Tag Archives: abortion

Messaging

As the midterms get closer, the punditry gets more predictable. For the past several weeks, not a day has gone by without at least one column–usually more– bemoaning the Democratic Party’s lack of effective messaging.

To which I say bull-feathers.

The problem with “messaging” isn’t that candidates aren’t choosing to emphasize arguments likely to move voters; the problem is the civic ignorance of those voters and the siloed information environments they inhabit.

Take inflation. Republicans are convinced that an emphasis on inflation is a winner for the GOP, and they may well be right. If they are, it will be because the average voter has absolutely no understanding of economics–and is totally unaware that inflation is currently a global phenomenon (much worse elsewhere, actually) with multiple causes.

Progressives have been pointing to several of those causes–“messaging” about the effect of the war in Ukraine, the Saudi’s outrageous decision to cut production so as to raise gas prices (a transparent effort to help Putin by helping Trump’s MAGA base), the persistence of pandemic supply chain problems, and a healthy dose of corporate greed.

That last item has led to calls by some economists for a one-time windfall profits tax–but again, how many American voters understand how price gouging  occurs, or what a windfall tax is or does?

American voters have historically blamed the President–no matter who is in office and no matter what his party–for economic conditions a President cannot and does not control. Those voters have historically gone to the polls in midterm elections and ousted members of the President’s party–despite the fact that the opposing party is generally offering zero credible policies to address the economic problem of the moment.

Right now, the GOP’s proposal to “fix” inflation is to cut spending on Social Security and Medicare, and  stop supplying arms and humanitarian aid to Ukraine. How many voters know that, or are aware of the various statements to that effect made by Republican members of the House and Senate?

For that matter, how many voters understand how the filibuster works, and how its deployment by the GOP has doomed popular legislation?

Until the most recent session of the U.S. Supreme Court, few voters understood the connection between the politics of the Senate majority and the placement of qualified jurists on that Court. (Most still don’t understand how we got the current, highly politicized and retrograde Court majority.)

A number of the pundits decrying the inadequacy of Democratic messaging are convinced that the upcoming election is about saving American democracy–a point with which I agree–and that effective messaging should focus on that threat. They never seem to explain just how they would address the loss of American democracy in those 30-second TV ads or glossy mailed flyers.

If American voters understood how our government is supposed to work–if they all knew, for example, that we have three branches of government (a fact that was evidently a revelation to Tommy Tuberville, elected to the U.S. Senate from Alabama presumably because he was a good athlete), and how those branches are supposed to operate, perhaps it would be possible to make the case in a way that would resonate with those voters. Without that public understanding, Democrats (and disaffected Republicans like Liz Cheney) are reduced to making the accusation–and an accusation is not an explanation.

For that matter, even excellent messaging must be heard to be effective.

If American voters all tuned in to the same media outlets, it might be possible to educate them about these matters, but of course, they don’t. Democratic messaging–no matter how brilliant–isn’t likely to reach the legions of voters glued to Fox News and its clones.

What do American voters know?

Most know that an illegitimate Supreme Court has–for the first time in American history–withdrawn a constitutional right. Most know that the right to reproductive autonomy is critical to women’s health and equality, and a significant number know that Republicans are very likely to continue to chip away at other rights previously protected by the constitutional right to privacy.

Some portion of the electorate knows that the President doesn’t control gas prices,  and that Republicans will continue their assault on the social safety net.  Growing numbers recognize that the MAGA movement is dangerous; they may not be able to define fascism but–like pornography– they know it when they see it.

Will what American voters do know be enough to upend the history of midterm elections–a history that favors the party not currently in control of the White House? Will what they do understand motivate sufficient numbers to turn out to VOTE BLUE NO MATTER WHO?

I guess we’ll find out.

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Lindsey Graham Tells The Truth…

Ok, so it was inadvertent.

Graham–as most readers of this blog undoubtedly know–has blown the cover off the “states’ rights” arguments in Dobbs–and even the state’s rights “musing” in Clarence Thomases horrific concurrence. The Court’s argument is that certain fundamental rights previously protected nationally really aren’t so fundamental, and ought to be decided by state legislatures that are “closer to the people.”

That argument was never particularly persuasive, since it has a lot in common with the argument that human freedom from bondage isn’t a fundamental right, so whether or not slavery should be allowed would be best decided at the state level. (It also overlooks the widespread gerrymandering that has resulted in multiple state legislatures that don’t remotely reflect the wishes of their constituents.)

As multiple news organizations have reported

 With abortion access already expected to be a major issue in November’s midterm elections, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham supercharged the debate over reproductive rights by introducing a bill that would ban most abortions after the 15th week of pregnancy.

“I have chosen to craft legislation that I think is eminently reasonable in the eyes of the world,” the South Carolina senator said. “If we take back the House and the Senate, I can assure you we’ll have a vote,” he vowed, speaking at a Capitol Hill press conference where he was flanked by some of the nation’s most prominent anti-abortion activists, including Marjorie Dannenfelser of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. Many of those activists would like an outright ban on all abortions.

“This bill, frankly, doesn’t go far enough for many people,” said Penny Young Nance, president of Concerned Women for America. “But it is a consensus piece of legislation.”

Well, so much for the rights of states that want to protect a woman’s right to choose.

I don’t know what Graham thought he was doing with this legislative turd–perhaps he thought a national law that waited to criminalize abortion until 15 weeks would  be so generous that it would appeal to people who are conflicted about outright bans. Perhaps, as some commentators have suggested, he thought the promise of a nation-wide ban would motivate the GOP’s reliable anti-choice base.

Whatever.

What Graham has really done is strip away the rhetorical excuses in order to display another sort of “choice”– the stark choice voters will face on this issue in a few short weeks. If the GOP takes Congress, a national ban on abortion becomes very possible–no matter what Mitch McConnell says about Senators’ “preference to leave this matter to the states.” Urged on by its rabid base, the Republican Party will be free to ignore the rights of Blue and Purple states and the women who live in them. (Former vice president Mike Pence emphasized that point in an interview with Real Clear Politics, saying a national abortion ban and individual state restrictions “is profoundly more important than any short-term politics.”)

Senator Schumer’s response was a statement of the obvious.

“For the hard hard right this has never been about states’ rights. This has never been about letting Texas choose its own path while California takes another. No, for MAGA Republicans, this has always been about making abortion illegal everywhere,” Schumer told reporters on Tuesday afternoon.

For the naive pundits who predicted that over-ruling Roe would calm the political waters, Graham’s response to critics should provide a wake-up call:

Graham dismissed political concerns. “There’s a narrative forming in America that the Republican Party and the pro-life movement is on the run,” he said on Tuesday. “No, no, no, no. We’re going nowhere.”

Whatever the legal criticisms of the reasoning in Roe v. Wade, the decision established a bright line between decisions government can legitimately make, and those that must be left to individuals in a truly free society. That principle is what is currently under attack–and as I have repeatedly insisted, the consequences of getting it wrong will extend far beyond abortion.

In the GOP’s zeal to prevent women from exercising the same degree of individual autonomy they gladly grant to White Christian males, they have presented us with an unambiguous choice. Graham’s bill has the virtue of making that choice crystal clear.

A vote for any Republican congressional or Senate candidate in November is a vote for federal government control over our most intimate, personal decisions, including whether and when to procreate, who we can be “intimate” with, and who we can marry…

Whether you agree or disagree with the decisions government imposes is ultimately irrelevant. The issue is–and. must be–who gets to decide? 

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Oh Indiana…

When friends and family members bemoan Indiana’s retrograde legislature, I like to remind them that the domination of that assemblage by pious frauds and occasional fascists (paging Jim Lucas) is a longstanding one. In the late 1800s,  the Indiana General Assembly decided to legislatively change the definition of pi.

Shades of Marjorie Taylor Greene…

When Indiana makes national news, it is almost never because our lawmakers have done something positive, so it wasn’t a surprise when, earlier this month, the state made headlines in the Washington Post.

That linked headline was a follow-up to an earlier article reporting on Indiana’s successful rush to pass one of the nation’s strictest anti-abortion bills. It featured comments received in response to that report–comments that put the legislation into proper historical context.

Indiana becoming the first state to pass an antiabortion law post-Dobbs is reminiscent of Indiana becoming the first state to pass forced sterilization, in 1907. To understand the state’s history of white-supremacist and misogynist legislation — catering to the Ku Klux Klan, the John Birch Society and other extremist groups — one needs to review the state’s conservative religious and political cultures. Not that this will liberate its citizens, but it gives context showing the state’s long history of oppressing individual liberty.

Another letter amplified the point by noting that, In the 1920s, Indiana was the only state in the union where every single county had its own chapter of the KKK.  (Still another letter-writer proved the continuing influence of Klan defensiveness, by insisting that both the John Birch Society and the KKK had Black members and integrated chapters…)

Friends who listened to the arguments over passage of SB 1, the anti-abortion bill, recounted the numerous references to Jesus–clearly, there are no First Amendment scholars in Indiana’s GOP super-majority! They also noted the divisions within the party over whether to allow any exceptions for rape, incest or the life of the mother. (“Pro-life” sentiments obviously don’t extend to the life of the women those lawmakers  dismiss as mere incubators…)

Disregard for the lives and autonomy of women is hardly the only evidence of what late NUVO editor Harrison Ullmann dubbed “The World’s Worst Legislature.” Our “pro life” lawmakers’ love affair with guns has led to increasing permissiveness–this year, despite the GOP’s purported support for police, the General Assembly ignored the testimony of law enforcement officials and eliminated the requirement of a permit to legally carry, conceal or transport a handgun within the state.

Ours is a state where the culture war dominates. It wasn’t that long ago–under the guidance of Mr. Piety–aka Mike Pence–that Indiana passed RFRA, another legislative effort that earned Indiana national headlines. As an article in the Chicago Tribune advised our lawmakers in the wake of that travesty,  “If you have to emphatically reassure citizens that your law won’t result in discrimination, it might be a bad law.”

This morning, the governor of Indiana signed a very bad law. The Religious Freedom Restoration Act is defended by its supporters as a means of protecting the religious liberty of each and every Hoosier of every faith.

That is what we in the “that’s a bunch of baloney” business call, not surprisingly, a bunch of baloney. This law, and others like it that are bubbling up in state legislatures across the country, is a transparent reaction to the swift expansion of same-sex marriage rights. The law effectively allows any business to refuse service to gay or lesbian people on religious grounds.

I’ve posted previously about the success of the legislature’s “Christian warriors” campaign to divert education funds to private, largely fundamentalist Christian schools via the nation’s largest voucher program.

That program isn’t the only attack by Indiana legislators on public school classrooms that has made national headlines. Vanity Fair was one of the many outlets reporting on Republican senator Scott Baldwin’s assertion that teachers must be “impartial” during lessons about Nazism and related “isms.” (Baldwin subsequently tried to walk back his statement, but it was too little, too late.) I suppose Hoosiers should be grateful for all the adverse publicity Baldwin generated; it was probably the reason the bill to ban teaching of (an invented) Critical Race Theory in the state’s public schools failed.

I absolutely agree with  one letter-writer to the Vigo County Tribune-Star. During the pandemic, as our intrepid legislators were protecting our freedom to infect our neighbors, he wrote:

It is better to be thought fools, than to pass legislation and remove all doubt.

In January 2022, Indiana Representatives plan to vote on House Bill 1001. The bill requires private businesses to accept any made-up excuse from employees refusing vaccination. Obvious bullpoo cannot be challenged…

 As an educator, I applaud any attempt to cure stupid. But, quarantining the worse cases in the House is not the answer.

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Putting Their Money Where Their Mouths Are–NOT

Even in Kansas–a deep-red state--voters have seen through the pious lies of the forced birth movement.

Rabid anti-abortion activists insist that they care about “both”–the woman and the fetus that they insist upon calling a baby. The New York Times recently published some data that shows just how hollow that declaration really is.

Pro-choice advocates have long emphasized that hollowness: the fact that the forced-birth movement conveniently ignores the complexities of pregnancy and its impact on women’s health, and the fact that once those little fetuses become actual babies, interest in their welfare magically evaporates. As the saying goes, the Times article brings the receipts.

The headline and sub-head really tell the story: “States With Abortion Bans Are Among Least Supportive for Mothers and Children.” “They tend to have the weakest social services and the worst results in several categories of health and well-being.” Extensive charts confirm the message that the states that are most hostile to abortion score poorly on a wide variety of health and well-being outcomes, while states supportive of abortion rights  have more generous social safety nets.

You might conclude that–in states where legislators actually give a rat’s patootie about women and babies–they pass laws that both respect female autonomy and provide support for the children of women who choose to give birth. They put their money where their mouths are.

Let’s look at Mississippi–a state Indiana seems to be trying to emulate:

In Mississippi, which brought the abortion case that ended Roe v. Wade before the Supreme Court, Gov. Tate Reeves vowed that the state would now “take every step necessary to support mothers and children.”

Today, however, Mississippi fares poorly on just about any measure of that goal. Its infant and maternal mortality rates are among the worst in the nation.

State leaders have rejected the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion, leaving an estimated 43,000 women of reproductive age without health insurance. They have chosen not to extend Medicaid to women for a full year after giving birth. And they have a welfare program that gives some of the country’s least generous cash assistance — a maximum of $260 a month for a poor mother raising two children.

If it was only Mississippi, that would be bad enough, but the Times investigation found that in the 24 states that have banned abortion (or probably will) policies on a broad range of outcomes are substantially worse than in states where abortion will probably remain legal. The article cited policies on child and maternal mortality, teenage birthrates and the share of women and children who have no health insurance.

The majority of these states have turned down the yearlong Medicaid postpartum extension. Nine have declined the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion, which provides health care to the poor. None offer new parents paid leave from work to care for their newborns.

One of the charts accompanying the text lists the states that have banned or dramatically restricted abortion or are likely to, along with their ranks on lack of insurance, maternal and infant mortality, and child poverty. (They all appear to be Red states. Indiana, unsurprisingly, is toward the bottom of those categories, just as we are at the bottom of states in voter turnout–which may not be a data point as unconnected as it first appears…among other issues, gerrymandering is bad for women.)

Indiana ranks 30th in its percentage of insured women; 41st in maternal mortality; 39th in infant mortality, and 28th in child poverty.  Those rankings are likely to sink even further after our retrograde legislature’s attack on women’s autonomy.

The article also acknowledges the role of racism.

Studies have repeatedly found that states where the safety net is less generous and harder to access tend to be those with relatively more Black residents. That has further implications for Black women, who have a maternal mortality rate nationally that is nearly three times that of white women.

The article has other examples of “pro life” states’ lack of concern for those “precious babies” once they are actually born.

None of the states that have banned abortion (or are likely to) guarantee parents paid leave from work to care for and bond with their newborns. Just 11 states and the District of Columbia do. Paid leave has been shown to benefit infants’ health and mothers’ physical and mental health as well as their economic prospects.

In most states, there is no guaranteed child care for children until they enter kindergarten at age 5. Subsidies available to low-income families cover a small segment of eligible children, ranging from less than 4 percent in Arkansas (which now bans abortion) to more than 17 percent in Vermont (which passed abortion rights legislation).

I encourage you to click through. Read the statistics and peruse the charts. And the next time someone piously proclaims that they “love them both,” hand them a copy.

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Another Form Of Rape

Indiana AG Todd Rokita is one of the few politicians in our polarized age who is despised on both sides of the political aisle. His naked ambition has led him into the fever swamps of the far Right, and the most recent example–reported in the linked article from Talking Points Memo–was his effort to smear the ob-gyn who terminated the pregnancy of a raped ten-year-old.

Rokita suggested that the doctor, Dr. Caitlin Bernard, had failed to file mandated reports with the state about the abuse and the abortion. At least, Rokita claimed, he could find no evidence for any reports. Bernard is an “abortion activist acting as a doctor with a history of failing to report,” Rokita told Fox News on Wednesday. “We’re gathering the information, we’re gathering the evidence as we speak and we’re going to fight this to the end, including looking at [Bernard’s] licensure, if she failed to report. In Indiana it’s a crime for … to intentionally not report.”

If Rokita weren’t shameless, he would have apologized after Indianapolis’ Fox affiliate easily ascertained–via a simple public records request– that Bernard had properly filed all required paperwork, and had also reported that the patient was a victim of abuse. (That abuse had also been reported to authorities in Ohio by the girl’s physician there.)

In other words Rokita went forward with a series of defamatory claims and accusations against Bernard and called down a nationwide campaign of harassment and vilification against her apparently without even the most cursory of records checks that were not only available to him as attorney general but members of the public in roughly 24 hours.

Rokita is one of several despicable Republicans who responded to the initial reports about a pregnant ten-year-old with accusations that the incident was manufactured–that the child didn’t exist, and that the rape and pregnancy were inventions of those hated liberals. 

Those attacks were really another form of rape.

I never doubted the accuracy of the report, but–like most Americans–assumed that a pregnancy in someone so young was a very rare situation. I was shocked to learn that it is far less rare than I had supposed.

The New York Times recently reported that  more than 1,000 girls under 15 seek abortions each year.

An article in The New Republic reported  figures from countries with total or near-total bans on abortion.

In Paraguay, where abortion is banned unless it threatens the mother’s life, health officials forced an 11-year-old girl to carry a pregnancy until she could obtain a cesarean section after she was raped by her stepfather in 2015. An 11-year-old girl in Argentina, which had similarly strict laws until recently, delivered a 23-week-old baby by cesarean section in 2019 after officials there refused to allow her to obtain an abortion. The young Argentine girl reportedly attempted suicide twice and begged doctors to “remove what the old man put inside me.”

It’s unclear exactly how often this phenomenon occurs—and even a single instance of it is heartrending—but available numbers suggest it occurs with some frequency. Amnesty International reported last year that in Paraguay, which ranks between New Jersey and Arizona in population, more than 1,000 girls who were 14 years old or younger gave birth in 2019 and early 2020. An analysis this week by The Columbus Dispatch found 50 reports of rape or sexual abuse toward girls 15 years old or younger in Columbus, Ohio, since May of this year. Using data from the Ohio Department of Health, the newspaper also reported that 306 girls who were 15 years old or younger obtained an abortion in that state between 2016 and 2020.

The article went on to quote the truly horrifying reaction to this particular incident by those who have spearheaded the forced birth movement.

Jim Bopp, an Indiana lawyer who serves as the general counsel for the National Right to Life organization, told Politico on Thursday that the model legislation he drafted for Indiana would have required the 10-year-old girl to continue the pregnancy. “She would have had the baby, and as many women who have had babies as a result of rape, we would hope that she would understand the reason and ultimately the benefit of having the child,” Bopp told the news outlet.

It seems like the denialism isn’t really about the 10-year-old girl in question but rather about obfuscating the natural consequences of overturning Roe. By eliminating the constitutional right to reproductive self-government and enacting abortion bans without rape or incest exemptions, anti-abortion activists have implicitly created a new right to take Roe’s place. Rapists can now rest assured that if they impregnate their victim, state and local governments will work tirelessly to ensure that the survivor—even if she is a 10-year-old girl—carries that pregnancy to term.

Welcome to MAGA world.
 

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