Supreme Court targets Roe vs Wade

[deepwatersolo]

Not sure if this has been posted already, but SCOTUS has decided to take up a Mississippi case on a 15 weeks ban on abortion that seems to have been designed for a direct overturn of Roe vs. Wade. (Sorry, can‘t link to the Slate Article on my Phone).

The article I read on „Slate“ bears the headline „Supreme Court takes direct aim at Roe vs. Wade“. It explains in more detail why the SCOTUS actions hint at an effort to knock Roe vs. Wade down alltogether, instead of tinkering around...

www.cnn.com/2021/05/17/politics/supreme-court-abortion-mississippi/index.html

Thanks OP

It was only a matter of time. Abortion doesn't go away if you limit or ban it. As we see already women travel to blue states where they have greater access, there's only one abortion clinic in Mississippi as is. America has long liked to use women's bodies as a battlefield, a proxy to conduct wider arguments about conservatism, tradition, religion and women's role etc. I feel for women in the US (where access to abortion is already incredibly difficult in red states) but I don't know how they will ever protect women's bodily autonomy long term, particularly not with the federal system and the zealotry of the religious right?

Yes it was all over Facebook yesterday I was called a murderous slut for suggesting that people who have no uterus should have no opinion and that men should use protection rather than expecting/demanding women to carry there children unwillingly this went down badly i was even mansplained single parenting (highlight of my fucking day as a single parent) apparently his ex tricked him into two children for the benefits then left them with him 🤔 im not sure why he thought that ment she was getting benefits because he had the children (apparently)

Thanks deep

Just dreadful, feels like parts of america is going backwards on this

Shows what a tenuous grasp we have on womens rights

This is so depressing.

How can we help?

Well, Republicans have the majority vote on the SC, and the last 2 of the 3 appointments made by Trump have resolutely anti abortion views, so a case being brought by pro-lifers was inevitable. What does not necessarily follow is that the SC will roll back Roe v Wade. From what I have read about the SC, it tends to be much more collegiate and much less partisan body than the initial appointment process of individual justices would suggest. Overturning a 50 year precedent is not inevitable.

What this does highlight, though, is that Democrats/the left have been bloody stupid over the last 15 years. Whilst most commentators both sides of the Atlantic were moaning about the Trump presidency (and I agree, he was atrocious), the Supreme Court really was the main prize for the Republicans, and getting 3 appointments in a single term was remarkable. They now have a legacy there that will far outlive the mess Trump has left behind or the Biden presidency.

The lifetime appointments rule is just crazy. It might have worked back in the 18th Century when people had much shorter life spans, but the farce of Democrats praying that Ruth Bader Ginsburg would outlive a Republican presidency just shows you how unfit for purpose the set up is. She was a remarkable woman, but she should have had the sense to resign during the Obama term*, rather than holding on to see Hilary Clinton become president (which was never a given). Especially after suffering repeated bouts of ill health.

*Yes Obama got screwed anyway, when he tried to appoint Neil Gorsuch during his last year as president, and that's another appalling scandal. Which again shows that the system of appointment and retention of a role on the SC is not fit for purpose. When the Leader of the Senate can just decide he's not going to have a hearing on the appointment, and thus block it on the grounds that it was the last year of Obama's term - and conveniently do a complete 180 degree turn to ensure Coney Barratt took Bader Ginsburg's spot, at the behest of a lame duck Senate and lame duck president Trump.

The lifetime appointments rule is just crazy. It might have worked back in the 18th Century when people had much shorter life spans, but the farce of Democrats praying that Ruth Bader Ginsburg would outlive a Republican presidency just shows you how unfit for purpose the set up is. She was a remarkable woman, but she should have had the sense to resign during the Obama term, rather than holding on to see Hilary Clinton become president (which was never a given). Especially after suffering repeated bouts of ill health.
*
I totally agree. RBG really should have resigned, the stakes were too high.

Don't know why the formatting doesn't work for me any more

Well presumably RBG isn't the only Democratic nominee in the Supreme Court - why should she have been the one to resign?

And if the answer is because "she was old" then

She worked her arse off to get there and I think all the stuff about her resigning
is sexist and ageist bs. The problem wasn't with her it was with the set up.

I take your point Foo and RBG was hugely symbolically important for the Democrats and progressive causes, but I wonder about the motive for staying when there was an opportunity to make a politically astute move, especially since she'd also had cancer four times.

You know, I have tried many times to understand he mindset of peple who wish to force women through pregnancy and giving birth, to have an unwanted child who is then I presume given up and shoved into the overcrowded system..but I just fucking cant. It seems barbaric. I notice that people who are 'pro life' (I prefer forced birthers, but there you go) seem to also, generally speaking of course, be against support for parents..their interest in the 'baby' appears to disappear completely once its born, which seems odd to me too really. Of course not all forced birthers will be that way, but from online discourse, and the few I unfortunately know in real life, this seems to hold true. Its baffling really. This topic annoys me so fucking much. Even moreso when it seems dominated by male people, who shouldnt ever get a say tbh. I don't give a shit if thats sexist, or 'its their baby too' or any of that rubbish. Males should be completely removed, in a topic that they will never understand, and will never actually go through.

It's got nothing to do with sexism. Had she been a man, I'd have had the same view. It just do happened that she was the oldest and longest serving of the democratic appointments when Obama was in power, and more importantly had suffered repeated bouts of cancer. Yes, she was ill and old, and that's rather the point isn't it. A lifetime appointment means just that, you carry on until you die, irrespective of your physical and mental capacity to do the job. None of the other democratic appointees had served as long, were as old as her, or had her health problems.

If you consider yourself part of the Democratic Party legacy, and want to retain the liberal agenda you helped to build, then you think of the bigger picture, and what will be good for driving the Democratic agenda in the future. You can have any number of Democratic presidencies, but if they are being blocked by a conservative SC, then that doesn't help, does it. Had she resigned at the start of Obama's final term, it would have been with no disgrace and on entirely understandable grounds. He could have appointed someone hand picked by RBG herself, to carry on her legacy.

Instead, working on the (arrogant? naive?) assumption that Hilary Clinton was a shoe-in, she held on to her seat. And then had to cling on, because the entire Democratic establishment was counting on an elderly and ill (no less remarkable for it, but those are the facts) person to save their legacy and hope Trump wouldn't be returned for a second term.

It’s scary that people don’t seem to understand you can’t ban abortion. Only safe abortion

Though I guess some force birthers won’t care if the mother dies. It’s her punishment for aborting a foetus

And, I'm sorry, but the naivety was there right to the end. RGB requested that no appointment be made to fill her seat until a new government was in place. Nothing in the conduct of the Republicans, and in particular, Senate Leader Mitch McConnell over the preceding 15 years indicated that they would do anything so honourable. The minute Obama lost the Senate, the Democrats should have mobilised to secure the Supreme Court going into the future. They played the "we go high" card against Republican politicians who live in the gutter, and happily so. They totally failed to read the political climate.

My final wee missive on this to @FightingtheFoo, who thinks I am a sexist. If I was Joe Biden, I would be asking Justice Stephen Breyer, aged 82, appointed by Bill Clinton in 1994, whether he's like to put his feet up now and, move aside for a new, younger Democratic appointee; do this while the Dems are clinging on to the Senate - but only just because they have Kamala Harris's weighted vote - and before the Republicans get another chance to seize the reigns and come up with some other bullshit reason to either block a Democratic appointment, or drive through a Republican one. Because if the Democrats don't get the next SC appointment, they are truly fucked. The old school Republican SC justices might have some honour and integrity. The next Republican one will be from the same stable as Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barratt, and will likely have a good 40 years in them to thoroughly screw things up for liberals.

Yes Obama got screwed anyway, when he tried to appoint Neil Gorsuch during his last year as president

Correcting myself, that should have read Merrick Garland, not Neil Gorsuch. NG was the person Trump put in to what should have been MG's seat. MG is now Attorney General.

I have similar feelings to Ted and Hecates about RBG. Much of USA law and politics is baffling to me so I accept I may not be as well informed as I could be. But I am very sensitive - some might say hyper sensitive - to ageism and, as far as I'm concerned, if you're 80+ and have Cancer then your time is running out and, if you're concerned about your legacy, then you need to take action to protect it.

It just sounds like a huge amount of blaming to me on a woman who was doing what the office dictated - a lifetime appointment being a lifetime appointment. And her legacy remains intact - she was under no obligation to retire. I obviously understand why people think she should have but it was her right not to. And she earned it.

And I may be mistaken but didn't Obama try to push someone onto the SC in his last few weeks, before Trump was sworn in - which set the precedent for Trump doing the same for the end of his term (or is that what PP referred to above?)

Off topic, I do find it amusing that @thethermalstair started an entire thread complaining that there aren't enough proper feminist topics anymore and the forum is all about gender identity but has yet to appear on this thread, which is about as pure feminist as they come.

I was hoping OP might come back and engage too.

Jesus god will you stop it? I’m having a very difficult time at the mo and being chastised for not sitting on this board waiting to pounce on every thread is really unnecessary. I didn’t realise I wasn’t allowed to take part in feminist chat unless I did it full time.

Good post, TedImgoingmad. (9:59)