Thursday, May 5, 2022

Roe's end won't help Democrats

Basically because they've already milked it for what it's worth.  For the GOP, the plutocrats who actually own the party have many new stand-in issues ready to take its place, so there won't be anyone there moving to the other side (plus the people who will keep voting for Republicans because they don't want abortion rights coming back).  It's really a class war issue, because rich enough women can also go somewhere else to get the job done.  Poor women are stuck, and medicaid won't pay a dime.

https://newrepublic.com/article/166313/end-roe-wade-motivate-democrats

TNR article doesn't really discuss Democrats much.  We've already been supposedly voting "pro-choice" since 1973, but what have our Democratic representatives done.  Zip at the national level.   The current Roe based law passed the house but will never get even 50 votes, let alone the 60 needed to pass filibuster in the senate.  Manchin doesn't support pro-choice.  Sinema claims she does but refuses to alter the filibuster.  If there WERE no filibuster, AND no GOP party discipline, the law could pass with 2 (supposedly) pro-choice republicans and 2 explicitly anti-abortion Democrats (Manchin and Casey).

I'm not sure if the math was ever much better.  When there were more Democrats in the Senate, there were even more anti-choice Democrats among them, and prior to 1975 the filibuster threshold was 66 votes.  By switching his show business to anti-choice (as Governor of California, Reagan signed the law legalizing abortion) Reagan found the magic formula (owned by Plutocrats, empowered by flim flam theocrats) that has helped the GOP win most presidencies and many congresses ever since.  It need not matter if your  immorality is plainly visible (like Trump) as long as you do the dirty work (like Trump and McConnell) for the flim flam theocrats.

Though many I read are specifically blaming Democrats, I believe the underlying problem is the anti-Democratic institutions, especially the US Senate.  However, the Democrat representatives are due considerable disgust anyway for their many failures to play hard ball on this and many other issues, while raising money and votes on them anyway.  They've pumped this and other issues endlessly but once elected, they seek those checks from plutocratic donors and do little else.  They might lose some of those plutocrat checks with a more active posture on this or other issues (like $15 minimum wage or cancellation of student debt) and besides there's not enough time amidst "more important" matters, like how many billions of outdated and proven dysfunctional weapons to dispose of in Ukraine to cycle the inventory here where the homeless ranks and poverty are also growing.  And ever more visible censorship (meet the new disinformation czar, on top of all the existing 2-5 letter agencies) to maintain domestic ignorance and amnesia and international pressure (coupster Victoria Nuland off to Brazil probably to prevent the US Imperialism denouncing Lula from winning is only the latest paragraph).  From all I can tell, only the truest Western vassal states are buying the US line any more, and how Macron delayed his weapons disposal to Ukraine to sneak past his 5 year election victory over an out-and-out fascist is a clear story on how these things are going (some believe this has post-facto united the left in France...but I'm not sure that's possible without another revolution--French politics has become americanized too).

Can't entirely blame President Biden for not doing enough to protect abortion rights, but it's notable that during his congressional career he worked many many times to weaken abortion rights.  He was once denied communion (2019) and the US Bishops voted *overwhelmingly* to deny communion to politicians who don't fight abortion rights to their satisfaction, but the current Pope has blocked that at least for now.  Biden has done nothing to pressure Democrats in the Senate to get the filibuster out of the way on any issue, including his supposedly signature proposals.

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