Clinton won the popular vote by almost 3 million votes. And we who voted for her are still alive and voting. The electoral college has got to go.
I don't know the exact number, but unfortunately the Dems need to have a 5% advantage in the popular vote to get elected for President these days. This has been getting worse, and I'm not sure of the cause. Al Gore won by about 0.5 million but still narrowly lost. Then Hillary won by 3 million and still lost. I'm very worried that the next election will go to Trump.
To hedge our bets, my sister and I are planning to hold our noses and cross over in the primaries and vote for Nikky Haley. Afterall there is really no point in voting in the Democratic primary, unless Biden decides he is too old and makes way for a younger generation of Democrats. In my opinion he should do so, but won't.
If Biden withdrew at any time, it would be like saying all he's done for us is pointless. Continually hammering on that is like throwing away the election. We are looking at an election between two aging men. There is nothing wrong with the aging part.
Take a good look at the candidates. Biden is 81, still vibrant and sharp. His speeches are clear and spirited. He regularly travels, meets with both American decision-makers and World leaders. He has not dropped an issue, at home or abroad. His running mate, Kamala Harris, unlike nearly every vp before her, is active in administration affairs, and up to date on key issues.
Trump is 3 years younger but looks and moves like a man 2 decades older. He has had multiple facelifts and other surgeries to look younger, but cannot hide his age. He has multiple health issues, and moves with difficulty. He is acting a part, and in repose his face reveals his emptiness. He has the body of a man in the end stages of aging: take a look at his suits: they are cut and padded to disguise the fact that his face juts forward, and his shoulders are permanently slumped. The suits attempt to make him look as if he were standing upright. The back neck is cut high, and he lifts his face to face forward rather than down (thus also stretching his wattles so they are less evident). Sitting, he either leans forward or slumps back to relax his neck.
And that doesn't even touch on his inability to speak extemporaneously and make sense. As often is the case with an elderly person in decline, he does better with a script, or when repeating old memes that come from his recall as a younger man. But when have you heard anything original come out of his mouth. Most of what he says are reused phrases blurted out in a disconnected series. He rarely travels, and when he does, his appearances are brief and orchestrated. In addition, no one has a clue who his running mate might be. I can almost guarantee it will not be one of the people from the primaries. It will probably be someone chosen for him by the people with the money.
So what is age, and who is old here? And why is Biden's age an issue to some people, but Trump's clear decline is not often mentioned? The best answer to this that I've see is that the MSM (and some others who should know better) are seeking the horse race "other side", which is lazy reporting. Trump's legal troubles are legendary, so they have to counter that with something about Biden. The MSM and the Trumpists really have to stretch to try to find some kind of legal issue to put up against Trump's legal messes, and so far they haven't been able to. So Biden's flaw is that he is old. Ok, so then the counter to that is to look at Trump's age.
Or drop the whole thing, and actually cover the news and the issues we face as a nation. Which of these candidates is Presidential material in today's world?
Why would you and your sister do that? Age is just a number and Joe has proven over and over again that he is quite adept at handling a myriad of things. Younger Dems are making their way up the ladder but no one should be challenging him. And I would like to say a pox on No Labels candidates!
RBG was great but she failed to protect Roe v Wade. Agree 100% with the responsibility you place on HRC; she is a lousy politician who ran a lousy campaign. However, the bad guys told us what they were going to do long before they did it. This is not about arguing 'responsibly.' The Court is already 100% political; we should not kid ourselves. This is hardball, and the Dems MUST play hardball. If they do not play hardball, we (the Dems) will keep losing. Obviously it is correct to expand the Court (see my follow-up comment above). Please wake me up when the Dems control the White House and have 50 reliable votes in the Senate (i.e. not Manchin or Sinema). It was and is naive to ignore any tactic or strategy to gain the ultimate advantage. Obama approached RBG about retiring, but she was not receptive. Hard to anticipate everything that followed, but with hindsight, a big disservice by RBG for the causes she championed.
I appreciate your response, John, yet still disagree with some of your thoughts.
The Court is not 100% political, although it is far too political than it should be. This particular Court being the worst in that sense in my lifetime. Nonetheless, no Court has ever been wholly political, as evidenced even recently by Gorsuch's vote in the Bostock case wherein he wrote the majority opinion holding that gay and transgender workers are protected by the Civil Rights Act.
Beyond all that, the Democratic Party needs to convince the majority of the Country that its positions and policies are correct or better than those set forth by the GOP. Stacking the Court ala McConnell and Trump is the exact opposite of restoring the People's faith in their institutions, and is the last tactic to be emulated
Your “lousy politician” is my hero. When I was young adult woman, she was an exemplar for me of how women could succeed in this man’s world. The “lousy politician” was a tireless worker for women’s and children’s rights; was Secretary of State; was a Senator, all of which she accomplished when such things were hard for women, as they still are. We have only had three female secretaries of state, ever. We have only had 60 female senators, ever. This is an exalted group. She is one of the giants on whose shoulders we women stand, and that includes Kamala Harris. That she lost to Trump in a perfect storm of misogyny, a thirty year campaign of misinformation, media culpability, Russian interference, and James Comey does not make her a lousy politician. Not forgetting, of course, that she won the popular vote.
I believe that RBG thought that Roe was poorly decided and thought that the best way to assure the right to choice was via legislation. She was right, I believe. Relying on the 14th Amendment and its due process clause and inferring from that a right to privacy just begs for its overturn.
Also, I don’t agree that she should have retired. Look at what happened when Scalia died and Obama had the opportunity to replace him. McConnell refused to even give Garland a hearing for a year. Who’s to say he wouldn’t have done the same had RBG stepped down?
McChinless is a nasty piece of work who does what he pleases when he please. RBG was right to hang on as long as she did.
Sounds nice. They’re not playing nice. This has been in the works for EVER & they made it happen. Stinks to high heaven.
And senators that say, “Well I don’t know why a woman would want to get an abortion.” IGNORANT men like that should not be allowed to have a say about women’s “rights.”
I'm afraid we will have to allow men to vote, even those with a negative opinion about women's rights. However I do think that senators like you describe should not be representing us.
I agree with you on so much. Even about Hillary- she never should’ve run. And Bernie might’ve won, but who knows. How do you beat ignorance? Regardless, we know they’re changing laws to do what they want- power & money… & would hope I’m alive when it all comes crashing down on them, but don’t like to gloat or say I told you so. My husband is a Republican. It’s been personal & sad.
Better yet, majority Dems in both houses of Congress and Biden in the presidency adding 4 justices to SCOTUS. THEN we get modern: voting laws, repeal of Citizens United, abortion as necessary, etc.
Thanks, John. I've been thinking about this for a while. I hope it's just a matter that something is in the works but that Biden is just holding his cards close to the vest.
I share your hope Jim, but I am not hopeful that President Biden (who I admire deeply and support fully) has anything in the works. Under better circumstances, this Administration would put forth a Judicial Reform Act to expand the Court to 13 justices, 4 of whom this President would nominate immediately. Sadly, hope is never a strategy.
I think we will be surprised at what Biden will do given majorities with which to do it. I recognize Jill Biden as a fellow warrior, and there is also the cabinet. Look at the mess Biden inherited and how much he has managed to clear up even with nasty Republicans constantly nipping at his heels.
That's exactly what I've been hoping for. And he also seems to be flagging on filling federal judge positions. But I'm in no position to create a strategy for the President. He obviously has his hands full.
We have to give Kagan another 15 years and Sotomayor another 10, as sharp minds. But beyond late 70s it is time to call it quits, just like with our president. Set the stage for the younger generation of Democrats, and don't just selfishly hang on until the very end.
John G, what you are asking for is a prolonging of the anti-democratic atmosphere we are working to counter. Yes, Dems need to be strategic, but the things you are proposing are not strategic, they are reactionary. And harmful. They would entrench us in continual face-offs. We are in a situation right now where we could come out of this election with a "middle" in place that could help us move forward on common ground. The way to do that is work this election hard, not sit back and add fire to fire. The goal is to become a nation that works for the people of America, not to gain points in a boy's game of win at all costs. We've been doing that for too long. Stop, now.
Agree with ONE of your points, to work hard and effectively in this election. To do so, the Dems (our side) must work much smarter than they have done so far. The Dems marketing campaign has been almost non-existent, and ineffective. The Dems must raise our game by a large increment. Btw, we are already entrenched in continual face-offs against an 'anti-democratic' adversary. I desperately wish their fever would break, as it did with McCarthy in the 1950s. However, it is NAIVE to believe the bad guys will ever go back to the old 'honorable' way. The days of decent republican lawmakers like Eisenhower, Dirksen, Baker, Dole, McCain et al are gone forever. The bad guys have clearly told us otherwise, and they are obviously not going back. They aim to 'win at all costs.' So far, doing so has gained the bad guys a 6-3 advantage in the Court. If the Dems do not play hardball, this could soon be a 7-2 advantage.
I have a question as a retired ICU nurse. How can a politician or judge or anyone other than a physician or nurse, with OB/GYN education, experience and license, make any medical decision for a pregnant woman? They are not qualified. They are practicing medicine without a license. It is illegal. I am serious about this. Name me another medical decision about medical care that a lay person can legally make and force on the patient.
I have another example, though not in the medical field.
When the Supreme Court decreed that wetlands not directly connected to a river were not wetlands, I hit the roof. I started my professional career as a hydrogeologist (with other related skills). That opinion flies in the face of long-standing evidence that wetlands are connected with both groundwater and river systems. That includes wetlands that are some distance away from rivers and those that are connected with ephemeral streams and lakes. Even perched wetlands (not contiguous with underlying ground water) are important factors in the water cycle; some are significant factors in wildlife habitat and in flood prevention. But the SC decided that an "expert" provided by one of their hidden managers knew more than someone like me and many other specialists who worked with communities and agencies to identify and create management plans that protected water resources.
The result: the complete dismantling of EPAs wetlands division and cutting of resources for protecting wetlands- so that they could be used for development. This compromises rivers and communities who will, in this time of climate change, be more vulnerable to flooding. It is up to states and private entities and minus fed funding) to correct past errors, and prevent new ones.
This decision is not based on science at all. It is literally (and deliberately) giving away vulnerable and essential lands to developers, against national needs and values, for the benefit of largely industrial development. We've been here before: that's why EPA was created.
The only thing that gives me any sense that something is going right is being able to see dams being removed from rivers that should never have been dammed, and watching them return to free flowing streams, accessible again to the fish who were blocked from their breeding beds and to the indigenous people whose lands were taken from them. I am happy that both my parents lived long enough to see the Rogue River become a free-flowing river again, and now I am watching (via the internet) the dams on the Lower Klamath being removed. The first one I watched was the Elwha in WA state: what a glorious site that was. I saw the dams come down live and only two years later, the river was well on the way to recovery, and now has a natural estuary at it's base that is thriving with birds and vegetation and a healthy exosystem.
I had to end with that, because it took years and a lot of had work to get the idea across that rivers need to be healthy in order for us to be healthy. But it is happening. The same goes for the Dobb's decision. It is one of the things that impedes our having a healthy democracy. It and voter suppression and the appropriation of Congressional procedures to keep Congress from functioning, and election financial reform. Dobb's is the result of deeply flawed legal reasoning that in itself should provide a way to reverse it. I hope I live long enough to see it.
A Civil War IS being planned. MAGA militias are training. Let's just hope it's the same goons who failed on JAN 6 and their brethren. Unless they have Putin backing them (or the Oiligarchs who control governors in TX, FL, with troops or missiles, it won't go very far.
Destroying true democracy has been the end goal of the those corrupted by massive wealth and the power since the Civil War, at least. As Cox Richardson so eloquently points out.
My concern recently, with Abbott's tragic test of the power of Governors over their own borders, militias (and National Guard) is that once again they are Plotting unnoticed, right under our noses.
Who did I just see on ig - Charlie Kirk- giddy with pride at being an official part of Trump's "military" did he say? Or Militia? I know he also said he's also in Trump's Praetorian Guard. How bizarre is that No One seems to have prepared for JAN 6?
And if what they say about projection is true, do Trump and whoever backs him already have a "deep state" ready to aid and abet? Have they already aided and abetted? On JAN 6? How about when the Secret Service permanently deleted all text messages from that critical time period. "Oops, it was just an update."
OK, maybe I'm sounding conspiratorial, but I'd always rather prepare for the worst and hope for the best. A normal, before times election. A nice clean win for the Democrats and a calm, peaceful, uncontested transfer of power.
God, I hope so….that opposition to DOBB`S will rid us of Trump….the history that Heather detailed for us demonstrated just how precious personal freedoms are and how fragile….and ‘keeping the Republic’ is a full time ongoing consuming project!
Trump is only a symptom of the problem. We are on the verge of becoming a Kleptocracy like Russia. The fact the Project 2025 outlines the whole thing blows my mind. Orwell is rolling in his grave.
An absolutely Stellar letter tonight. I hope history will repeat itself.
Preferably without a war.
A case could be made that there's a guerrilla war going on now -- an ongoing insurrection, if you will.
You do realize that the ten years from 1854 she wrote about, ending with the rededication to the fundamental rights, is the period leading to and then into the Civil War, yes?
This is not a Hollywood movie. Can't stick our heads in the sand and pretend it's going to go away.
More history may repeat than any realize
Internet is pretty effective at radicalizing. No one is immune. This is not a good time/era for hubris.
A sign of the times, and definitely a social paradigm shift.
This old Reggae song, condemning the decadent USA, includes the line,
"Legal murder, they call abortion."
https://youtu.be/5L45toPpEv0?si=qUlfQDDIyhzgA5Tj
How does one cogently argue that abortion is NOT murder?
In thirty nine years of medical practice, I've only had one patient who used abortion as a form of birth control. No one else I've ever met really wants an abortion. The decision is always serious and difficult. Clearly, being able to prevent unwanted or unplanned pregnancies is a better way to go. Unfortunately, many of the same people who don't want others to have abortions also want to block their access to effective birth control. This contradiction clearly demonstrates that their ulterior motive is to control and oppress women and is not about the fetus. When, as a species, are we going to grow out of such stupid, inhumane behavior?
When a woman starts to have children and how many she has needs to be her decision. And, lest you keep fooling yourself, parenting is full of life-and-death decisions you have to make for your children: to vaccinate or not, when to let them cross the street unsupervised for the first time, when to let them ride their bikes across town, when to let them go backpacking by themselves, just to name a few.
Thank you your wisdom bred of real life experience. ....One thing that bothers me: why call terminating a pregnancy: Abortion? It has some very negative connotations..ABORTION meanings:
A: a misshapen thing or person : A MONSTROSITY...............
B: informal + sometimes offensive : something regarded as horrifically or disgustingly bad........................
C: arrest of development (as of a part or process) resulting in imperfection..........................
Why can't it be referred to as a "Termination"..
I took, as an NP, only have had one patient who used abortion as birth control, no matter how much education she was given on the dangers of future conception using this method of BC. And this was an Ivy League University.
Your words are wise and true. Thank you
Thank you. I am sure you are a wonderful doctor who cares about your patients. I wish there were more like you.
Steven Hall,
I hear your argument about "their" hypocrisy regarding abortion and birth control. But the Rastafarian who wrote "Legal murder, they call abortion" wasn't one of them. What is the general argument that abortion is not murder?
Or that it is?
Aborting a non-viable fetus is not murder. It's that simple.
I'm not opposing your statement, but it is a special situation. How about in general?
In general, the issue of abortion is complicated. What about the 10-year old Ohio girl who was impregnated by a rapist? What interest, if any at all, does the state have in telling/controlling a female what she can and can't do with her own body? It's complicated. What's next, the state controlling our thoughts, what we can and cannot read (Florida under the Fascist Republican Party, for example?) The white Christian nationalists are now carrying the torch of the old KKK, though now its called MAGA. I equate them to the Islamic extremists, same cloth, American Taliban.
Who are YOU to have an opinion worth reading? When was the last time your person was invaded by a foreigner?
Self defense.
Works for the right-to-carry folks
Here's another one, a bit more "legal":
James,
You sneer and then sneer some more, while ignoring my point.
Sir Edward Coke WAS the law, for the Founders as law students. Coke clearly stated that abortion was NOT murder.
That was the point of this whole discussion.
Your mom?
She established the local chapter of an organization dedicated to breastfeeding and natural childbirth. She wanted to become a midwife, but cancer cut her short.
I never had a chance to ask what she thought about abortion.
So now I ask around here, and people seem to have trouble answering.
It may be hard for you to get a thoughtful answer because people no longer give you the benefit of the doubt. You often troll, you are often insulting to HCR and her commenters. You and yours are described by you as semi-heroic and noble.
I think people have a ‘why bother?’ attitude even when you ask a seemingly serious question.
But you reap what you sow.
Justifiable for trespassing on private property.
??
I don't think that qualifies as cogent.
Well maybe there should be a new civil war - the one that overturns Dobbs.
I really don’t think that anyone really wants that. Another civil war, that is. Although some rabidly anti-choice states are trying to create their own version of the Fugitive Slave Act, by trying to prevent women from crossing state lines to receive reproductive health care unavailable to them at home. Or attempting to punish providers in other states who help these women. Or demanding their confidential medical records, so that they can be prosecuted at home for breaking these laws.
Yep. Sounds like the Fugitive Slave Act to me. With a twist.
I think the Nazi right absolutely wants another civil war. They threaten it, and hold their guns and bibles close to their hearts. Religion is and always been used to justify murdering the "others". What is the Supreme Court doing except indulging the othering of half the country? Look at Israel/Hamas and what Putin is doing to Ukraine.
If they want to secede so badly, this time, I'd be inclined to let them go.
In the spirit of Lincoln, I choose to disagree.
When you say "they" and "them", who are you referring to? How are you going to limit secession just to the people you think are seeking secession, without considering the impacts on the people living there who do not want secession? The second group are likely the majority of the residents in those states- remember that these are the same states with voter suppression. Sometimes it is ok to be flippant, but unless we take a hard look at the actual consequences of our flippancy, we reveal the shallowness of how we see things.
It is tempting to permit secession, but would be a disaster for democracies around the world if the military/economic power of the U.S. were diminished. The U.S. is the strongest guardian of democracies.
The MAGA/KKK extreme white protestant nationalists are fueled principally by racism with a call for Christianity to be the official U.S. religion. Rational discourse and reasoning are not possible in the vast majority of cases. They simply must be defeated, preferably at the polls.
I wonder if we shouldn't call the bluff of those anti-choice states. Give them the option to leave America. Bring it to a popular up or down vote, requiring a vote from each of the residents of those states--not their Representatives and Senators. Let's see how serious they really are.
There is a lot more Blue in these states, even in Texas, than are getting the opportunity to be heard in our elections.
They wouldn't survive without Government help.
Who, specifically, do you mean by "they"?
True!
That is a brilliant analogy, Marla. And inherent in the analogy is the unspoken belief that women are lesser beings who must be controlled by their superiors.
21st century "slaves" thanks to the scorruptus.
Yes. To these people, we are lesser beings. These days, women have less bodily autonomy than a corpse.
Controlled by the state, if there is no male with direct control.
So long as the military follows the constitution there will be no civil war.
As many of the top brass who worked behind the scenes to stop Trump and now saying it out loud, any President would falter. It never ceases to amaze me having not been born here is that this country cannot get past the Civil War. The people of Germany are massing together against the far right in huge numbers. They remember well what happened to their country. People here are far too complacent about Democracy.
I've been watching what's going on in Germany and am sooooooooo proud of your people there -- standing up against the deportation of immigrants !
Thank you for sharing. Gaza and abortion have rallied the large numbers in the US while a rally against the right has yet to materialize.
Good luck with that if the worst happens to get back in the Oval Office. Using the military against the American people is just one of the things he promised to do as Dictator For A Day!
It's a very apt analogy. Women are being treated as property as were slaves. As property they belong to their husbands or, if they are, god forbid, unmarried, they belong to the state. A new underground railroad will develop and the Supreme Court will resurrect "Dred Scott!" to force free states to return these errant and misguided women to Texas et al.
Exactly.
The 13th Amendment abolishing slavery should be used as a legal basis for the right to an abortion. Restrictions on abortion and the resulting forced pregnancies are disturbingly suggestive of involuntary servitude: forced pregnancy requires a woman to provide continuous physical service to the fetus in order to further the state's asserted interest. Indeed, the actual process of delivery demands work of the most intense and physical kind: labor of 12 or more grueling hours of contractions is not uncommon.
Abortion prohibitions violate the Amendment's guarantee of personal liberty, because forced pregnancy and childbirth, by compelling the woman to serve the fetus, creates "that control by which the personal service of one man [sic] is disposed of or coerced for another's benefit which is the essence of involuntary servitude." Such laws violate the amendment's guarantee of equality, because forcing women to be mothers makes them into a servant caste, a group which is held subject to a special duty to serve others and not themselves.
Having a right to life does not guarantee a right to the use of another person's body -- even if one needs it for life itself.
While the pregnant woman is not serving at the fetus' command -- it is the state that supplies the element of coercion -- she is nevertheless serving involuntarily for the fetus' benefit, and this is what the Court should have said that the amendment forbids.
If I remember correctly, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg advocated for reproductive rights based not on the right to privacy but on the 13th amendment. She didn’t think the privacy argument was strong enough to withstand appeals.
I have argued for years that—since the civil war—there are two instances where the government sets aside bodily autonomy and seizes the person of an adult. The first is when it sends someone to prison. The second is when a woman becomes pregnant. My question is not whether the 13th or 14th amendment is more germane. My question is how the state ever forced its way into this decision.
I suppose it’s a part of the time when American society considered women as chattel. But surely, as that has changed, we should take a look at removing this issue from examination by judges, legislators, or any other external authority.
I think this is a stronger base to build these rights on.
Well maybe it is sexist of me to say this, but women fight differently than men. We must decide we will not tolerate this oppression. Think more Harriet Tubman and less Gen Grant.
Women are not loaded with testosterone....But, Nancy Pelosi: she was a women who could fight fight fight. Still at it.
I suggest that on Jan 6 we witnessed the first first confrontation in the new civil war!
Racist and anti-Semitic terrorists have used weapons against innocent citizens!
Red controlled state legislatures have declared war on the voting rights of vulnerable citizens!
The Robert’s stench court has declared women are second class citizens by their DOBBS DECISION!
The orange creature , doing his impression of a dictator, preaches defiance of laws and those who serve in the court system!
Each of you can add to this list of instances of the ongoing civil war in this country!
GOP Nihilists without a plan other than rewrite the constitution, a version based on hate, fear and greed. Add religion and the support base grows in self rightousness.
The majority has work to do to prevent the overturn of our democracy.
For sure, but it does well to recall that the Northern states were more like a coalition of various views, with slavery pro and con a bit of a mixed bag. This was likely why, having "won the war", northern politician gradually caved in Reconstruction more esp, post. Initially, Lincoln emphasized he wasn't trying to eliminate slavery in the South, just prevent its expansion, and that was a clarion call for secession in the South. Lincoln lost electoral support after his anti-slavery proclamation in the summer of 62 - then came 1863 and later, with black troops augmenting the Union armies.
How Civil Wars Start, and How to Stop Them- dr Barbara Walter, PhD poly sci University of San Diego. It’s the right book to read for the Herd.
Do you realize that by 1854, the majority of Americans had understood for ten years that their country was headed to war with itself. Give credit where credit is due. Remember the Alamo.
Trump's mad, disheveled mind is old-hat. HCR is often as a Yankee, press officer distributing Biden points without much reference to his bearhug of Netanyahu's destruction of Gaza and more than 25 thousand deaths of mostly Palestinian women and children as well as Biden's approval of the massive Willow oil-drilling project on Alaska’s remote North Slope.
The US' binary choice between the disheveled fascist and the old-fashioned, do-gooder is in a below, sorry-state condition.
The questions for me are of and by the people. How many Americans would actually vote for Trump, and how many of them would fight for him? What is the data and the analysis of the state of the people? May we go further away from Trump in the coming months? How many of the American people has he captured?
HCR's loyalty to democracy has been for me a single-vision via Biden, without the capability or scope to dig for a sense of the country's disheveled populous.
How may this population be reached? So far, neither Biden's team or the Democratic Party have their messages about Trump and their own missions ready for prime time -- a sorry state, indeed!
Fern, While I expect HCR fully is aware of the urgent causes and actions that demand our attention, I also expect she recognizes that our work, in large part, both must be guided by, and also must call upon us repeatedly to amplify, a fundamental truth: Whatever one’s first issue of concern, rising up for freedom and democracy had better be one’s second. Because without preserving our constitutional republic, progress of any kind is far less likely.
Your expectations and beliefs in HCR's understanding are not the same for all of us. I'm not aware that my comment questioned preserving our constitutional republic. You seemed to me to have mushed a bunch of principles together in your support for an infallible HCR, whom I believe to be accomplished and admirable.
Fern, To be clear, I sense that Heather’s LFAA is the product of a system of prioritization that has led her to prioritize values that in her mind would best serve the greater good, given the potential undoing of the revolutionary promise of the republic.
Your persistence, Barbara Jo Krieger, in representing what you 'sense' to be HRC's priorities, cannot match her own account of them, but thank you for your efforts.
Fern, Admittedly, I’m not inside Heather’s head. Accordingly, I rely upon my skill in textual interpretation to extrapolate intent.
Barbara, with further consideration of your 'textual interpretations' and 'extrapolations' of HCR's Letters, it is as though the Letters are prescriptions for how we, subscribers, of this newsletter '...would best serve the greater good, given the potential undoing of the revolutionary promise of the republic.' to quote you. To my mind your interpretation invests enormous belief in HCR's foresight and, perhaps, not enough of the independent thinking and judgement we bring to the table.
Fern, The Letters hardly are prescriptive nor do they preclude independent thought. As stated, they simply, in my view, lay the groundwork for a fundamental truth: namely that preserving our constitutional republic is preservative of every other opportunity.
I think Biden's embrace is of the idea of Israel, certainly not Netanyahu. There is no love lost between those two, and while he does regrettably not make a lot of public noise about the rift, I think he is pressuring as best he can. Given that Netanyahu (and Putin) --not to mention freaking Jamie Dimon--long for the return of the trumpanzee, this is going to be an ugly tightrope that has to be walked.
I totally agree. Netanyahu is the Israeli Trump.
I am gobsmacked about Jamie Dimon's statement. tffg got to him too or he wants a piece of the potential administration should tffg ever get reelected.
Another Geitner. The best treasury secretary that Wall Street can buy.
"Biden's embrace is of the idea of Israel": we all had an idea of the ideal of Israel. That was the romantic origin story; that is/was in the past. Israel has become a nation out of control with the support of the most powerful country in the world. They have become arrogant and selfish, on their way to being hated in that region and beyond. The USA has stepped into a mess that could force us into WW3.
And Dimon at one time did insist his bank was not discriminatory.
Under Dimon, his bank over the years has paid several billions of dollars in fines for bad business practices, yet he continues to reap tens of millions of $$$ in bonuses!
Makes no sense that he is perceived as the wizard of banking!!!??
Hoping he turns out to be the 21st century version of Jack Welch: praised as "genius" until his true nature became too obvious to ignore.
There are levers, in addition to the bear hug of Netanyahu, that may be used by Biden, other than talk. People within the administration, including the department of state, have found fault with Biden's lack of action with reference to Israel's conduct of the war.
I don't know what Jamie Dimon is up to. He may be eyeing a political life for himself as Biden has not come close to capturing the approval of even a small majority of American voters.
I think Biden enjoys a larger measure of approval than is generally appreciated.
Jamie Dimon? He's just another rich whore who lies tax cuts for the very wealthy. I think he'd have a far smaller chance in politics than Bloomberg did.
I agree and I think you can be forgiven for not providing footnotes and formal attributions. This is a very good Comments section, but it doesn’t have to be a place for academic precision. If it was, there would be very few posts here at all!
What is your basis for thinking that '...Biden enjoys a larger measure of approval than is generally appreciated'?
Many of the people disapprove of Biden for many different reasons. His age, his inability to control Netanyahu. That the price of a Snickers Bar is still too high, and that his DOJ didn’t put Trump in jail two years ago, will probably vote for him as Trump continues to get meaner and crazier. The Dems have to make sure the people who voted for Biden before vote for him again.
It's not up to the US President to do any "action" in regards to Israel's conduct of the war, as abhorent as Netanyahu's actions have been. To cry for the Palestenians who (1) allowed Hamas to take control, bring in weapons, built a bunker under the hospital and (2) started the war, is a cry against war itself. Neither side is innocent, but Israel had the right to protect itself. Netanyahu needs to be promptly voted out by Israel's people and negotiations for peace need to be started.
Any guess how long that will take? And, by then, in Gaza?? Will they all be dead from killing, untreated wounds, disease or starvation? Israel will suffer no consequences....just get more land for settlements.
And, be hated in that region and beyond.
Israel suffered consequences when hamas attacked in the first place -- hitting a festival of mostly young people. Cold hearted, and knowing Israel would counter attack and hamas having no regard themselves for what was going to happen to the Palenstinians. War sucks.
Fern. This country has too many Jamie Dimons.
Yes, Frankom, the growth of billionaires in the US has been rich!
'The collective fortune of America's 741 billionaires has grown to $5.2 trillion at the end of November 2023, the highest amount ever recorded according to an analysis by Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF)' See link below.
https://americansfortaxfairness.org/u-s-billionaires-now-worth-record-5-2-trillion/#:~:text=The%20collective%20fortune%20of%20America's,for%20Tax%20Fairness%20(ATF).
'The 400 Richest People In America ; 1. Elon Musk. $251 B ; 2. Jeff Bezos. $161 B ; 3. Larry Ellison. $158 B ; 4. Warren Buffett. $121 B ; 5. Larry Page. $114 B' (Forbes)
Jamie Dimons: Salary for the year's worth of "work"...36million.
WTF does anyone do with the kind of wealth except wield power over others a lot less wealthy.
Well said Jen!!!
We still don't seem to grasp that the Israeli right wing—and our support of it—is a threat to world peace.
Progwoman, Because people both here and abroad are hopeful that the case against Israel brought by South Africa before the International Court of Justice will have a positive outcome, pre-planning already is underway for global standouts to mark an unprecedented moment in history when Israel is held accountable before the world.
Folks in Israel are continuing to uprise against Netanyahu, including families of the hostages.
Folks in Israel have known since day one that their government does not give a damn about hostages. On day one, Israel started bombing; did they know or care where the hostages were? No and no. Hostages are better dead than alive which then leads to negotiations over their release.
They have a policy to kill a hostage being captured so they don't have to deal with negotiations...It's called The Hannibal Directive. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannibal_Directive)
Israelis are guilty of wanting to live without terrorist attacks. The Palestinians have had many opportunities to live in peace but chose to terrorize Israelis. The two states can only exist with a guarantee of security for both. Hamas has had no interest in helping their own people instead of building tunnels and arming themself for they are committed to eliminating Israel. Which makes negotiating with Hamas impossible. As for the argument of land that is occupied and should be returned. No country has ever returned lands once taken over. Should the American indigenous people get their land back? The Palestinians have paid dearly for their constant terrorizing of Israelis. Israel's reaction to being terrorized has cost them their international reputation. There could be a coalition of Arab States that could back a Palestinian State and provide security for both the Palestinians and Israel. Maybe something good from something terrible.
What nobody seems to be acknowledging is the impossibility of a non-contiguous Palestinian state. We have only to look at how that worked with Pakistan and what became Bangladesh, to see how important it is. I see no way for a Palestinian state to exist in two separate places separated by 50-100 miles, which is precisely Israel’s intent, to divide and conquer. If that assumption is correct, then the only solution is a one state combination of Israelis and Palestinians, but that would necessitate Israel ceasing to be a religious state and become an all encompassing secular state, where all parties interests are protected. It doesn’t matter what god you pray too or even if you pray to one at all, all people deserve the right to live their lives without fear of persecution, the situation we are watching unfold there is testament to the failure of the state to support that idea.
Can you imagine them getting along after all this? There is probably no Palestinian who has not had a close family member slaughtered in this "war". The Israeli's have been taught from a childhood that Palestinians are dirty animals. What is going to happen with all the very established settlements in the West Bank? Will those Israels just hand them over? Where in Israel will Palestinians live? Can they afford a house or apartment? Most of the working age men have no jobs, therefore no wives. There are no solutions. That is what Israel wants. NO solutions. Ever.
Oh, please! Israel has attacked Palestinians and built illegal settlements on the minimal territory allotted to Palestinians after they were driven from their villages and urban areas. Gaza is/was a concentration camp controlled by Israel. The Palestinians are not animals to be penned up and held in inhuman conditions, even if Israelis have been taught that they are. Israel has always wanted and planned for them to be all dead and gone. Some object to this with violent actions. Wouldn't you?
As far as giving American Indians their land back? Too late for that. That was the past. This is NOW.
'There are so many brush fires and so many players with matches in the region that it is not hard to imagine the conflict deteriorating into something even deadlier. Israel continues to hammer Hamas in Gaza while exchanging fire across the Lebanese border with Hezbollah, taking on two groups backed by Iran, even as American troops fight with Houthis in Yemen and militias in Iraq and Syria. Iran blamed Israel for an airstrike on Damascus, Syria, on Saturday that killed five Iranian military figures. Iran for its part has fired missiles into Iraq, Syria and Pakistan, prompting Pakistan to mount its own airstrike against Iran.' (NYT, excerpt(
'Mr. Biden’s team is trying to manage all those flashpoints at the same time it is trying to find a way to press Israel to scale back its war against Hamas to a more surgical operation with fewer civilian casualties. So far, according to Gaza health officials, more than 25,000 people have been killed, some of them Hamas combatants but most of them women and children.'
'A senior Biden administration official was leaving for the region on Sunday to seek a new agreement between Israel and Hamas to release some or all of the 120 hostages still believed to be held in exchange for at least a pause in the fighting, according to two American officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because of diplomatic sensitivities.'
'The official, Brett McGurk, the president’s Middle East coordinator, planned to travel to Cairo to meet with Abbas Kamel, the chief of Egypt’s General Intelligence Service and widely considered the nation’s second-most-powerful official. As part of the trip, previously reported by Axios, Mr. McGurk will also head to Doha, Qatar, to meet with the country’s prime minister, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani.'
'At the same time, administration officials said they were worried the conflict in the region might be getting worse, not better.'
“We have to guard against and be vigilant against the possibility that, in fact, rather than heading towards de-escalation, we are on a path of escalation that we have to manage,” Jake Sullivan, the president’s national security adviser, said last week during an appearance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.'
“It remains a central locus of our strategy,” he added. “Try to ensure that we manage escalation across the Middle East to the maximum extent possible, taking every possible measure that we can in that regard, and ultimately get on a path of diplomacy and de-escalation.” (NYTimes) Sorry that a gifted link could not be provided.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/21/us/politics/us-militias-tipping-point.html
Fern...I've read several of your comments and I would like to suggest that only now has the full extent of Netanyahu's extreme right wing administration brutality and genocide been uncloaked by the Hamas attack. And that the US support of Isreal is ingrained in decades of US foriegn policy that cannot be turned on a dime. I am sure you've been paying attention and have seen media reporting of Blinken and Bidens effort to pull back that brutal response and their part in negotiating humanitarian aid. And I am sure....they are much more demanding behind closed doors, than is reported.
This is not nothing! It is big! Our support of Isreal, this time, is different. We have ignored Israeli encroachment and unlawful attacks on Palestinian citizens for decades. Furthermore, Biden and Blinken alone are not solely responsible for US response to the conflict as Congress is the only body that can fund aid, and I'm sure you have noticed it has become a divided body on that issue.
What is it that you would like the US to do? Rather than blame....contact you respresentives...protest. Help with humanitarian aid from the US. Contact agencies and entities fighting for a two state solution.
Accusations and blaming never change anything.
well said Susan.
Hamas brutally murdered over a thousand people as part of their explicit aim of wiping out Israel and all Jews. They acted on behalf of their stated genocidal aims, filmed it, and announced they would do it again. They are thugs who have been brutalizing the people of Gaza for 15 years.
It's tough to provide for those in a prison when the warden is brutally cruel.
Susan, thank you for your attention to this crucial subject. My comments are generally supported by journalistic reports and analysis. Venting, accusations and blaming are not features of my content or style. Salud!
Fern, Thank you for providing this detailed, blow-by blow account underscoring how violence is spinning out of control in the Middle East. That said, I find Jake Sullivan’s remedy noted in your final paragraph so generalized as to be virtually useless.
In my view, de-escalation in the region starts with a regional compact, with the U.S. playing a vital role, such that Palestinians have a path to freedom and can see that an ethical resistance, not what happened on October 7th, but an ethical fight for its rights, is working.
The fact that a gift link was not provided means that NYT reserves the right to reprint. This is copyrighted material. I don't think you mean to break the law, but simply to pass along info. But that is the law. If NYT is aware of it, they are simply giving you a pass (or they may look at this as free advertising, or not worth the trouble). But if they do decide to take action, you would be liable of illegally reprinting their copy. Word to the wise, Fern. You COULD paraphrase and attribute to the source with a full citation.
progwoman,
You are correct, however, Biden DOES recognize where much of his campaign money comes from, hence, his support for the destruction and genocide taking place in Gaza.
So, world peace might be threatened but Biden's campaign contributions are NOT.
Mike S. I get your point and it is depressing that Biden may not be perfect as he may be our last chance to keep a democracy. November 24 is coming soon.
Silly comment.
You say Jews are controlling the government through money? Your Klan membership and white hood are in the mail. Does it even occur to you that there may be factors you are not considering?
Half of Israel had been in the streets weekly for months, protesting the right wing government.
Hamas interrupted all that with its brutal slaughter of 1200 civilians, including rape, and taking of hundreds of hostages, babies to eighties, who have been kept in terrible conditions and sometimes murdered. Neither the UN nor the International Red Cross have lifted a pinky to object to any of it or visit the hostages. The stated and restated mission of Hamas, which is the government of Gaza, is to destroy Israel and kill all Jews worldwide. That mission is openly genocide. Their actions of October 7, mass murder in dehumanizing ways, acted on it.
Israel has a right to defend itself. Too much of the world has an attitude that terror and military attacks on Israel are no big deal, murdered Israelis are minor, there’s only a problem when Israel fights back. If some group took over Mexico and launched an attack that killed more than a thousand people across the border in Texas, what do you suppose would happen next?
Hamas is an odd choice for progressives to defend. Hamas hides in 350 miles of tunnels it built and supplied with materials stolen from humanitarian aid sent to Gazans. No civilians are allowed in those tunnels. Hamas hides behind civilians, shoots civilians who decline to be human shields. After Hamas won one election, they proceeded to throw their political opponents off buildings. They do the same to gay people, and to women who act differently than they prescribe.
I see a discussion that includes Hamas and Israel. I see nothing that suggests that progressives are defending Hamas. I do see posts that speak of the torn feelings about the Israeli response being out of proportion and the concern that Netanyahu is prolonging the war for his own purposes (staying in power). Not every post about those things needs to also mention Hamas- though I do see many posts talking about Hamas not representing the interests of Palestinians, and concern that Israel is adding to their excesses with more destruction and killing of civilians. This latter is a perspective shared by a large share (if not the majority of Israelis). The argument is not whether Hamas is a problem. It is what the heck do we do in order to bring this to a state where we can move toward stopping this madness.
When I say "we", I am talking about the roles that each party plays in moving to cease fire and what lies beyond. Part of the discussion is the appropriate role that the US, a third nation among others, plays, and how Biden interacts to hopefully create a political buffer to moderate reactionary actions on both sides. That is not the same thing as "defending Hamas", something you seem to have read into the complexity of opinions being expressed as we struggle in our conversations to understand what is going on.
Now hopefully, we can remember that all these comments are taking place on Letter From An American, during the muddle of really awkward reporting about an ever more off-the-charts weird primary season just getting underway.
Annie, I like your perspective.
Perhaps the posts demonizing Israel and support for Israel didn’t strike you as they did me. One person referred to the Hamas massacre of October 7 as an action they approved that supposedly ‘uncloaked’ Israeli genocide. Mass murder reveals that the people killed were genocidal? There’s more, I’m not ‘reading in’ to see it, but I have no stomach for repeating more of it. There is also thoughtful discussion, including from you, for which I am grateful.
Thank you, Joan. I jumped over most of that thread so I probably missed the posts you are referring to, which I agree are disgusting and offensive. I think that whole thread was out of place and inappropriate. Today those were at the top of LFAA by the time I came in, and they grew rapidly tiresome, so after posting that post, I just wheeled down until I got to letters actually responding to Heather's column. I value LFAA and wish people would remember what it is about (American history and it's influence on current American affairs), and respect it by sticking to the theme of Heather's Letter of the Day. I read a lot, and people who want to get extensively into other topics should perhaps find one of the many substack columns where that is the topic of discussion.
I am giving thought to what I am subscribed to, and though I appreciate being part of the LFAA community, it has gotten repetitive and time-consuming and too often just petty. When half of it is off-topic, I don't get much out of it. I'll continue to read the letter, but I'll let my paid subscription go when it runs out in March. More of my stuff is being picked up elsewhere now, with some direct requests coming in. I'm getting started with action too, and it's time to focus more on getting out the vote and raising awareness.
Though I'm not fond of Facebook, LFAA has a great community there too. Many of the people I most appreciate here are also on other substack columns I frequent too (such as Hubbell and Vance and Simon Rosenburg). It's been a hard decision to make, after being here from the beginning, and there are people I'll miss. You are one of them.
They are a very scary cult.
Are you advocating for support of the democratic majority in Israel? Or do you support the Hamas-Iran-Putin enemies of Israel?
I'm advocating that the democratic government of the United States of which I am a citizen place restrictions upon our aid to Israel until it restrains from wholesale slaughter of people in Palestine and restrains from annihilation of Palestinian settlements in Gaza and the West Bank.
Fern, you know that you have my respect and admiration.
But the phrase Biden's "bearhug of Netanyahu's destruction of Gaza" is a misrepresentation. It is not consistent with the president's continuous efforts to get Israel to address the Hamas problem with minimal civilian casualties.
And perhaps we should mention that the administration has been stressing the need for a two state solution for Israel and Palestine. Insisting over and over.
Joseph Biden is not the president of Israel. Bibi the butcher is. His government betrays the peaceful culture of most Israelis. His coalition of ultra orthodox, ultra bigoted Muslim haters is his only way to stay out of jail.
And the elephant in the room? As long as Hamas exists, rockets will be fired into Israel. Civilians will be running into their safe rooms as they have for decades. Bombs will be exploded in markets. Jews will be hunted as they have always been hunted.
I completely agree that the devastation and deaths in Gaza are wrong. But I have yet to hear anyone come up with another solution to the fact that Hamas is committed to the deaths or expulsion of all Jews in Israel. It's as if Hitler had been reborn and regrouped in tunnels under hospitals, schools and refugee camps. How do you combat such behavior?
Maybe all those smart folks in the UN could cobble together a force that could enter Gaza and somehow magically find the originators of a genocide against Jews? Oh, but wait, that won't happen, because Russia will veto it. Russia, who partners with Iran who funds the Hamas cowards who hide behind their own children.
Ultimately, if we zoom out and look at Israel, we see a nation, that is in the view of many, over reacting. But I hear crickets when it comes to what MUST ultimately occur if there is to be peace in that region: the complete dismantling and/or removal of Hamas. An organization that Arab nations do not want in their countries. Has Egypt welcomed Gazan civilians while all this has been happening? No! Why? They fear Hamas.
Bibi is a brutal monster wannabe dictator. His destruction of Gaza is criminal. Hamas is an organization with a manifesto that would welcome another Holocaust. It can't be allowed to exist.
Anyone here who has some good suggestions on how all this can be sorted without bloodshed, please weigh in.
Thank you, Bill, for the reminder that there are no simple answers in this situation that has been stewing since the establishment of Israel. My heart breaks for those on both sides who want to live in peace, and I am filled with anger at the leaders on both sides who are willing to wreak such destruction while keeping themselves and their family tucked away in safety.
I agree with you. It is easy to moan about what Biden is not doing. I too hate the destruction of war. If there was an easy solution to this vexing issue it would likely be resolved. Playing arm chair quarterback is not helpful.
I can't imagine a path forward especially with the media in such shambles.
Dear Bill,
A fine analysis! One sits and wonders , why oh why do some need so much power and need to fuel it with hate?
In the 70’s I was lucky to be hand picked to oversee the Press Plane that carried a marvelous group of journalists to accompany President Carter while he and Begin and Sadat hammered out the peace agreement between their countries. The final agreement was signed on my birthday in 1979 at Camp David. Sanity prevailed.... how the world bounced back and forth and back and forth since then mainly for the whim of men in need of power!
When I say men I do not exclude women. Look at the “pro-choice” movement being denigrated by so called Godly women. It isn’t enough that these power hungry and angry people have” choice”, they seem to need to dissolve that same “Choice” for others.
My husband and I just watched a powerfully well done film called”The Serpent Queen” shown on Starz.
As my husband says, in response to my anger and frustration.... the more we change the more we stay the same.
Is this what being a “human animal” means?
Just going from how to destroy ourselves and others in the name of power and hate?And the irony of finding someone(“God” )to blame it all on.
I wish I were so magnificent as to have an answer that would be heard. Until then stand together in sanity and in being about survival, not destruction!
Afternoon Bill,
I write in response to your invitation to “weigh in.”
Paraphrasing commentary from scholars whose names, regrettably, I don’t recall, I have become increasingly convinced that U.S. leadership’s acceptance of a ceasefire largely will rely on its recognizing that the only way Hamas ultimately will be weakened and made an irrelevant political force is if Palestinians have a path to freedom and can see that an ethical resistance, not what happened on October 7th, but an ethical fight for its rights, is working.
Considering U.S. leadership, after Hamas’s brutal attack, had repeatedly underscored America’s hopes that Israel not repeat our mistakes, perhaps enough of those at the top might be receptive to the advantages of viewing the situation through this restructured lens.
Yes. But as long as Netanyahu refuses to consider such ideas, he will be a blockade to peace. His "toughness" and his brutality is weakening Israel. I hope Israelis will send him packing soon.
What if Israel immediately invited the UN to assist Gazans in establishing their own governing body sans Hamas. Chances are Hamas would attack their own.
Hamas is a cancer.
Bill, Seeing Netanyahu says he opposes the creation of a Palestinian state after the Gaza war, I concur with progressives in Congress who say the U.S. should “reset relationship of unconditional support” for Israel. Moreover, notwithstanding support from Markey and Warren, I can’t accept the U.S. Senate voting down Bernie Sanders’ resolution to freeze U.S. military aid to Israel if the State Department failed to produce a report on whether Israel was committing human rights violations in Gaza.
I voted for Bernie. I am aligned with him on many if not most issues. And I see the logic of trying to use freezing aid to Israel. But I believe it's much more complicated than that. Any Israeli military weakness will be seen as an opportunity for Hamas to continue firing rockets at Israeli cities - it's still happening! and nobody mentions this! Israeli weakness could escalate their efforts at extermination. And simultaneously, Hezbollah has been and could increase further it's incursions and rocket fire from the north.
There is a lot that the right wing extremists in Israel are doing that should be condemned. The attacks on Palestinians by "settlers" in the West Bank make me furious. The land stolen from folks who have lived there for generations should be returned.
But stepping back and looking at the bigger geopolitical picture, I see only one democracy in the Middle East. And I see forces from multiple directions pledged to it's demise.
A world where justice ruled would have seen a neutral UN with boots on the ground in Israel and the Palestinian territories.
How can Palestinians have a path to freedom if they are being relentlessly bombed and have no food, shelter, water, medical supplies?
Judith, Were you to read the full exchange between me and Bill you would find my perspective entails 1) conditioning continued U.S. military aid to Israel upon agreement to a ceasefire and to the creation of a Palestinian state and 2) launching a Middle East regional compact, with the U.S. playing a vital role, such that, as stated, Palestinians would have a path to freedom and could see that an ethical resistance, not what happened on October 7th, but an ethical fight for its rights, were working.
Briefly stated, in my view, resolution boils down to U.S. leadership exerting leverage that currently is being withheld.
I don’t know the exact history but haven’t US presidents sent highly qualified men over to find a way towards peace. And, haven’t the Israelis just continued to build more settlements in the West Bank? It seems that Israel is resolute in its determination to take over every square inch. It was a terrible thing to send some and then all Jews to a country inhabited by another people. The colonizers just played fast and free with the non-western countries they controlled.
Your defense of Biden's ineffective talk, talk, talk and lack of action with reference to Israel's conduct of the war as it has played out in Gaza as well as attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank is as effective as Biden's, Bill. Their has been strong criticism around the world and the UN as well as in the United States of Biden's positions with reference to Israel. You have strong opinions. I am not of a mind to provide you with oodles of links to reports on Israel's conduct of the war; you are able to do that yourself; seek more and you shall find.
I hear you. And I would like to hear from you and anyone else what the Americans and the American president should do now.
How does an American reign in someone like Netanyahu? And how does America simultaneously guarantee the safety of Israeli Jews and Arabs who have been coexisting peacefully and only want to survive and help their children thrive?
Let the Israelis remove Netanyahu from office. A big "let".
Last I heard 75% of Israelis want him gone. Why they are waiting so long must have to do with fear of losing continuity during a war. But the war has no end in sight.
There should be an election now, and Bibi should be a citizen who can be charged with corruption. No more hiding under the covers of power.
He needs to go! Saner heads should prevail.
Vivian Silver was a friend of friends of mine. A Canadian who moved to Israel as a young woman, she lived in a farming community and devoted decades to working for peace. Vivian was a cofounder of Women Wage Peace. She was missing after October 7 and presumed a hostage - until her DNA was identified from a bone in the ashes of her home.
Tragic. So many good people have gotten swept up on both sides....and, in all of these violent "disagreements".
How should Biden and the Democrats get their word out? Not in the NYT obviously, nor even NPR, their negative Biden bias is astonishing. Many local TV stations are owned by conservative Sinclair, the rest are primarily entertainment pretending to be news. Most people don’t read the local newspapers either. Put Biden ads in blue states so we can see they are doing something? That would feel good, but be a waste of dollars that needs to be spent in red and purple states. The Biden ads coming out in those states are remarkable and pull no punches. See Robert Hubbell’s substack, he often links them. The word has to gets out from all of us. Speak up, vote, help register voters, work with GOTV (get out the vote), write postcards, give money etc. Democrats are historically notorious for not voting, where Republicans do vote.
I’m struck by the Democrats who are so distraught they can’t feel joy, already looking for the exits if Trump gets elected, the ones who refuse to hear, or discuss, any unpleasantness. Most Americans are good people who care deeply about our country. I think we’re tough enough to get engaged and do the work of saving it.
Cancel your subscriptions like I did! It only hurts for a day or two.
Frankly, I'm afraid to talk to my sister about the threat our country would be under if that beast gets even near the Oval Office! I love my sister, (wife of a high-end CPA) and don't want to lose her. Also, I'm afraid of the MAGA's out there because they're so loud, mean, and nasty. Plus, they have guns! There's got to be more than MSNBC, PBS, and CNN. At least David Muir on World News Tonight tells the truth in facts. When I drove cross-country last year, nearly every hotel lobby had Fox News on, and I had to go on a deep search to find MSNBC in my room. I'm happy to write & send postcards, but isn't that preaching to the choir?
Not at all. You’d be encouraging Dems and left leaning Independents to GO VOTE. Right now Santos seat in NY is up for special election. A Democrat could win that seat, maybe flip the House blue, if people actually turn out and vote.
See Hopium Chronicles by Simon Rosenberg for some of the data you seek
Great letters by Simon!
Thank you, Grace. In the future, it would be helpful to provide a link to the information you suggested.
https://open.substack.com/pub/simonwdc/p/with-democrats-things-get-better-73e?r=3hkyi&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
Fern McBride (NYC), “Let she who is without sin…etc.”. Above, you asserted, without attribution, “People within the administration, including the department of state, have found fault with Biden's lack of action with reference to Israel's conduct of the war.”
I agree that Biden’s actions can be criticized by reasonable people such as yourself, but I worry that we’re underestimating the limitations he’s subject to. Mehdi Hasan whom I trust and respect has said, “Biden could end this war with a phone call.” Apparently, past presidents have been able to do that, but in these times Biden may not have that option.
And I agree it’s good to back up what we say, but posts in a Comments section, even if it’s an unusually good one like this is, don’t have to be ready for rigorous, exacting review, do they?
With little time to spare, here are some links for you, Alan:
'Dissent, and a generation gap, inside the Biden administration over the Israel-Hamas war
When civilians began dying in Gaza, said one U.S. official, “we all know the tools they used to kill them,” referring to Israeli weapons supplied by the U.S.'
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/dissent-generation-gap-biden-administration-israel-hamas-war-rcna127358
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/11/26/biden-white-house-divisions-israel-gaza/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/01/19/senate-democrats-question-biden-israel/
Thanks. I’ll read these, but I wasn’t asking for proof. Just saying, “What’s good for the goose….etc.”. You might’ve been holding other Commenters to a standard you don’t always follow. Admittedly, my point is not that big a deal. 😀
Always.
We area party to genocide,
Be careful with the use of the word genocide, regardless of South Africa's claim. One can condemn Israel for the huge loss of life, but calling it genocide it is not.
I think Biden’s trying to keep blood off our troop’s hands. You know? The humans who do combat and die, so that you can safely type on Heather’s comment section and bash Biden
Heather has often stated that she is not an expert on the Middle East. She is an historian of these United States and, particularly of the Republican Party. As such, she doesn't feel qualified to speak on Israeli policies.
There are plenty of low integrity so-called journalists and pundits willing to share their thoughts without a good foundation of facts. That's called having an agenda.
Excellent comments Fern, you make feel less alone.
Dear Nora, we have all felt alone during this very challenging and dangerous time. I felt that way today as I pointed to what I believed to be HCR's completely uncritical view of Biden. I am a supporter of his, but consider it strange of that sometimes the forum feels to be a cheerleading squad for whatever HCR or Biden presents. With admiration and gratitude to them both, they cannot be infallible. It is part of our role as engaged citizens to aware of the strengths, attention, inattention and weaknesses of our leaders, so that we may be heard and encourage their best.
I am not a fan of Biden mainly his foreign policy which I find abhorrent. I think the Democrats could have a much better choice and he is too old. His polling and approval rates should terrify people. The two times she interviewed him she had such wimpy questions and just completely avoided foreign policy if I remembering him right. I keep hoping a better choice will come up. I am not worried about myself but am very worried for the future and my son and nieces and nephews. Thanks for being able to comment and disagree in a respectful way.
Nora, we are in sync about being thoughtful citizens, not automatons ruled by the positions of people we respect or not. Biden has accomplished a good deal as president in support of most Americans. He seemed much more in the hands of cooperate interests when he was the senator representing the state of Delaware. Biden's behavior as head of the judiciary committee during Clarence Thomas' confirmation hearing, along with Anita Hill's accusations against Thomas was abysmal. He has come a great distance.
I have appreciated this exchange with you, thank you.
Who do you read who is currently doing what you propose HCR should be doing? Anyone else on Substack or another analyst of who does the balancing from today's news with "the capability or scope to dig for a sense of the country's disheveled populous?" Or, are you suggesting that HCR should change her focus or pose clearer opinions on where these bits of in-process history she brings in her daily post should or could go? To you concern, she has been doing this reporting steadily for several years. Are you wanting her to interpret that history now? Change from recorder of significant happenings in this multi-year period and become a shaper of a course toward saving our democracy? Curious.
Fred, your questions to me are very worthwhile. I do not have time tonight to answer them but may find the time tomorrow and or on Wednesday to give them some of the time they deserve.
Generally, I have begun to believe that given the dire need for us to find ways to secure democracy in the US, HCR was falling back in using Biden's policies as the default position of some recent letters. Any weaknesses or faults in Biden were either not recognized or addressed in the letters. There seemed to be scant attention to the American people and very frequent us v. them Letters that I found repetitive. I have and will support Biden for the presidency, but I thought that HCR has been addressing his work with an uncritical eye. The letters sometimes read more like the thoughtful notes of an advocate than one by a historian.
On occasion the forum has the feel of a cheerleading team for Biden and HCR. and or a venting assembly. A friend recently wrote, '... the comment section is drowning in flowers.' Historians Timothy Snyder and Anne Applebaum are two of the writers that I follow. I have a high opinion of Ishaan Tharoor, a columnist on the foreign desk of The Washington Post, where he authors the Today's WorldView newsletter and column. In addition, I subscribe to The Atlantic Magazine, The New Yorker and the New York Review of Books. I must say goodbye for now, Fred.
Exactly.
The 13th Amendment abolishing slavery should be used as a legal basis for the right to an abortion. Restrictions on abortion and the resulting forced pregnancies are disturbingly suggestive of involuntary servitude: forced pregnancy requires a woman to provide continuous physical service to the fetus in order to further the state's asserted interest. Indeed, the actual process of delivery demands work of the most intense and physical kind: labor of 12 or more grueling hours of contractions is not uncommon.
Abortion prohibitions violate the Amendment's guarantee of personal liberty, because forced pregnancy and childbirth, by compelling the woman to serve the fetus, creates "that control by which the personal service of one man [sic] is disposed of or coerced for another's benefit which is the essence of involuntary servitude." Such laws violate the amendment's guarantee of equality, because forcing women to be mothers makes them into a servant caste, a group which is held subject to a special duty to serve others and not themselves.
Having a right to life does not guarantee a right to the use of another person's body -- even if one needs it for life itself.
While the pregnant woman is not serving at the fetus' command -- it is the state that supplies the element of coercion -- she is nevertheless serving involuntarily for the fetus' benefit, and this is what the Court should say that the amendment forbids........................
Folks: C/C this so you can post it also.
Thank you. I think the comments are correct. Its legalized slavery.
I believe control by government of what one chooses for personal health and safety and well being is expressing the state’s ownership of all three of those individual rights as a human being.
This control is enslavement.
We do “control” badly and painfully inadequate in our efforts.
A government that can enslave an American pregnant woman can expand that with such legalese to other challenging situations involving women. This is the big fight!
Enslaving another person strips away what’s most dear from a human being.
The offspring of these involuntary servitudes can exclaim that they were born of a slave!
What is a child called whose mother was not married: a bastard.
Where did many of these bastards end up: in orphanages.
Where do most unwanted black children end up? With their impoverished Mother because she knows the chances of their being adopted are slim to zero.
Do the lunatics on the Supreme Court reckon there will less need for families to adopt abroad when there are white babies they can buy at home.
What about Male Accountability in this? Why do the men who impregnated the woman get to just walk away?
Because men control the world and make the rules. From the get-go they made the rules in religions. And, in governments.
Only in our short little equal rights times did we women start to think we had equal rights. Guess we were wrong. And, the women who are against the right to an abortion, they have just drunken the Kool-Aid ladled out by men's religions.
As I have posted here: Women should collect DNA and ID from every sex partner and then take them to court to support and raise (or keep!) the human they were forced through involuntary servitude to bring into the world. Why aren't law firms taking up this challenge?
Because Law Firms are run by Men!
If it were the case that if a woman choses to become pregnant and then changes her mind: I might say: whoa-Nelly! That would feel very wrong to me. Against the law? Not sure. But, a sex act that leads to an unwanted pregnancy, esp. with a contraception that fails" of course she should be able to "get rid of it".
I feel that the Supremes decided that I was a partial citizen - like 3/5ths. They are now putting the health, life and liberties at women are at risk. I consider them murderers
Carolyn, nobody that I’ve talked to wants to be forced to donate bone marrow to save a life. When I’ve asked what’s different in having the government tell a woman to put her health and life at risk to continue a pregnancy to save a life, I get silence. One person said that it is because an unborn baby is without sin. My counter was to ask if they wanted the government to require bone marrow donations to save children. Everyone has ended up saying that they’d never thought about it that way.
Arguing “my body, my choice” can too easily be corrupted by antiabortion people to seem to promote irresponsible sex. Putting it as the government forcing you to put your health at risk takes the sex out of the argument.
[Edited] Thank you. This is a variation of the statement I make when the subject arises: in no country in the world can you be forced to donate any part of your body, not even blood, not even to save a life. Yet the forced birthers demand that females donate their bodies for 9 months and their lives for at least 18 years, no matter what. The fact that men are 100% responsible for all pregnancies is not considered part of the equation.
Also, it's quite ironic that the forced birth crowd is also the anti-science crowd that wouldn't be able to enact their draconian bans without the advances of science that created transabdominal ultrasound.
Perhaps Kazuo Ishiguro was prescient about the direction the United States is headed under an extremist right wing government in his book “Never Let Me Go”. If forced birth is accepted, why not forced organ harvesting? Is this what we have to look forward to? That may sound hyperbolic, that is until you consider recent stories, like that of Kate Cox - who ever thought that could happen? Others controlling the medical state of our bodies without consent for the benefit of someone else, born or unborn.
The worst part about the government controlling the medical state of our bodies is that it's being done by people with absolutely zero knowledge of medicine or science. You'd think that being parents, which most of them are, would have taught them a thing or two about anatomy and physiology but they clearly thought all those babies were just god's little miracles /s/
I loved that book. Great comparison, thank you.
Agree with you that men make women pregnant, yet bear no responsibility, unless through legal marriage. My suggestion to our esteemed politicians: create laws that require the biological father to financially support their child for 50% of rent, food, healthcare, education through college, sports, summer camps, toys, books, haircuts, etc, etc. Those who call themselves “Christians” are so pro-life, but they don’t give a damn for the child once they’re born. Republicans want to take away Medicaid, food assistance through SNAP, public education in poorer communities is terrible, affordable housing is impossible to find. In the end, it’s all a ruse to keep women second class citizens and away from financial independence and power.
Is the motivation of those who voted to overturn Roe: cheap labor from the offspring of poor women and less competition for jobs from educated women?
You're on the right track. In November 1986 Reagan's White House Working Group on Family, led by that "good Christian," Gary Bauer, posited that it was welfare that led to childhood poverty and their solution was to not provide it for unwed mothers under 21 who did not live with their parents. That is NOT a typo. They said that families should have more children to guard against eventual depletion of the Social Security Trust Fund and a shortage of recruits for the armed forces. They also wanted states to rescind laws that made divorce easy. I know all this because I was so shocked that I cut the article out of the paper and kept it in my little box of keepsakes.
Gary Bauer: on family and-religious values..........Listen or read text.
https://archive.mpr.org/stories/1989/08/21/gary-bauer-on-family-and-religious-values
Holy Smokes! Too bad it isn't in todays papers where one can link, or C/C. I'm going to try to find it.
I totally believe some/many "good Christians" think this way. I decided a couple of decades ago that somehow the Christian label was a bit negative. Boy, was I right.
There are laws on the books to force biological fathers to support their off-spring. But that doesn't address the fact that it's the woman's body and life that are taken from her.
As for not giving a damn about the fetus once it becomes an actual baby you'd think.... Well, if we've learned one thing the hard way it's that they believe that all women who want abortions are sluts and the deserve to be punished. As the child was conceived in sin it is therefore undeserving of societal support. Or so it seems by their behavior.
Why not just force the male to raise the child. And, pay "damages" for the pregnancy and childbirth. That should put a crimp into his "life style".
Cathy, what if the "breeder" wants nothing to do with a child...it's not everybody's cup of tea....
Make the men take the kid.
On the other hand: White babies can fetch a nice price. I predict there will be plenty on the market soon.
If a woman cannot have dominion over her own body, what right is safe? Speech? No. Religion? No? Association? No, as we see from the attacks on those who help child rape victims. Dobbs and its progeny are about much more than abortion. They are about the most basic rights. And that’s what the fight is about.
Women have to go to WAR!!! Every woman should get their male sex partner's ID and DNA so they can sue for lifetime support for a pregnancy she is forced to complete. AND, women should consider other forms of sexual gratification...including other women. Make the men suffer almost as much. I say almost. because there is no way a man can pay the enormous price for that unwanted pregnancy. Why is it just about what women have to do to have autonomy?? I say go full-bore to make men miserable about this bullsh*t law.
Remember that their 2022 decision also asserted that privacy is not a right. That applies to many more than just those involved in birthing.
https://www.americanbar.org/groups/communications_law/publications/communications_lawyer/2023-summer/unprecedented-precedent-and-original-originalism/
Many more potential allies. *edit > Just scanned that article Ed, and thanks. That's how I've seen that decision myself as well. Isn't confirmation a grand feeling ?
Mary and MisTBlu - Thanks for the forced bone marrow donation/forced organ donation analogy. Very powerful arguments to have in reserve.
Maybe the “father” of the zygote could be required to contribute half his salary for 18 years to the state for support. Probably could get an abortion at Jiffy Lube if that were the case…
Maybe the "father" could be required to donate a kidney! They could save two lives!
Great idea, Only if he didn't "do the right thing"
He should be forced to raise that human.
Women should collect DNA and ID from every sex partner and then take them to court to support and raise (or keep!) the human she was forced through involuntary servitude to bring into the world. Why aren't law firms taking up this challenge?
Boy, would that result in one hell of a blowback. Males have been able to hit and run for eons.. How convenient that females are left holding the "bag." I do know of a situation or two where the guys were "used" and did the "right thing." But definitely a minority...
Scathing !
Scathing: Bitterly denunciatory; harshly critical. Harmful or painful; injurious. Harshly or bitterly critical.
Gee Louis, you must be really terrified for the male species.
Because I was very active at the local level in 2018, when GA Republicans were passing the Heartbeat bill in anticipation of SCOTUS overturning ROE, I participated in protests held in support on abortion rights. To my dismay, some the crudest messaging I saw was trumpeted by Planned Parenthood. I couldn't believe how ignorant that organization was of how propaganda works. It was if they wanted to provide ammunition for pro-birthers instead of maintain reproductive rights for women. "Abortion on demand!" was the most prominent message on buttons. If you're a pro-birther, that sounds like an advertisement for promiscuity.And to top it off, many of the protesters who were given a bullhorn were obviously not straight and often sounded like they had an ax grind against patriarchal society in general instead of securing reproductive rights for childbearing women. I can't blame them, I do too, but I think Planned Parenthood should have used that time to educate the public on how abortion care is medical care often out of necessity to save the mother's life.
I believe abortion needs to be on a continuum of reproductive health care, not a standalone issue. The media have shown what happens to women’s health when the choice is abortion or not. I guess I’m saying when some ppl hear the word abortion, they hear “elective abortion,” not women’s health care.
Unfortunately, the rabid pro-lifer is congenitally deaf to Planned Parenthood’s mission and message!
"in a deliberate attempt to polarize American politics" ..........may be why those anti-abortionists really don't know what the heck is going on.
I always open the argument on the basis of "what about the man?"
If women are required to give birth, then the product of that gestation is to be genetically tested and the man responsible for the pregnancy must put up a $500,000 bond for the care and education of that child. If he cannot, his wages are confiscated. He is also to be chemically castrated so he cannot irresponsibly father more children.
No one likes thst either, but it's hard to argue it's unfair.
I'll go with that, but many men love the woman being the one who gets blamed for everything, although it is sperm that causes pregnancy, every time.
I wonder what men would do if they were subjected to forced vasectomy? If a woman of say over 50 years of age can not or should not bring a child into the world as she is too old, why not say at age 50 all men must be forced to not bring children into the world also?
(I am not meaning to argue ages of mothers, just using this as an example.)
What if every newborn was required to have it's DNA tested to ensure that the biological father assume financial responsibility for 18 years? That the mother must provide a name of possible fathers to ensure that the father was identified?
Gabrielle Blair's book EJACULATE RESPONSIBLY
Brilliant Mary; I'm adding that twist to my arsenal.
Ah that magical phrase ‘irresponsible sex’! All too many so called pro life champions desire to dictate with whom and how two people have consentual sexual intercorse!
The forced bone marrow question chillingly puts the Dobbs issue into perspective and reminds me of the provocatively disturbing book “Never Let Me Go,” which is not too far of a stretch from our current forced birth environment where others control the use of our bodies to benefit another, born or unborn.
It seems to me from Heathers interpret the first change noted was because of ( Nixon) wanting to sway the votes ie political. When actually Drs brought the cause front n center because of the risks/death to women ie wanting safety first. No political, no religiosity.
Sanctity of life .
How that transfers to the Israel/Palestine issue to me seems equally ...
Sanctity of life..
Convenient confusion arises when politics and/or religion enters per se..little regard for the majority afflicted -women and children-the sin/no sin is entirely upon the action of politics or religion ...
Sanctity of life...is dead?
Killing how many Jews? How many Nazis? How many blacks? How many Indigenous? How many_ _ _ _s ? ... (fill in ‘their’ hated race/color/origin/religion/affiliation/party) does it take for sanctity of life to be #1 priority....
“Arguing “my body, my choice” can too easily be corrupted by antiabortion people to seem to promote irresponsible sex.”
But what is their definition of “irresponsible sex”. For the “Christian Right” the definition is a woman having sex when she is not married. It’s that simple! They believe allowing abortion promotes promiscuity in unmarried women ….(and in teenage girls too)! They may mention men too but their focus leans heavily on women.
Their primary view on abortion is not about being pro-life. Yes, that sounds contrary to everything we’ve been told and read for years. They see abortion being a “get out of jail free” card for women. Abortion allows sexual activity outside of wedlock. Thus the Christian Right see Liberals as have no morals when it comes to sex. You get pregnant, hey no problem, just have an abortion. Be as promiscuous as you want.
I can’t stress this enough. Do a simple search. Type “sexual promiscuity and abortion” into your favorite search engine and see what comes up. You might be surprised to see what you find.
George T. ,
You explained exactly what I was trying to get across. The antiabortion movement doesn’t talk about mothers who have too many children to take care of—their focus is on seemingly promiscuous single women (while celebrating equally promiscuous men as “players”, “studs” or “young men sowing their oats”).
Right....and some of those women with too many children have husbands who are promiscuous men still out there sowing their oats.
If someone says something so ridiculous as " an unborn baby is without sin.".....I am not sure they can be helped.
I love the fact you point out that women are now only partial citizens. To reduce our power, they needed to hamstring us. 3/5ths a citizen seems to calculate out right. And just like before it’s a stain on our country we must add to the other foolish decisions made in the arrogant pursuit of power.
3/5 of a citizen who must be owned by someone else. Don't forget that part.
I consider five of them to be part of the party of death and a couple have corruption issues as well. Then there's beer Bret. Not a stellar group on the regressive side.
Murderers, Carolyn?
They certainly don't care for how doctors may counsel expectant mothers and their families.
In this disdain for the expertise of doctors, and the personal panoply of concerns mothers and their families variously face, the dictators on the court may easily morph into the murderers which dictators often (or always?) do.
This imperviousness to expertise, to the roles of physicians and other health personnel, may remind us now, too, of the Chevron precedent this same far-right ideologue court seems also on the verge of killing.
These who are gnawing to get rid of the Chevron precedent hate experts, expertise, as much as MAGA cultists hate elites from doctors to environmentalists. They just want a blunderbuss mentality to push all Americans into simplified life dictates, the way MAGA hates democracy, hates free elections open to all -- and wants orange, diaper-wearing dictator instead.
Yes, Carolyn, but let's look at one other consideration to go with your good one regarding the latent murderousness on the court and abroad the land.
This is what our Heather refers to here, too, as the connections between the southern enslavers of the past, and today's ideologues, dark money rulers, and corrupted violence stokers.
Democracy, anyone? A higher literacy which lets us admit and enjoy complexities, differences, and the skills to see, inhabit, and bless them?
The so-called Chevron deference is like a ticking bomb that would remake America — for the worse — if overturned. But how many people have even a clue that the Supreme Court heard arguments about it last week? Or its monumental ramifications?
You could call the issue the holy grail for the right-wing extremist justices, who want to kill the Chevron deference. Overturning it would vastly limit the power of Congress and the Executive branch and increase judicial authority. The issue doesn't get much attention because it's complex and deals with the mechanics of government.
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/we-are-witnessing-the-biggest-judicial-power-grab-since-1803/
Great take on Chevron, Michael. This quote really got me:
"The conservative super lawyer Paul Clement, who was arguing against Chevron deference, promised this wouldn’t happen, but his reasoning was hypocritically thin. He said courts would still respect the precedents that happened under Chevron, even as he was arguing out of the other side of his mouth that the court should ignore the very precedent set by Chevron." Respect the precedents? Ha! Just like they respected Roe v Wade, ya think?
Respect for precedents is The Big Lie of this Supreme Court.
Morning, Lynell! Exactly. Destroying the precedents is EXACTLY the point.
Morning, Ally! Of all the things there is to fret about, SCOTUS tops the list IMO. I understand Pt. Biden is against expanding the Court. I never heard him say why.
I suspect that it is because that was one of FDR's initial mechanisms to combat the opposition to his recovery policies.
This is the very decision that Leonard Leo and his CNP cronies have been paying for
It would let corporations run wild.
"Wilder" is what I'd choose.
We will notice when our world is turned upside down
The same men that pay Judges on the court for their outcomes, are the same men that wrote Project 2025. It's all right there in print...how they will own us. The Chevron ruling to come has Charles Koch excited. He has spent billions to make this happen. Again, we are just collateral damage for their cause.
I came across this very succinct ‘lesson’ on Chevron by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, and thought it a good on to pass on.
https://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/sen-whitehouse-scotus-could-limit-agency-experts-who-can-call-bs-on-big-business-202171973722
Thanks for this. Sen. Whitehouse captured some nuances I wasn't aware of and, of course, nailed the essence of the where the court appears headed: "hogwash."
Oh my; just scanned that article (thanks Michael).... it literally actually states what I called it - a power grab.
I listen carefully to Whitehouse, who gave a short course on dark money and the SC to Amy Coney Barrett during her confirmation hearing.
He mentions, in your clip, the Major Questions Doctrine, which I had to look up and then found a fascinating article in the Harvard Law about ways to make the MQD " less like the Voldemort of administrative law". This learning is why I love this Substack and its smart commenters! Thanks.
I did Michael. It's a poorly disguised power grab.
But power grab is what they are all about. Project 2025
Thank you. Mark Elias has referred to it in Democracy Docket messages.
Yes - murderers - when they put the life of a fetus equal to the life of a living, breathing woman and without a medical degree - or a uterus - believe they have the right to take that woman’s right to life away from her and give it to the body inside of her - they are murderers. We have been here before as Heather’s piece described. Those justices knew what hell they were bringing and they did it anyway. Murderers of living breathing women
Jeri, that has ever been the case, that the men walked away leaving women to deal with the consequences. The forced birthers reveal their true intentions when they refuse to help provide a safety net when the children come into the world.
And the man walks away, laughing his arse off, not all, but most I would venture
Even when that fetus is not viable. What possible benefit is that to anyone? Murderers indeed.
Never mind that our maternal mortality rates are high compared to peer nations. It’s more dangerous to be pregnant here, especially for Black women.
Yes! Yes! Yes! Back to the liberal “arts,” which includes the sciences. History, civics, language, foundational skills, the floor on which we must stand if we are to reason and be reasonable.
We assume the murderers you mention are the SCOTUS conservatives?
Of course, that is who I am referring to.
I've offered that 3/5ths assertion here before. What riles me is that generally, folks are failing to recognize that if I sit still when your fundamental, unalienable rights are taken - mine and everyone else's are potentially next. They are murderers, and of more than life, but also the rights that make a life worth treasuring and savoring. Another Lincoln quote worth mentioning right here, is this. > "Accustomed to trample on the rights of those around you, you have lost the genius of your own independence, and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises." -- Abraham Lincoln.
Dan, I love Abraham Lincoln and all he stood for!! He and I share a birthday and the quote under my picture in my high school annual is one he made.
"I will study and get ready and someday my chance will come."
I most MAGA people would give you a laugh emoji, it requires thinking about the big picture. Many of their posts are about "my rights"
Carole: When I finish reading, etc. (yes, I'm one of those that reads 'all the comments, lol) I want to come back to this contribution of yours; 'poke me' - please, if it slips my mind.
See Martin Niemoller's "First they came for the..." poem.
For levity (showing that Officer House from the Grammar Police has a sense of humor):
"First they came for the verbs, and I said nothing because verbing weirds language. Then they arrival for the nouns, and I speech nothing because I no verbs." -Peter Ellis.
https://www.reddit.com/r/quotes/comments/qgb0vv/first_they_came_for_the_verbs_and_i_said_nothing/
Lol Ally !
3/5 of a person--was that not the fraction given in the Constitution for the count of each enslaved Black person?
Yep!
It's a misogynistic world out there. Misogyny kills a woman every 6 seconds.
Phyllis Shaflay was angry because her husband wouldn't let her have a career in politics. So, she goes on a rampage ripping working women apart. This woman carried the misogyny flag for her husband. The war on women never ends. We can't even walk alone into a parking lot at night without fear.
Schlafly was a friggin’ nightmare for women, especially black women and the poor. I was never so happy than when her demise occurred.
An evil bitch if ever there was one
She sure fucking was.
She was a hypocrite. She wanted to deny other women what she had.
Carolyn, Dobbs resulted in forced labor.
I was 52 years old when I learned that my deeply Catholic mother had had an ectopic pregnancy when I was just 18 months old, and my brothers were 4 and 7. She called her friend Ruth saying she was bleeding profusely. Ruth left work, picked my mom up and took her to the emergency room at the Catholic hospital where I was born. They refused to treat my mom, saying she should go home and rest. Instead, Ruth took mom to the University Hospital (where Ruth was the Dean of the School of Nursing.) They admitted my mom, and just four hours later, my mom was in the recovery room, awake and talking with my dad.
My dad died when I was 28. My mom died when I was 51. I never heard anyone in my family discuss the "family" secret - my mom was given life-saving surgery when I was barely a toddler and hid it from everyone because she was Catholic - and my parents might have been excommunicated for their "sins." Literally, kept a secret because their community thought that the surgery performed on my mom was an abortion. And my brothers and I only learned of it because Ruth thought it was important. Well, yeah, it is!
Ectopic pregnancies are never viable. Never. All the doctors at St. Mary's did was send my mom home to die. As they do now in some states in this country. In 2024. Unbelievable.
I am grateful so many of my fellow Americans get themselves to the polls to vote for those who will protect women's access to healthcare. Period. As others have said, time for history to repeat itself! Time for the minority opinions to be put in their place. Time for women to again determine their own healthcare and family needs.
Your mom was lucky My dear Friend’s mother was left to die leaving 3 children under the age of 7. My friend being 2 ½. To me what they did to her mother was EVIL.
Oh how horrid!!
From 2019:
Ohio bill orders doctors to ‘reimplant ectopic pregnancy’ or face 'abortion murder' charges
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/nov/29/ohio-extreme-abortion-bill-reimplant-ectopic-pregnancy
“There is no procedure to reimplant an ectopic pregnancy,” said Dr Chris Zahn, vice-president of practice activities at the American College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. “It is not possible to move an ectopic pregnancy from a fallopian tube, or anywhere else it might have implanted, to the uterus,” he said.
“Reimplantation is not physiologically possible. Women with ectopic pregnancies are at risk for catastrophic hemorrhage and death in the setting of an ectopic pregnancy, and treating the ectopic pregnancy can certainly save a mom’s life,” said Zahn.
That's insane. Someone explain to me why dimwitted uneducated politicians make medical laws. The no-science politicians are making our health care decisions. Stupid people elect stupid politicians. There is not one active brain cell between them.
I called my local representative and asked them if they would accompany me to my doctor appointment because they knew more about medicine than my doctor did. And that their input was necessary so that my doctor would know how to proceed. They didn't know what to say to me. So, they hung up the phone on me. I keep calling.
Lisa59, I love what you are asking when you call your elected reps offices! That brilliantly points out the absolute absurdity of the times we are living in. If you’ve ever seen “Roe vs Bros” on instagram you’ll witness the terrifying lack of knowledge by the average person in America on how female reproductive systems work. Those people vote. And some of those people run for office and get elected. We have to keep calling it out!
Sarah, I did see some of that bros thing. I was gobsmacked as usual.
State legislators making laws are looked @ regarding their constitutionality is what I understand to be the procedure. When passing legislation re medical care, they should be looked at by the Medical community. In both cases sometimes they get passed anyway , happens in MT
Oh my god, JL. That's horrifying.
Evidence of how little science matters to modern Republicans, and how little their positions have to do with compassion.
Blast it from the rafters, J L
JL, my mom was a science and math teacher who understood exactly what was going on with her pregnancy. She would scream loudly were she still alive. Such incredible ignorance of basic physiology!!!
Those legislators are a bunch of idiots.
Ruth was a wonderful friend--to all of you.
Under the starched while cap (of the era) that Ruth may have worn, she had a halo.
Thank you so much for sharing all that Sheila. I have similar tales to recount; hope I remember after I rest a bit; I'm in EST and flagging a bit. How sad was that; they sent her home to die, in untold agony for all concerned, to carry all their days. It makes me so sad that she carried those 'secrets' for such terrible reasons.. Secrets like those, keep us sick. I crave 'sunlight' on all things. Peace sister...
The Catholic hospital that used to be here—and most of them I expect—have ethics committees that look at individual cases. The sisters who sat on the committees had empathy, but everyone was afraid of the bishop. Google the case in Phoenix where the archbishop, Olmstead, injected himself and demanded every future case be approved by him (not an MD need I say). He also excommunicated the Sister of Mercy who gave the okay. If I recall the patient already had four children and it was either remove the fetus or she died.
The Catholic Church doesn't care about life; they just care about numbers.
Many of those desperately poor streaming from south of the border come from desperately poor mothers who were told each baby is "a blessing".
Family secrets are complicated. I learned a couple of decades ago that a priest impregnated a 16 year old girl in the early 1900s somewhere in my family line.
I have a friend who was raised Catholic. Her mother had an affair with a priest. Another priest (close friend) faked his death because he couldn’t have his mother knowing that he left the church and married. Sick, sick, sick.
Incredible story and your poor mom kept that secret “under wraps”. My mom, on the other hand, was born and raised in Berlin. It was there that she had two abortions in a back alley establishment. She arranged for her older sister to have one too. In those days, an abortion was $50. Quite a high price to pay in the early 30’s. My sister and I did not find this tidbit out until after our father had died in 1997. Bless her, she lived until the age of 89!
In today's money: $918.40.
Sheila, and the TX bishops conference lauded the 5th Circuit’s decision that a woman like your mother was not entitled to life-saving care in any state that prohibited “abortion” (an all-encompassing word). They are—you know—“pro-life.” That tipped me over the edge.
MLM, pro-life, my &ss! When I think about how long it took for my mom to recover from that surgery while still caring for three young active kids, I wonder frankly how she even survived. And my dad was a helpful man, not the kind that expected to be waited on. Grateful my daughters live here in MN. They have access to good medical care - including abortion. Glad to have the time to help get out the vote!
With Heather, all the dots are always connected, the I’s dotted, the T’s crossed, and in such a lucid and informative way. Thank goodness for this body of work. Its influence on the future of our society will be immeasurable.
My fervent hope is that issues like overturning Dobbs can be what galvanizes opposition to everything the GOP currently stands for as we head toward this election. As seems imminent at this point in time, the election will come down to T***p/Biden 2.0. (With DeSantis bowing out and all the GOP now seemingly capitulating to The Orange Jesus, this looks even more certain -- implausible though it still seems to be!) Though it is still really early on and a LOT can happen before November (my gut feeling tells me there are all kinds of scenarios that can happen between now and then), I sincerely WANT to believe that by November, when/if the American people are confronted with a choice between these two, the choice will be pretty obvious. More than that, though, we have to vote against the MAGA/fascist cult all the way down to local level ballots. Maybe Dobbs can be the "fire-bell in the night" that helps people realize what's at stake and what could happen if we don't stand up and fight this NOW!
Agreed, Bruce....all the way down to the local level. Heather is setting a fire under us this weekend.
Yes, city councils, county commissions, school boards......! MAGA has penetrated each of these already, trying to undermine government structure!
Divide et impera, divide and rule.
Yes, they have caused some real problems around here. Right now in the city more progressive people are the majority on the council and the school board. The county is a different story because the people in Salem forget that they are part of Marion County.
If they win, these Republicans will take away our right to Dr. Heather Cox Richardson.
Then we go underground!
Heather Cox Richardson thank you.
Polarization in these cases is born when citizen's rights are curtailed.
We demand our rights of autonomy. NOW!
Your history lesson is perfect for today, Professor ⭐
Polarization in these cases is also born when the minority are desperate for power at any cost.
A Sunday letter, and what a history lesson
The nasty weather moved over Novascotia. Still pretty cold in Maine. An on the mark lecture in any case. We do have a great professor, do we not?
That we do…a treasure (I’m in AZ, hard to complain about just a dog walk when it’s 40 degrees!)
I am a routine weather tracker with Windy, my favorite app. Us old duffers have to keep busy somehow. With the election roaring down on us, there is much more to get involved with. Jessica Craven keeps me pointed in the right direction. We're looking at rain and 53F here in So Cal.
I once again expected a serenity picture and here we have a wonderful history lesson bringing together two issues in our history and how they influenced the vote.
Thank you, Heather. Let’s hope the majority will regain the right to rule over the radicalized minority right wing. We’ve got our work cut out for ourselves to get out the blue vote up and down the ballot in November.
Walk me through the steps: suppose that Dems win. What will be the process to restore Women’s Rights?
A bill to do so.
“MAGA Has Devoured American Evangelicalism,” (NYTimes about a week ago)
The question has arisen for me: Could it be also said that “MAGA Has Devoured much of American Catholicism? “
Much of the writing about Trump and religion focuses on Evangelicalism, witness these two opinion pieces. But the hypothesis occurs to me that much of American Catholicism, including the majority of American Bishops, having supported former president Trump in 2016, will likely support him in the upcoming election, if he is not disqualified to run. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops recently selected abortion as its number one 2024 issue. [Why not warfare and violence as the most significant issue?] Is this a thinly veiled institutional Catholic strategy to encourage or mandate that Catholics cast their support in Trump’s direction, who during his presidency opposed abortion and successfully saw to the selection of three anti-abortion Supreme Court judges, two of them Catholic? Also, upon investigation, it turns out, not by coincidence, that numerous officials high up in Trump’s former presidential staffing graduated from elite Catholic universities and law schools. Even now, affiliated with Trump are Catholic individuals such as Chris LaCivita, currently a senior advisor to Donald Trump's 2024 presidential campaign; Leonard Leo, hugely instrumental in Trump’s selection of three anti-abortion Supreme Court Justices; and the Napa Institute, at which many Catholic bishops wine and dine with influential politicians and business leaders. Some priests have even gone so far as to state from the pulpit that it would be a mortal sin to vote for Biden, a more faithful practitioner of his faith than Trump has ever been. These same bishops and priests influence many Hispanic voters. Equal to or a close second to American Evangelicalism, does “MAGA American Catholicism” warrant more attention as a significant factor lending Trump power?
Absolutely agree, George. There is an online petition going ( see below). May not stop the rogue priests and Bishops though.
"Faithful America, which backs social justice causes and opposes "Christian nationalism," urged Catholics to condemn bishops who "boost the Christofascist campaign of Donald Trump" in a recently launched online petition that had been signed by over 12,500 as of Friday afternoon." ( Newsweek, Jan.19, 2024, Thousands Sign Christian Petition Urging Bishops Not to Back Donald Trump, Aila Slisco)
You are right Carol….and it’s not the first time we have agreed! And George is right too!I worked for many years within the Catholic structures..have been a guest of the national bishops in DC and of the good nuns at NETWORK….ALSO IN DC. The Catholic Church is a very complex institution…currently think it is safe to say that the US hierarchy ARE pro-Trump ….the old platitude was the bishops were reps the priests/people more apt to be Dems….definitely simplistic but some truth to it…in my view, right now it’s really serious for the very reasons George outlined so well…I personally think any ‘Catholic encounter’ relative to the campaign should explicitly ask said Catholic how in Gods name they can justify supporting such a profoundly gross candidate…(and there’s ample data to cite)…I would cut these guys no slack at all and it might not be a bad idea to quote Genesis on ‘selling one’s soul for a mess of pottage’…..
Well, we have Pope Francis, and he should just fire the whole lot for supporting Trump.
The USCCB has been aggressively “pro-life” (misapplication of the word in the extreme) for at least the last 3 election cycles. “Faithful Citizenship,” their publication on how to think about politicians and their positions, used to be somewhat reasonable (for bishops). But now there is a majority that insists abortion be their “preeminent” priority, even as some others want the conference to consider other pressing issues. Like everyone, bishops have truly enjoyed their positions of power and have been courted and co-opted by republicans, especially obscenely rich ones like Leonard Leo and Timothy Busch. (It was Pat Buchanan, for one, a fanatic Catholic, who persuaded Nixon to rope in Catholics to make this a religious line in the sand.) Most recently Cardinal Dolan, an attention seeker if there ever was one, is the subject of a Faithful America petition.
Imagine working for the Catholic Church … I can.
The US bishops ‘pre eminent priority’ currently abortion assumes that because they have ‘taught it’ ..it is so…
They consistently ignore the ‘primacy of personal conscience’ issue which indicates that one’s personal conscience (right or wrong) is the last position before God and takes ‘moral precedence.’ And I’d argue that a woman’s ultimate personal decision on abortion is clearly in this milieu….conservative bishops are still fighting a pre Vatican 2 understanding of these issues…they want power/control/authority……
They want to be the last word and their misogyny is glaring.
Pretty much! My personal favorite was the guy who flatly stated in public that to vote democrat was evil..Period.
And, who's in charge of the rules of the Catholic Church: Men!
So do Catholics turn a blind eye to the sexual abuse they perpetrated on young boys? What gives them moral authority?
No ‘moral authority’ that I can see rather ‘civil authority’ …..
The reopening of the ‘statutes of limitations on abuse’ in the individual states have forced accountability….in California there are a large number of dioceses in ‘bankruptcy’ due to their ‘abuse’ claims costs….the dioceses of San Francisco, Oakland, Santa Rosa and Sacramento …so far…..and ‘bankruptcy’ is the choice many take to get a ‘handle’ on the abuse claims filed.
Comparing Biden's practice of his faith to Trump's is meaningless, since the latter's practice is non-existent. As a Catholic myself, I have seen evidence that Biden is a more faithful practitioner of his faith than the majority of US Catholics.
Definitely!
The sanctity of life argument does not hold up when applied mainly to abortion while overlooking capital punishment, war and lack of gun control. When the Catholic and Evangelical “Christian’s”are as vigorous in their opposition to these atrocities they can use the sanctity of life argument. Until then it is the repression and control of women that they are so vigorously advocating.
The gun violence on the local level and War on the global are horrific.
I'd say so. Although I don't think "The Church" has much of a mandate any more. Not since birth control really. Then the pedophilia racket.
I also think Trump should get zero credit for packing the Supreme Court with 3 more mediocre Federalist Society trained and indebted, extreme Catholic judges. Trump was given a list of judges to choose from, I believe by the Heritage Foundation.
He probably just took an aid's advice and went golfing. Although maybe he complained after the second male and asked for a female, and photos. And now we have Aunt Lydia, but prettier.
I believe Machiavelli's best student, Mitch McConnell, deserves the credit, for all his exquisitely painful manipulation of every lever of power in the Senate, including Abolishing The Filibuster (gasp!) to railroad the Senate into a blind advise and shotgun consent.
THAT was the actual coup, and we sat and watched it on TV. Beer breath and all.
He gets no credit from me. Leonard Leo, however, is the evildoer. He and the Federalist Society members manipulated putting three unqualified jurists un those spots. Mitch just accommodated by doing what he does best by being a clever devil.
Spot on, George.
While I do not begrudge the Catholic Church's anti-abortion position, I do begrudge the increasing misogyny it mixes in therewith, along with the ludicrous condemnations of Catholic politicians who exercise their individual conscience here on our troubled temporal plain.
The demonization of those who support abortion rights while disdaining abortion is ghastly, almost as bad as the blindly cruel backhanded and sometimes forehanded misogyny, sadly long apparent.
I begrudge 'no ones' beliefs as they apply to themselves; my despise is reserved for those who would impose their beliefs on my freedoms.
Agreed. Believe in your imaginary sky pilot, but don't hold me to your beliefs.
Yep; I've got a current issue with 'exactly that' Ally. When I get back to others (and you !) who related in that vein, I have zero doubt that you'll relate again.
Thank you. I know about Catholic bishops, but hadn’t thought about their supporting Trump. And especially not with such venom.
When the all male bishops’ primary attention is on abortion,
while in war fellow humans are outwardly and intentionally killing each other (one might see them as “grown up fetuses”), and not express continuous outrage, there is something amiss. Mosque, Temple, Church, are all next to each other in Jerusalem. God is One, so to speak,
Our, Our Father/Mother/Creator.
Not at all pleased with their leaving their places of “Worship” and then killing each other of the other tribe “group.”
I hate to be cynical but there have been more than 80 priests in MA that have been accused by the Catholic Church for pedophilia. These Bishops and Priests fantasize about sex with children -- and most with impunity. And these are just the few the church has made public.
But yet, right to life and forced birth for all women in all circumstances. And one Biblical references to abortion and that was when a Rabbi said it's ok for a husband to abort his cheating wife's fetus.
Pope Francis is far more modem than these bishops. He is human, and understands climate change and overpopulation, both of which are heretical to these medievalists, who haven’t caught up to Galileo.
The Napa Institute when I last looked had ten bishops on its Ecclesiastical Advisors Board…..A number from California…Bay Area LA etc..
Including Cordeleone of SF
And Vasa Santa Rosa, Gomez LA, Barber, Oakland and 6 more …..
Paprocki of Springfield, IL, a real loon.
That SOB!
The evil Catholic Church - isn’t that the same institution that opposes the death penalty, has been active on social justice issues, and educates many youths from low income families and where some of the public schools are at best, inadequate? I may disagree with their adamant stance on abortion, but their stance on abortion has some logical consistency within their overall pro-life philosophy. Also, it is far less monolithic than many on both sides of the political spectrum think.
No it doesn’t, if they agree a woman should die rather than get treated for life-threatening complications in a state that bans all abortions. That’s not pro-life; that’s pro-fetus. And the repubs don’t believe in social services for that woman and baby after birth. That’s also not pro-life.
Stephen, yes less monolithic, and,yes, lots of good work and outreach ( usually by lay men and women and the Sisters and religious order brothers and priests who are left-- all the church). But the discussion here seems to center on the leadership of the U.S. church and there is a serious point to be made about how politically partisan the U.S.Bishops are as a Conference. Some are punitively and vocally far right and often actively anti- Pope Francis. A handful are moderate. Most ( and IMO this is the worst sin) are silently protecting their ecclesiastical careers. The most partisan depend on the financial resources the Leos and Buschs provide. They have become players in the dark money network whether they will admit it or not.
Their largely unrevised document on Citizenship definitely says they cannot tell Catholics how to vote ( tax issues, right?) but there are many ways to sway ( and punish) a congregation without naming names ( though some of them do that too!)
The women here who have recounted the reproductive horrors in Catholic hospitals, where fear of the wrath of a Bishop rules, are right. The Bishops are largely pro- birth, not pro- life or they would put significantly more budgetary and pastoral resources into helping women and children survive. But that takes us into the arena of the deep seated misogyny of men who are not parents and who have been actually trained to avoid and fear entanglement with women and who are encouraged to think of themselves as cultic superiors. No, not all priests; no, not all Bishops. But, it seems, our current crop are a critical mass of the wrong stuff.
Like Joan Leslie I have an up- close and personal experience of the institutional church and stay with it because I do believe that all of us Catholics are the church. But, at the moment, partisanship and dark money have resulted in a serious institutional leadership problem in the church in the United States. And I say that fully aware and highly appreciative of the thousands of Catholic men and women who are unselfishly, and in some places at great risk, living real Gospel values every single day across the world.
Carol as I reread your very prescient comments I’m particularly struck by your description of the majority of US bishops….”Most, (and IMO this is the worst sin) are silently protecting their ecclesiastical careers”. I am very very struck by the parallels between our dear bishops and their Republican elected counterparts who are NOT dealing appropriately with the gross Trumpian behavior for exactly the same reason….I was horrified the evening of January 6th when 147 House Republicans voted NO on certifying the state presidential results of one of the most accurate elections in our history! These guys give a whole new meaning to cowardice and corruption….
I agree with the almost everything you say and in the other cases for example, dark money, I will confess to ignorance on the issue. I was responding to the rather strident anti-Catholic posts. As you point out, many of the bishops in the US have slid from religious conservative to political conservative. But within the US, policies and practices tolerated or promoted in one diocese may be prohibited in the next (Boston MA versus Worcester MA). As you state, while many of the Bishops of the Church are questionable, many of the priests, nuns and laity are forces for good even if they sincerely and thoughtfully disagree with us on specific issues.
Good replies, all. I am aware that the church is a spectrum and concur with Carol’s comments. “it’s not all like that,” is one I share with Stephen. However, at the institutional “power” level, aren’t many Catholics giving Trump a free pass, morally, (the end justifies the means), when they really would not want him to be principal of their children’s elementary school? Weren’t there a million ways (in dollars certainly, he used the presidency for his and his family’s self-aggrandizement,
rather than the common good? Is Mar A Lago an apt symbol of one’s alignment with working people?
AND I very much support ALL Carol’s comments…my own experience was primarily in the Catholic Charities/Social Justice end …served on State Boards etc…know well just how decent and effective such efforts have been. But sadly at this time the ‘institutional’ Church does appear to have made choices I can NOT personally support. And George’s conclusions I think are useful.
Yes.
Good point!
Good point..
A good friend of mine who was an ardent Democrat told me that Choice was the number one issue for the country. I felt so bad for her that she passed away just after Trump's election.
Terrible way for her to go.
Your comment reminds me also that a good friend, similar to yours, and who enthusiastically participated in the nationwide Women's March right after Trump's inauguration, I believe (or was it after his election) passed away shortly thereafter also. She was so actively engaged.
My friend was super active in politics and all the women's issues. She was so smart, actually a relative of Winston Churchill; his American mother was the sister of her great grandmother. or, great great... Horrible that I can't call her any longer.
Your friend sounds like a rare individual, the two of you blessed knowing each other, and her early reaching the trail head very sadly earlier than expected, leaves you missing her physical presence as your companion and fellow traveler on our earthly Camino … though may she be with you in spirit..
Yes, she is sorta with me in spirit but it ain't same..I do not have her extensive political experience or her amazing brain. Her 1st daughter is my god daughter and although I don't do religion, I have been able to be a good 2nd mom to her after the nasty situation with her step dad rejecting her big time.
You are her “bonus mom.”
I certainly hope Dobbs gets the votes out!
As Heather noted, whenever abortion rights are on the ballot, the measures pass overwhelmingly. Dobbs, however, is just emblematic of a desire on the part of some to encroach on the rights of the many, so we must remember that the right to an abortion is just one of many rights--the right to vote, the right to form a union, the right to have clean water, the right to love and marry whom we choose--the list goes on and on--that we must preserve if we expect to preserve our democracy.
AND Clarence Thomas has expressed an interest in re-looking at SSM and birth control. But not interracial marriage, no surprise, whose existence does not appear in the constitution either.
He mentioned three of the four "companion" cases to Roe: Griswold (contraception), Lawrence (decriminalizing same sex sexual conduct) and Obergefell (same sex marriage). He tellingly left out Loving, which does permit interracial marriage.
Thomas voted today along with Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Alito to leave the razor wire in place in the Rio Grande. What a Fascist.
What a fascist piece of work. Every one of them.
I am NOT against interracial marriage...But, I'm against his. He and "that women" are a devil team.
He is such a scumbag.
Yes.
It needs our help to do it.
For sure!!!!!!!!! We must all be involved even if it's calling Democrats and/or Independents. Write letters to the editor, talk to your neighbors, friends or who will ever listen. GET INVOLVED! We can not sit this one out. Too much is at stake!
The 7 justices in the majority were nominated by FDR (Douglas), Eisenhower (Brennan, Stewart), LBJ (Marshall), and Nixon (Burger, Blackmun, Powell). The 2 dissenting justices were nominated by Kennedy (White) and Nixon (Rehnquist). It seems amazing now that 5 of the 7 justices in the majority were nominated by Republican Presidents. Then, as now, only 3 justices were nominated by Democratic Presidents. I WANT the Dems to be more strategic and play hardball. For example, RBG should have retired in 2012, so a DEM could appoint a 40-something successor. If either Kagan (age 63) or Sotomayor (age 69) have even the slightest health concern, they should retire now so Biden and the Dem majority in the Senate can approve her successor. We have probably already seen the last time a Republican majority will approve a Dem-nominated Supreme Court Justice. If Biden is reelected and faces a Republican majority in the Senate (possible or likely), he will be unable to nominate ANY Justices. The Senate will stonewall him, regardless of the time remaining in his next term. And by the way, a Dem majority in the Senate (also possible) should stonewall anyone nominated by a Republican President. Fight fire with fire.
I couldn't disagree more with your otherwise passionate and good faith argument, John.
RBG was correct to stay on the Court, as long as her diminutive yet courageous body held breath. Nobody knows the outcome of elections beforehand. And the entire purpose of a lifetime appointment is just that, to allow a reasonable and sufficiently wise Justice to dispense equal justice under the law, irrespective of fear, favor or access to cigar smoking vacations with billionaires, and above all else, above the fickle winds of politics.
It wasn't her fault that a perfect storm hit, McConnell's Machiavelli-on-steroids refusal to provide Garland even a hearing, Comey, Putin, and HRC's refusal to campaign in Wisconsin and blithely assuming that her sense of entitlement and historical place would usher her to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
We know what happened thereafter.
None of us can responsibly argue to turn the Supreme Court into another fully political arena, simply because the MAGA-ites and their ignorant mob do so.
The real answer here, in my opinion, is to expand the Supreme Court so that it actually represents America and Americans. The fact that we have as many Supreme Court Justices as sat bewigged when Washington was present, is absurd at best, dangerous at worst
I agree that RBG was correct in staying in the job and doing her job. And lest we forget, Hilary Clinton won the popular vote by almost 3 million votes. And we who voted for her are still alive and voting. The electoral college has got to go.
Thanks, Leslie.
I don't know the exact number, but unfortunately the Dems need to have a 5% advantage in the popular vote to get elected for President these days. This has been getting worse, and I'm not sure of the cause. Al Gore won by about 0.5 million but still narrowly lost. Then Hillary won by 3 million and still lost. I'm very worried that the next election will go to Trump.
To hedge our bets, my sister and I are planning to hold our noses and cross over in the primaries and vote for Nikky Haley. Afterall there is really no point in voting in the Democratic primary, unless Biden decides he is too old and makes way for a younger generation of Democrats. In my opinion he should do so, but won't.
If Biden withdrew at any time, it would be like saying all he's done for us is pointless. Continually hammering on that is like throwing away the election. We are looking at an election between two aging men. There is nothing wrong with the aging part.
Take a good look at the candidates. Biden is 81, still vibrant and sharp. His speeches are clear and spirited. He regularly travels, meets with both American decision-makers and World leaders. He has not dropped an issue, at home or abroad. His running mate, Kamala Harris, unlike nearly every vp before her, is active in administration affairs, and up to date on key issues.
Trump is 3 years younger but looks and moves like a man 2 decades older. He has had multiple facelifts and other surgeries to look younger, but cannot hide his age. He has multiple health issues, and moves with difficulty. He is acting a part, and in repose his face reveals his emptiness. He has the body of a man in the end stages of aging: take a look at his suits: they are cut and padded to disguise the fact that his face juts forward, and his shoulders are permanently slumped. The suits attempt to make him look as if he were standing upright. The back neck is cut high, and he lifts his face to face forward rather than down (thus also stretching his wattles so they are less evident). Sitting, he either leans forward or slumps back to relax his neck.
And that doesn't even touch on his inability to speak extemporaneously and make sense. As often is the case with an elderly person in decline, he does better with a script, or when repeating old memes that come from his recall as a younger man. But when have you heard anything original come out of his mouth. Most of what he says are reused phrases blurted out in a disconnected series. He rarely travels, and when he does, his appearances are brief and orchestrated. In addition, no one has a clue who his running mate might be. I can almost guarantee it will not be one of the people from the primaries. It will probably be someone chosen for him by the people with the money.
So what is age, and who is old here? And why is Biden's age an issue to some people, but Trump's clear decline is not often mentioned? The best answer to this that I've see is that the MSM (and some others who should know better) are seeking the horse race "other side", which is lazy reporting. Trump's legal troubles are legendary, so they have to counter that with something about Biden. The MSM and the Trumpists really have to stretch to try to find some kind of legal issue to put up against Trump's legal messes, and so far they haven't been able to. So Biden's flaw is that he is old. Ok, so then the counter to that is to look at Trump's age.
Or drop the whole thing, and actually cover the news and the issues we face as a nation. Which of these candidates is Presidential material in today's world?
Why would you and your sister do that? Age is just a number and Joe has proven over and over again that he is quite adept at handling a myriad of things. Younger Dems are making their way up the ladder but no one should be challenging him. And I would like to say a pox on No Labels candidates!
Like who, and in the time remaining before November 2024?
RBG was great but she failed to protect Roe v Wade. Agree 100% with the responsibility you place on HRC; she is a lousy politician who ran a lousy campaign. However, the bad guys told us what they were going to do long before they did it. This is not about arguing 'responsibly.' The Court is already 100% political; we should not kid ourselves. This is hardball, and the Dems MUST play hardball. If they do not play hardball, we (the Dems) will keep losing. Obviously it is correct to expand the Court (see my follow-up comment above). Please wake me up when the Dems control the White House and have 50 reliable votes in the Senate (i.e. not Manchin or Sinema). It was and is naive to ignore any tactic or strategy to gain the ultimate advantage. Obama approached RBG about retiring, but she was not receptive. Hard to anticipate everything that followed, but with hindsight, a big disservice by RBG for the causes she championed.
I appreciate your response, John, yet still disagree with some of your thoughts.
The Court is not 100% political, although it is far too political than it should be. This particular Court being the worst in that sense in my lifetime. Nonetheless, no Court has ever been wholly political, as evidenced even recently by Gorsuch's vote in the Bostock case wherein he wrote the majority opinion holding that gay and transgender workers are protected by the Civil Rights Act.
Beyond all that, the Democratic Party needs to convince the majority of the Country that its positions and policies are correct or better than those set forth by the GOP. Stacking the Court ala McConnell and Trump is the exact opposite of restoring the People's faith in their institutions, and is the last tactic to be emulated
Your “lousy politician” is my hero. When I was young adult woman, she was an exemplar for me of how women could succeed in this man’s world. The “lousy politician” was a tireless worker for women’s and children’s rights; was Secretary of State; was a Senator, all of which she accomplished when such things were hard for women, as they still are. We have only had three female secretaries of state, ever. We have only had 60 female senators, ever. This is an exalted group. She is one of the giants on whose shoulders we women stand, and that includes Kamala Harris. That she lost to Trump in a perfect storm of misogyny, a thirty year campaign of misinformation, media culpability, Russian interference, and James Comey does not make her a lousy politician. Not forgetting, of course, that she won the popular vote.
I believe that RBG thought that Roe was poorly decided and thought that the best way to assure the right to choice was via legislation. She was right, I believe. Relying on the 14th Amendment and its due process clause and inferring from that a right to privacy just begs for its overturn.
Also, I don’t agree that she should have retired. Look at what happened when Scalia died and Obama had the opportunity to replace him. McConnell refused to even give Garland a hearing for a year. Who’s to say he wouldn’t have done the same had RBG stepped down?
McChinless is a nasty piece of work who does what he pleases when he please. RBG was right to hang on as long as she did.
Sounds nice. They’re not playing nice. This has been in the works for EVER & they made it happen. Stinks to high heaven.
And senators that say, “Well I don’t know why a woman would want to get an abortion.” IGNORANT men like that should not be allowed to have a say about women’s “rights.”
I'm afraid we will have to allow men to vote, even those with a negative opinion about women's rights. However I do think that senators like you describe should not be representing us.
Did you read my comment above?
I agree with you on so much. Even about Hillary- she never should’ve run. And Bernie might’ve won, but who knows. How do you beat ignorance? Regardless, we know they’re changing laws to do what they want- power & money… & would hope I’m alive when it all comes crashing down on them, but don’t like to gloat or say I told you so. My husband is a Republican. It’s been personal & sad.
I edited it for you… ;)
Better yet, majority Dems in both houses of Congress and Biden in the presidency adding 4 justices to SCOTUS. THEN we get modern: voting laws, repeal of Citizens United, abortion as necessary, etc.
Don't forget other things like "The Fairness Doctrine" or a vastly improved version for the 21st century realities we can see.
RBG cost us ROE…..AGREE WITH John G. TOTALLY.
Thanks, John. I've been thinking about this for a while. I hope it's just a matter that something is in the works but that Biden is just holding his cards close to the vest.
I share your hope Jim, but I am not hopeful that President Biden (who I admire deeply and support fully) has anything in the works. Under better circumstances, this Administration would put forth a Judicial Reform Act to expand the Court to 13 justices, 4 of whom this President would nominate immediately. Sadly, hope is never a strategy.
I think we will be surprised at what Biden will do given majorities with which to do it. I recognize Jill Biden as a fellow warrior, and there is also the cabinet. Look at the mess Biden inherited and how much he has managed to clear up even with nasty Republicans constantly nipping at his heels.
That's exactly what I've been hoping for. And he also seems to be flagging on filling federal judge positions. But I'm in no position to create a strategy for the President. He obviously has his hands full.
I recall asking friend who would not vote for either presidential cabinet, "what about the Supreme Court?".
We have to give Kagan another 15 years and Sotomayor another 10, as sharp minds. But beyond late 70s it is time to call it quits, just like with our president. Set the stage for the younger generation of Democrats, and don't just selfishly hang on until the very end.
I mean, you can still write books etc. after you retire, and mentor the younger generation, which you should be doing.
John G, what you are asking for is a prolonging of the anti-democratic atmosphere we are working to counter. Yes, Dems need to be strategic, but the things you are proposing are not strategic, they are reactionary. And harmful. They would entrench us in continual face-offs. We are in a situation right now where we could come out of this election with a "middle" in place that could help us move forward on common ground. The way to do that is work this election hard, not sit back and add fire to fire. The goal is to become a nation that works for the people of America, not to gain points in a boy's game of win at all costs. We've been doing that for too long. Stop, now.
Agree with ONE of your points, to work hard and effectively in this election. To do so, the Dems (our side) must work much smarter than they have done so far. The Dems marketing campaign has been almost non-existent, and ineffective. The Dems must raise our game by a large increment. Btw, we are already entrenched in continual face-offs against an 'anti-democratic' adversary. I desperately wish their fever would break, as it did with McCarthy in the 1950s. However, it is NAIVE to believe the bad guys will ever go back to the old 'honorable' way. The days of decent republican lawmakers like Eisenhower, Dirksen, Baker, Dole, McCain et al are gone forever. The bad guys have clearly told us otherwise, and they are obviously not going back. They aim to 'win at all costs.' So far, doing so has gained the bad guys a 6-3 advantage in the Court. If the Dems do not play hardball, this could soon be a 7-2 advantage.
I have a question as a retired ICU nurse. How can a politician or judge or anyone other than a physician or nurse, with OB/GYN education, experience and license, make any medical decision for a pregnant woman? They are not qualified. They are practicing medicine without a license. It is illegal. I am serious about this. Name me another medical decision about medical care that a lay person can legally make and force on the patient.
I have another example, though not in the medical field.
When the Supreme Court decreed that wetlands not directly connected to a river were not wetlands, I hit the roof. I started my professional career as a hydrogeologist (with other related skills). That opinion flies in the face of long-standing evidence that wetlands are connected with both groundwater and river systems. That includes wetlands that are some distance away from rivers and those that are connected with ephemeral streams and lakes. Even perched wetlands (not contiguous with underlying ground water) are important factors in the water cycle; some are significant factors in wildlife habitat and in flood prevention. But the SC decided that an "expert" provided by one of their hidden managers knew more than someone like me and many other specialists who worked with communities and agencies to identify and create management plans that protected water resources.
The result: the complete dismantling of EPAs wetlands division and cutting of resources for protecting wetlands- so that they could be used for development. This compromises rivers and communities who will, in this time of climate change, be more vulnerable to flooding. It is up to states and private entities and minus fed funding) to correct past errors, and prevent new ones.
This decision is not based on science at all. It is literally (and deliberately) giving away vulnerable and essential lands to developers, against national needs and values, for the benefit of largely industrial development. We've been here before: that's why EPA was created.
The only thing that gives me any sense that something is going right is being able to see dams being removed from rivers that should never have been dammed, and watching them return to free flowing streams, accessible again to the fish who were blocked from their breeding beds and to the indigenous people whose lands were taken from them. I am happy that both my parents lived long enough to see the Rogue River become a free-flowing river again, and now I am watching (via the internet) the dams on the Lower Klamath being removed. The first one I watched was the Elwha in WA state: what a glorious site that was. I saw the dams come down live and only two years later, the river was well on the way to recovery, and now has a natural estuary at it's base that is thriving with birds and vegetation and a healthy exosystem.
I had to end with that, because it took years and a lot of had work to get the idea across that rivers need to be healthy in order for us to be healthy. But it is happening. The same goes for the Dobb's decision. It is one of the things that impedes our having a healthy democracy. It and voter suppression and the appropriation of Congressional procedures to keep Congress from functioning, and election financial reform. Dobb's is the result of deeply flawed legal reasoning that in itself should provide a way to reverse it. I hope I live long enough to see it.
They are unqualified to even consider the issue.
denigrating the roles of wife and mother and were demanding rights they didn’t need or deserve.
1978 - women able to get own credit cards, open bank accounts without their husbands
All of this was not that long ago.
My mother-in-law was the first woman to get a credit card from a local department store in her name.
Excellent letter and so timely. Thank you.
Let's hope it doesn't take a repeat of the Civil War to restore sanity and preserve democracy and equality.
A Civil War IS being planned. MAGA militias are training. Let's just hope it's the same goons who failed on JAN 6 and their brethren. Unless they have Putin backing them (or the Oiligarchs who control governors in TX, FL, with troops or missiles, it won't go very far.
Destroying true democracy has been the end goal of the those corrupted by massive wealth and the power since the Civil War, at least. As Cox Richardson so eloquently points out.
My concern recently, with Abbott's tragic test of the power of Governors over their own borders, militias (and National Guard) is that once again they are Plotting unnoticed, right under our noses.
Who did I just see on ig - Charlie Kirk- giddy with pride at being an official part of Trump's "military" did he say? Or Militia? I know he also said he's also in Trump's Praetorian Guard. How bizarre is that No One seems to have prepared for JAN 6?
And if what they say about projection is true, do Trump and whoever backs him already have a "deep state" ready to aid and abet? Have they already aided and abetted? On JAN 6? How about when the Secret Service permanently deleted all text messages from that critical time period. "Oops, it was just an update."
OK, maybe I'm sounding conspiratorial, but I'd always rather prepare for the worst and hope for the best. A normal, before times election. A nice clean win for the Democrats and a calm, peaceful, uncontested transfer of power.
(how many of you just thought, "yeah, right!")
Or this brilliant idea from DeSatan so glad he’s gone
https://youtu.be/CmLnSSARlHA?si=lDn5up9FZ2NYinS5
All those well armed southern state militias...
God, I hope so….that opposition to DOBB`S will rid us of Trump….the history that Heather detailed for us demonstrated just how precious personal freedoms are and how fragile….and ‘keeping the Republic’ is a full time ongoing consuming project!
Trump is only a symptom of the problem. We are on the verge of becoming a Kleptocracy like Russia. The fact the Project 2025 outlines the whole thing blows my mind. Orwell is rolling in his grave.