I wish we were hearing more from leaders in the entertainment and media industries. That they will pull their offices and events from states like Tennessee and Texas (MusicBiz and SXSW I'm looking at you). These entities have more than enough money to take a stand with their enormous revenues these past many years. These same entities (record labels, publishers, media outlets) depend on persons who can get pregnant and persons who could die from pregnancy. You can't have a flourishing creative scene in an oppressive draconian state or country and thus it would actually be good for business, good for the entertainment industry to take a stand.
And what can the people do? The people, the enlightened people of this country, or just those who don't want themselves or a loved one to go to jail for taking the abortion pill, or go to jail for murder in Louisiana for having an abortion, or know a doctor who could go to jail for providing an abortion to a women suffering an ectopic pregnancy (for those who don't know, and apparently this is a great many of our ignorant elected officials, an ectopic pregnancy occurs in the fallopian tubes and can NEVER lead to a viable pregnancy but can without medical intervention almost always lead to the death of the person carrying the ectopic pregnancy), or for helping an eleven year old who was raped ((ust a reminder to your right wing readers, when it's an eleven year old it's always rape) or any doctor who ends a pregnancy for any number of various reasons, what can we do? We can go on strike, and I mean stop working, stop spending, for as long as it takes to force the Senate and the House to enact legislation making abortion on demand the law of the land, that it be treated as a medical decision between a pregnant person and their doctor. Period. Even a week long work and spend strike could bring the country to its knees and scare any state senators and representatives who may be on the fence on this issue. Let's use the power of the mighty dollar for good. This is what it's going to take to prevent this whole nation from slipping into some dystopian nightmare where the ignorant and the cruel are running the show.
Lisa Marks
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I was an editor on a documentary about the Women's movement in 2013. One of the interviewees was a woman who started and ran an abortion clinic in Fargo, ND for 20 years, 1981-2001.
She said that every single week, someone who had been outside the clinic protesting was inside getting an abortion, or the daughter of someone who had been outside the clinic protesting was inside getting an abortion, or the wife of a legislator who was trying to shut them down was inside getting an abortion.
She also said that, without fail, each one said "it was different for them".
You would think that if a women found herself in a position where she had to overcome her "deeply held religious beliefs" in order to obtain an abortion would understand that other women might be in that position, too, and that maybe it was necessary to have (and they would be grateful for having) a clean, legal, affordable place to do it.
To this day, you can go online and read about "anti-abortion" women rampaging through clinics demanding to be first in line for their abortion because theirs is "justified", and everyone else in there is a slut using abortion as a form of birth control.
The selfishness and hypocrisy know no bounds.
https://www.boredpanda.com/abortion-clinic-worker-anti-abortion-women-get-abortions/?utm_source=duckduckgo&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=organic
Pam Arnold
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I feel it. It's grief. On top of grief. But it is cyclical. Rome is burning. Just watch Selling Sunset and those preening, surgically sculpted courtesans and their insecure, imposter clients.
Working people, ALL working people, mothers especially, need to refuse to work every Monday going forward. I don't care if it's Addison Rae or Amy Klobuchar or Oprah, or why not all freaking three, leave Maui and the Met Gala and get together and tell us where and when. I know a lot can't because they are on the line, but many can. All people who care about each other, because those old white men are desperately clinging on, and they see their own mortality in our myriad faces. Dance, refuse to serve them, clean their houses, drive them by bus or car, cook for them. Oh and how about no sex? Save our girls and our boys from their misogyny and homophobia. It's the only thing that works without violence. Non participation.
Johanna Santer
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This 52 year old male is not scared 'nor afraid....I'm ready! Ready to do what it takes to stop the madness. The GOP is a bully. You know what stops a bully? Not cowering and quivering....you pop that bully right in the mouth. They don't know what to do with that.
Dan Goettel
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Great piece mr Lefsetz. Here in The Netherlands the suitcase handlers on Schiphol (one of Europe's largest airports) decided to go on a spontaneous strike a week ago, on one of the busiest days of the year. To protest bad salaries and working conditions, ensuing a lot of chaos and huge criticism on Schiphols leadership. And guess what: unions are now talking with management about their complaints. No hard results yet, but seeing the amount of pressure from both society and politics, management will undoubtedly budge. Already new strikes have been announced for this summer, so pretty sure this will keep up the pressure to see real change.
Kind regards,
Steven
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Thank you everyone who "just couldn't vote for that woman."
Michael Alex
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Like shooters at the mall, medical bankruptcies, homeless encampments, $7-a-gallon gas, 60-80 hour work-weeks that still can't cover rent, $260,000 college degrees, Capitol rioters, and districts so gerrymandered there's no chance the majority can take back the country from a delusional minority . . . . this new atrocity is likely to be just another deadly thing Americans will come to accept as the 'price of living in this fantastic place' -- where keeping women in poverty guarantees a labor pool of people so desperate they'll work for peanuts.
Need we go on? Oh the garbage that was fed to generations of us. The U.S. has been broken for ages. Yes, it's hopeless.
Deb Wilker
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You nailed it. I've been saying it to my wife since Ferguson, then Trump, etc. etc. Until the majority of Americans are willing to risk their jobs nothing will change. That's how we got here. Everyone that thinks putting a black square on instagram for 24 hours is "doing something" to "fight back." The average American isn't willing to sacrifice their own livelihoods.
And I get it, believe me. Most of us get our health care through our jobs. There's risk not just to your pocketbook but to your actual life.
I left music and became a coach and teacher. If any group is about to realize its power, it is teachers. They're coming after us from every direction. I work in a private school so its a little different, but every public school teacher in america going on strike at the same time? Country will grind to a halt.
But you know what's sad? Tucker Carlson's lead every night will be about how the country's suffering is these greedy, selfish, entitled teacher's faults. ESPECIALLY the black and brown ones, who are just lucky to have a job.
And enough people will believe him.
Nick Lawson
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You hit it on the head...disruption. It just looks different now but the stakes are much higher. Still being an active protester at school in Madison, I will tell you that more than one Molotov cocktail was hurled by us. Not so peaceful.
John Brodey
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Great insights here, Bob. Reminds me of the interview you did with Little Stevie Van Zant when he pleaded with the left "where are the tough good guys".
We need all the tough good guys to stand up and fight. The left is the majority but they're wimps compared to the minority right wing.
Jay Bragg
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Boycotts!! Organized against anti abortion businesses
Sue Cook
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As soon as you use the phrase 'anti intellectualism' you're already in the realm of the elite effete and in a corner but every damn dumb thing, creeping authoritarianism, consumer inequality, crap medical availability, all of it stems from deprioritizing education.
American education should be up there with the military in importance. (You'd think that the powers that be would realize that if the masses were better educated new and better ways to blow shit up would abound but perhaps the emphasis is on maintaining stupid)
Presumably if the masses were better educated Roe vs Wade might be seen as a benefit. Maybe nobody would think that JFK Jr will become vice president too but maybe that's too much to ask.
All education should be free and subsidized.
I remember when Mick Jagger read from Borges in Performance and we all were intrigued and went out and checked out Borges' writing. Simpler times.
Chris Stein
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The Democrats have already blown it. Two Trumper acquaintances of mine already said to me, "What does Trump have to do with it?" I tried to explain about the Supreme Court, and one of them said "Trump nominated them, but Congress approved them." Most people don't follow things that closely and don't know how McConnel manipulated the confirmation votes. The Democrats HAVE to come right out and say, "TRUMP DID THIS." Forget all the high-brow, this isn't what America is about stuff they're saying. Name names, place the blame where it belongs, LOUD and CLEAR! You know the Republicans would!
Rocky
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I don't think the Left is home alone and scared - their problem is appreciation of complexity. The right has all the sound bite answers nailed down airtight. The Left really has no answers because... well? Who does? We're looking at extinction. We're trying to solve very difficult and expensive problems. Plus, we're looking at the fact that one half of America wants to return to The Dark Ages.
Truth is, you can't win an argument with a fool because they can manufacture 'facts' as needed.
The dem's and Left can't compete with the Right just as, for many, Hamlet can't compete with Rambo.
The left has some serious messaging, framing, and communication problems - but I'm not sure they'll ever be able to compete with the Road Runner. And that's pretty confusing.
I think they're waiting for the Road Runner to run off the cliff.
richard sales
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I LOVE the monday idea!
Peter Stema
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I dont like to swear in print but. HOLY FUCKING SHIT YES BOB. I'm so fucking tired of the "left" and the weak minded responses to everything. Protests? We are worried about pronouns while they are almost literally in tanks making abortion (and soon to be gay marriage) illegal. We have to fucking fight like nothing else matters. If we don't (and I'm very scared we wont) nothing else will. The right only cares about two things, power and money. Let's hit them where it hurts.
Joe Greenwald
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i find it quite alarming the these same loud people are the same people voting for these efforts...and - for the most important part - are likely not impacted ONE bit by abortion, directly speaking. Their opinion is purely based on a man-made idealism (usually religion) instead of actual real-world impacts that result from being forced (FORCED) to have a kid you didn't plan for. I think everyone really needs to think about that. that is not democracy. People creating and forcing legislation that doesn't impact them is not what democracy is about. Unfortunately, that's more and more the american way. Freedom my ass. It's all a farce.
Ryan Detter
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And S.E. Cupp is a Republican, only she'a an actual real Republican.
How's Cruz going to explain that there is nothing in the Constitution about leaking of documents, although Dershowitz and Turley could probably find something.
Isn't it time we called out the Constitution for what it really is...an extremely flawed document. If you put 10 lawyers in a room and one of them was Dershowitz, you'd have 11 different opinions on its meaning.
The left better wake up and go in hot from now until November.
Greg Stroh
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the right wing ? ~ Fuck them.
just fuck them and the negative, evil noise they make.
We've got them up here in Canada too ... yapping about their loss of 'freedom' in some wanker drive-around in our cities and our nations' capital Ottawa, honking horns, flying Fuck Trudeau flags and an upside down Canada flag.
The Conservatives have put a muzzle on their MP's in Parliament to make sure they don't explain their positions on abortion. But our Prime Minister drops the 'f' bomb on 'em in Parliament and they lose their shit. ... check that out. ... it's about time Trudeau told 'em go to stuff themselves.
As a left-leaning Liberal in Canada, I say ...... fuck them.
time for us to take back our freedoms and they can crawl back into their caves.
Maybe the real conservatives will come back and we can try to work together. Agree to disagree but get things done.
Ken Hunter
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How many more decisions from SCOTUS until women are considered 3/5ths of a person? This is how freedom disappears- a little at a time, then, all at once. As for making noise…how about a brave A-List movie or music star going on a hunger strike? Cultural icons need to come to the front and STAR in something important- FREEDOM.
Mark Maheu
Canada
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Spot on, as usual.
This is bigger than abortion or Trump or whoever else is making noise. We are at a crossroads. One is either for Democracy or one is for Autocracy. And sadly, a solid 1/3 of the country, or more, is for Autocracy including some very influential big players. What they seem to fail to accept is that Autocracy always ends in a 'cult of personality' government and eventually the ends do not justify the means. I could go on and get into the weeds but either one accepts these historical lessons and accepts this is our current situation or one does not. And I'm at a loss on how to convince anyone on the Autocracy side to change.
Cheers
Ken Goldfine
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Here's where music can make a statement...
All artists and touring musicians should pull out of any tour dates that are scheduled to happen in the 26 states that have these abortion laws lined up. I don't know why they didn't do it with Texas in the first place but now, those artists should pull the plug on bringing any business to those states. Sure, the fans will be upset but they can travel across state lines just like those in need of abortion will have to.
As you said, we should be cutting these states off in an economic way. The democratic states already prop them up but that's a political nightmare to unwind. The artists should take a stand - pull off those tour dates and put these red states in an economic chokehold in the best way they can.
If artists take a stand like that, others will follow. The first are the true rockstars who put art and morality ahead of money.
-Alex Frank
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I feel sick. I have three girls. Three black girls under the age of 12. I feel powerless and scared.
TJefferson
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How about we boycott companies that make donations or at least do not immediately cancel all donations to the Republican Party. A no false equivalent moves as Disney and as major corporations do where they contribute to both parties. From now on, your company donates to Democrats but ceases all contributions to Republicans immediately. Maybe to make this more effective we target two or three of the worst corporate offenders.
Murray Elias
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Is it not against a law to lie at a Senate Hearing when you are applying for a job as a Supreme Court judge? Seems the two Trump and cronies pushed through said they would not vote to change Roe v Wade? WTF?
If all this is recorded as it's done, pull the tape and play it back in a court. Hoist the two clowns on their own petards!
Regards
Brian Pritchard
B.C.
Canada
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It is not surprising as to how the right feels about abortion, until 1 of their offspring suffers an horrendous rape and pregnancy as a result. Women of means will continue to obtain abortions wherever the law will allow, whichever state will perform. Is banning RU486 - the abortion pill-next? It's disappointing to watch our country going backwards as to a woman's right to choose an outcome from an unwanted pregnancy. And how strange that Gorsuch and Kavanaugh both told female senators what they wanted to hear? Wish I could have been a fly on the wall during those inner sanctum meetings with the far right male Republicans. As for the future of this country regarding LGBTQ, interracial marriage, and other freedoms too numerous to name, I'm not optimistic.
Sari Leon
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Bob, Ben Franklin had a section on home abortion in a book about essential life information he partially wrote and published. There were other books in Colonial times that also contained this sort of information (some of it wrong). So you are right that the fascists are lying about the history of abortion in this country.
Thomas Moore
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Republicans have flat-out ruined this country.
Our teenage daughter's high school in the Atlanta area spent most of the day on lock down because at least THREE different students were on school property with firearms in the past two days.
Fuck this place.
I am desperately seeking a way to financially be able to move my family to the opposite side of the planet from this fucking freakshow.
Mike Froedge
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Keep going Bob.
What's happening in the States right now with the GOP is terrifying.
It's very, very strategic and targeted.
Its aim is to take down democracy, to take down the U.S.
You are 1000 per cent right to talk about Putin's strategy in this regard.
This has been going on for a long time..
But what's shocking is how a country so involved with people talking about patriotism,
and the party of Lincoln, is leading the country in this direction.
It's also shocking how many American voters have come up with this odd mantra, that if they've always voted for a specific party,
that's how they'll vote no matter what the current state of the party is.
And the level of people getting into politics to take advantage of this?
People who, as recently as 10 years ago would never have gotten this far,
We're living in dangerous times.
You've nailed it.
The centre and the left and people who really grasp what's going on, need to step up, speak out
and take this head on.
Karen Gordon
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In my experience, the extremists on the right embody various psychoses, prevalent among them is the need to make people who disagree with them wrong, while the left embodies neuroses, and blames themselves for things gone wrong. True to form, the right can be aggressive, while the left tends toward passive introspection.
Jon Sinton
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The biggest mistake by most right wing assholes is thinking that the left are not armed.
Hugo Burnham
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I used to believe that the pendulum would eventually swing the other way. The New New Deal. The New New Frontier. Whatever. I no longer think that's possible. As Merle Haggard said we are "headed downhill like a snowball headed for hell". Too fat. Too dumb. Too lazy…..Too late.
Wally Wilson
Nashville.
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To me, it can be simplified:
FOX News begat Trump, assisted by Russian social media bots
Trump begat 3 anti-abortion supreme court justices, assisted by McConnell who invalidated Garland and expedited Coney-Barrett
Radicalized Supreme Court begat the end of Roe vs. Wade
None of this would have happened if the national consciousness had not been polluted by FOX. They are the source of this.
Ed Wolfman
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I love your emails Bob. You are a truly a bright and shining light. Thank you for your work. The abortion news has made me very frustrated. I have a wife and two daughters and it's embarrassing I will grow up in a world with more rights than they will have. I donated to Planned Parenthood but don't know what else to do.
Thank you for reminding me I'm not alone!
Van Patton
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If democracy dies, its blood will be on the hands of those of us who refused to join the battle.
Watching the Democrats talk to the press is like watching a guy in a movie who won't pick up the gun that's a foot away as the murderous villain is approaching. Inside you're screaming "Grab the gun!"
The truth is sitting right there waiting to be used. Imagine what would happen if we were screaming the truth every day!
The left prefers nuance to binary simplicity. Shades of color to black and white. Consideration to certainty. But it ain't working. It's never gonna work. The people have had it with thinking. It's time to ACT UP!
Biden has to rest up and go out to the microphones and blast away. Every day. The Democrats must raise their voices in outrage and condemnation, relentlessly, every day. The Republicans even served up abortion on a silver platter for us, and we're letting them get away with that.
For God's sake, the former President is a proven fraudster who lies with glee about something as gravely important as a presidential election, and Biden never takes him on.
C'mon man.
Paul Gigante
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From your abortion letter today below. Do you remember when Life Magazines entire issue was photos of the 500 American soldiers (KIDS, mostly) who were killed in Vietnam the previous week. That helped turn people against the war. Still shocking to see those photos.
The "New York Times" printed victims of 9/11 in their pages, how about victims of abortion, day after day after day. The deaths of yore, never mind the more recent terminations.
Best,,
Bob Shuman
Marblehead, MA
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It's the eternal problem, the left is always nuanced, the right is simple. They don't wanna talk about the 110 thousand atopic pregnancies that could result in death from this. They don't want to talk about rape, incest etc. they don't wanna deal with the child after it's born. We are in trouble. I hope we can fight back somehow. I believe Putin jumped into this years ago with the right wing. In England and France hungry Poland. Used simple Nazi Tactics to separate the countries. Trump was the Trump card, and here we go. Please keep shouting.
Peter
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Stay loud, Bob!! These Handmaiden Tale wanna-be's with their arbitrary logic, faux love of the unborn and fascist tactics are never gonna stop until we fight back. And yeah, they have the guns.
Too bad the far Left is busy blaming the Dems more than they are the Right wing fascist fucks. A divided Left…it's all so very grim.
Kevin Bernston
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I bet it is.
They'll work hard to keep us barefoot and pregnant Won't they?
My question is, If it takes two to tango, and the result is a woman's pregnancy. Why is there no responsibility for the men involved in creating that life that needs to be so protected by these right to lifers,etc.?
And while we're talking about lives, what about the mothers life?
Would you like to look at the child that you knew was a product of rape or incest, both of which are illegal separately from resulting in an abortion, right?
I hope some of my sarcasm/irony/hypocrisy is dripping through here.
And what about the men who pay for their women to have an abortion, where does this leave them?
The people in charge of crafting these laws to rule our lives are ignorant and have no clue. Or any experience in the matter. . Yes Supreme Court this means you.
No woman wakes up thinking "oh let me have an abortion today".
What if they passed a law saying that the man who caused the abortion should be castrated. Sorry guys - did all your arm hair and maybe your pubic hair just stand up on end when I said that? Uh -huh. Thought so.
But the worst part of all these new abortion ban bills is the fact that the government will pay you to spy on your neighbor & report if somebody has an abortion. Interesting how they have this extra money to pay these people but don't have the money to really govern their state properly. Sorry but that's despicable.
Jc - from the heart & better experience with these things
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You said it all well. Fact: In states and countries that either outlaw or allow abortion, there is an inverse correlation with crime 18+/- years later. No abortion, crime up. Abortion, crime down. Unwanted children suffer as does society. Lose-lose game.
Llew Haden
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You are ABSOLUTELY right. A national strike (which may unfortunately effect the economies of pro abortion states more than right wing states) and it's time to start playing hardball, use technology against those who want to own women. Have women truckers come in and block roads that lead to state legislatures or homes of disingenuous journalists or networks who know they are lying but love their paycheck and face or voice spread around the nation.
How bout demanding the corporations we work for pay while we strike? Support their employees fighting for basic rights. Why do we buy a damn thing from a corporation that is tucked away in a tax free red state and doesn't say to a governor "we'll move to your state but not if you don't demand that you are a state that passes the ERA?"
Do people get that women are not considered equal under the constitution.
Not all, ofcourse, but many white men who seem to fear they are losing everything are gonna make sure they own our bodies and make sure we are not legally equal everywhere in America.
I used to diminish how much women were discriminated against. It's because I thought I could do anything I put my mind to and to acknowledge such discrimination existed would make that journey emotionally harder.
History has taught us one part of the genius of creating a middle class economic tier is that people don't like to give things up that provide comfort.
That along with assassinating progressive leadership stopped us from achieving our goals in the 60's and 70's. Sure we got outta Vietnam but accepted Ronald Reagan and his trickle down fantasy land. We gonna have to be willing to give up some creature comforts for the greater good. Do we still claim to be willing to do so?
Insane in the membrane.
Can I and can we stop pretending things are a way they are not?
Annie Roboff
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What do you suggest the left do? Block the entrances to every evangelical church in America? Prevent people from entering Chick-fil-A, Hobby Lobby and other companies known to give money to anti-choice efforts? What *can* we do at this point since we don't have the majority in the Senate to eliminate the filibuster and may very well lose the House in a few months?
I will be out marching, but I know it does little to nothing at this point. We needed this outrage when Obama's SCOTUS pick was denied, when the press was vilifying Hillary and people were eating it up (btw she was right about EVERY SINGLE THING), when the right was packing the courts for years and years and years, like the left should have been doing. As a woman, I am so angry that my right to my own body is controlled by 9 people on a court. How sad it is that women born today have fewer rights than women born 50 years ago.
And I am so furious that the *women* I know who are anti-choice and vocal about it (it's obscene to me that there are any women at all on this side of the argument) are the very same women I know who have taken advantage of the privileges we had protected under Roe v Wade. These same women who had miscarriages (and subsequent D&C procedures) and went thru in vitro (tell me again how many embryos are destroyed during IVF?) - but now that *they* have their little families, they are fine taking away those protections for the next generation. SMDH.
We all know who this is going to affect the most. This isn't about saving lives. This is about protecting the upper class and controlling poor women and making sure they stay poor. And they have the nerve to say it's in the name of God and Jesus.
If we aren't going to separate church and state, isn't it high time then that we tax the mother-living-shit out of these religious institutions and put that money towards caring for the living human beings in this country who need our help the most?
Suzanne Mayes
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Democrats, liberals, progressives... whatever you want to call us, we care too much about reason and rational thought, and facts, and measured response. i.e. we're the smart ones with no hair on fire. We can never compete with the right wing outrage machine. But we must organize and stand up for the majority of Americans who see this potential Supreme Court decision as the biggest disruption to everyday life, as we've known it, in our lifetimes. I can't even imagine an effective general strike at this point. Who will be the leaders that emerge from this moment? Will there be any? Is it possible to organize the liberal coalition? Turnout in our local Nashville elections this week was beyond dismal. I struggle to find hope in this moment.
Doyle Davis
Grimey's Records
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As I love my Arizona and am happy that it turned blue and will continue so, I'm from Germany and try to accept any other countries elections and choices as long as it is known as a free election. I (as almost all Europeans) hated and hate Trump. He's devil's son. My late Grandma from Italy always crossed herself when he was on TV and that was BEFORE he played a politician. That says a lot. I was laughing at her that time..
As someone who lives the major part of the year in Europe I can tell you that it all starts with your TV. "Reality" shows are not showing reality in the US. They are scripted. You guys yourself feed each other with fake reality. Your heroes are not people with high moral standards or living for and helping to turn the world into a better place. Those are crazies like Musk, Trump or the Kardashians. I mean hello???
Contrary, people who try to do what might help the majority of the country have to live in fear. I don't say that Sanders or AOC are always correct, but they fight for stuff people in most parts of Europe have as a standard of living for 50+ years. And we are free, you can say shit on tv if you think it's shit. And fuck, when you want to use a swear word, nobody cares.. there is no ef's... say exactly what and how it is. That is living the truth!
I have many friends in the US for decades now whom I love dearly. I'm lucky as none of them is a Republican. Funny side story is that I was a huge John McCain fan. But the Republican party has nothing in common with John McCain, he would be a Blue by nowadays standards.
However, the German law concerning abortion is very strict too. We have 12 weeks into pregnancy. Afterwards its only allowed if the mother's life is in danger. Mother is always more important than a non-born. That is probably the difference. We consider life that is already living on earth a higher worth than a "might get born in a couple of month" and "might be alive"...
I think the whole discussion that it is only about a female's body is wrong. It is part of it and of course I want to eat if I want, drink if I want, exercise if I want to and be pregnat if I want to. Nobody else should have the right to tell me what I HAVE to do. Suggesting yes. We have to go to a clinic before too and hear alternatives like giving birth and having the baby adopted, as there are long lists of couples waiting for a baby. But decision is only what the pregnant woman want.
But beside the female's body, everyone fighting for "LIFE" needs to acknowledge that an already living life is higher than a not born. Simply you can not put the basic rights of a living person below the rights of "someone/something" (whatever you call it) that is NOT living on earth.
To come to an end. Get your people educated. Teach them about consequences. About standards of living on other parts of the world. About rights and laws in other countries.
We are ONE earth. The problems you guys produce will become others. Like crazy Putin now. Suddenly he's not someone we hope to change in then long run, he became bitter enemy of the Western world. Shit does not know borders.
Guys help your wifes/gf's fight for their right to live the way the choose. They choose you, they know how to decide right, right ?
Alexandra Walker
Munich, Germany
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"Where is the left wing?
HOME ALONE AND SCARED!"
-- Bob
Bob,
The above is not how I feel -- I'm sometimes scared but it's not freezing me up. I'm knocking on doors* of Republicans (and former friends) one of whom tells me, "Don't go to my neighbors house; he'll shoot you if he finds out you're a Dem." And he's serious.
I'm trying! I'm still up for the public argument. I'm writing Lil' Susie Collins and Manchin and Lisa. I'm buying ammo ...
1. ... out of desperation for doing SOMETHING, I've even *decided to run for the Maine State House of Representatives for Christ's sake! Seriously. Qualified for our clean elections funding and everything, thinking "I might be able to help, somehow" ... and that's all I can think of to do!
2. I had my 5-years of rants on fecesbook, getting threats from several different people, pissing off former friends, family (yes, two of my brothers), and former students. And attempting to argue using reason, ad fontes, Snopes, lists of journalistic standards, blah, blah, blah, before I realized that NO ONE GIVES A SHIT about facts and truth; THEY are in control. Power is there's and there's exclusively; just like Putin, the threat of greater violence is there, the silo is completely encircled by the invisible fence outside and no rational person knows what to do -- many of us would "do it", but we can't figure out the "it" and the train's already off the rails.
3. I have several guns (the norm, here in rural Maine) even though I rarely hunt anymore, BUT I just recently bought another -- a small Glock for concealed carry.
What do "we" -- I'm a centrist-leaning-left guy; you know the kind, one who used to discuss and debate ISSUES -- what do we DO to take action? (I like your idea about protesting Fucker Carlson's place in western Maine, but what's that accomplish?) ...
... the far right is a juggernaut of bullshit and lies and they know they control the levers of power -- SCOTUS, lil' Mitchie, the State Houses, some (how many??) law enforcement folks. How to fight that?
It's a fucking CULT, pure and simple. Ever try to get someone out of a cult, until they're ready? It's a seamless world of -- how many? -- 35 million? 45 million people? TrumpianCultists. And there's no talking with them. Here in our region, they're now on our tiny little school board, the fundy churches are weaponized around this bullshit -- and the actual weapons are oiled and ready.
Trump whistles, the dogs will come. Again, but more of them, more confidently.
DOJ and Merrick and the holy Senate (remember when that was a place of honor?) appear to be gutless shills, themselves. The ONLY thing that I can see that might work, won't be done. WON'T BE DONE. Prosecute Trump and all of them, balls to the wall, and quickly. Take the chance that when the violence erupts, law enforcement and the military will hold. If they do and those people go to jail, then right wing momentum WILL stall. If they don't hold, oh well; the military would've been coming for us eventually anyway.
Tell me -- how do sane people ever come together over this? What do we DO besides hand-wringing, arming ourselves, me running for the state House, you doing whatever individual thing you do, young people holding signs and doing it the way we did in the 60s -- there is no simple, galvanizing "thing" that draws people on the center and left together, the way psycho-rage conspiracy draws the right together. And, we don't have 50 years of planning all this, experimenting to see what works, re-reading the dictatorial playbooks of antiquity.
What.
Do.
We.
Do?
Looks like we fucked, Bob. Please, PLEASE, show me how I'm wrong.
Kevin Ritchie
____________________________________
What we are seeing now is what happens when the next generation gets complacent and entitled. The rights that our foremothers and forefathers fought so hard to protect have been taken for granted. I attended all those meetings with my mother, I made phone calls, I helped her sponsor events to secure the rights of women and provide education about what options were out there for women. I had the honor of meeting all these amazing women who fought for women's rights. But, all I currently see is the hard work that my mother, and those before her, worked so hard to protect only to have completely been undone. Why? COMPLACENCY AND ENTITLEMENT. I am a Generation Xer and my mother fought HARD to protect women's rights and the rights of women to control their health, their bodies. I did not take that for granted and supported her causes to protect those freedoms, those rights. Unfortunately, the generation after Generation X never saw any of that, none of it. They only got to reap the benefits of the work that the previous generations had done, but never saw the sausage being made. They also didn't suffer any real tragedies in their early years of growing up, no wars, no guns in school, no confusing messages being delivered to them 24/7 through their cell phones. Their challenges were different, but they basically had it easy. Easy leads to complacency, complacency leads to entitlement. Here we are.
But, what happens in the real world as a result of these legal decisions? They don't affect people with money. The folks with money will figure out a way around this nonsense. The problem lies with those who do not have the means in which to solve these problems. The problem of a 16 y.o. who gets pregnant and has religious parents that force her to go through with a pregnancy to term. The problem of a 25 y.o. woman who has no financial support that gets raped by a boyfriend. The problem of a 30 y.o. man who has accidentally knocked up his girlfriend and doesn't have the means in which to care for himself, let alone a child and mother. These are real situations that exist now and will only grow in numbers if we continue on this path. Taking away these rights from people (not just women) will bring back what my mother and those before her worked so hard to protect. The back alley abortions, women harming themselves in order to "rid themselves" of unwanted pregnancies….it will all come back.
I'm not BLAMING any single person, any entire group or even specific generation for any of this, but I'm gonna say something that might piss people off. I just returned from a 3 day music festival in Atlanta and what I noticed was the fact that people had a lot of tattoos, beautiful artwork, intricate pieces…things you knew took a lot of time, and money, to create. I actually felt a little FOMO, as I didn't have any myself. Of course, it's everyone's right to mark their bodies up the way they wish (see what I did there?). But, if people spent as much time, effort and energy on protecting women's rights as they did on which tattoo to get next, I'm thinking we might be in a better situation than we are now.
Finally, I don't have the answers, I don't know what path is the right one…society has become so damn divided and angry at each other, it's seems impossible to even sit down and have a real conversation about the problem, let alone, how to solve it.
Khila L. Khani
____________________________________
I was thinking about my babysitter, who went to New York City. SO EXCITING to a little girl! I wanted to go on big girl trips, too.
But when I asked her what she did, did she have fun? She cried... Life before Roe v. Wade when so much was unspoken. I thought I'd done something wrong. Her mother told me, "no, everything's okay" and took me in the kitchen and gave me a small glass of Coke, asked me about school.
Years later, I asked the Mom what made my rock star/glorious blond haired/cheerleader babysitter cry, she told me the whole story.
This was the same mother who got me a charter subscription to MS magazine when it started publishing...
Rhetoric is easy. Adoption. Abortion. Just words.
The impact of both... on many... That's what no one considers.
Everything you say about young unwed mothers is spot on. SPOT ON. Plus the stigma for the child, the one on Aid to Dependent Children, who can't do the school trips or whatever, as well as the wear and tear on a mother who now has to pay for childcare if she's to work at a job that pays minimum wage or not much better. Words don't have dimension, real life implications or the exhaustion/rejection factored in.
Easy to sling words, hard to understand their reality or impact.
John Prine and the great Bobby Braddock (the Country Music Hall of Famer who wrote "He Stopped Loving Her Today") got it right when they wrote "Unwed Fathers."
"From an teenage lover, to an unwed mother
Kept undercover, like some bad dream
While unwed fathers, they can't be bothered
They run like water, through a mountain stream..."
He sang this in Dublin Ireland in 1988... a country where abortion was morally so wrong, and yet, the people felt every word because they understood the impact.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVXCVKqpw1s
And for all the well-off LGBTQ+ people who voted for Trump et al because of the tax incentives (and I know some), they're coming for you next. This is how it begins...
Women have no value to these people. Sexism isn't removed by virtue signal promotions of women into jobs, because often they can embody the same toxic masculinity cloaked by pro-femme rhetoric.
So it continues. Amazing how quickly progress is washed away if you're not diligent, because to quote your friend Larry McMurtry, "It Can't Happen Here."
Somewhere in heaven, my father weeps for us all...
Holly Gleason
Nashville, TN.
____________________________________
Bob, I have never replied to any of your emails before, but what you said was spot on. In the post truth world manufactured by the right where ignorance is weaponised, lies lionised, and the deliberate distortion of reality is gleefully and shamelessly blasted from the faux news sound system by the smirking point men and women of the trumplican cause, it seems that truth is "quaint", a poor second cousin of their false glamors and hyberbole. And now that the king of modern fake libertarianism, Elon Musk, owns Twitter, it's going to get worse. I too get demoralized and wonder how we ever going to get out of this mess and address any of the crises we face. All I know is that the only way they will absolutely win is of we don't push back. Never stop, Bob
Kevin Heydenrych
____________________________________
I can only imagine the kind of nasty emails you're gonna get for this. And again, it'll mostly come down to party lines. Without offering my own opinion, I'll just say this. I had dinner with a woman who worked at a Planned Parenthood. I was always sort of on the fence about abortion. She told me stories of battered and broken women coming in having them because they'd been physically, emotionally and mentally abused by their partners into having a baby. I feel like many Pro Life folks think abortions are limited to irresponsible sluts who got drunk and didn't use protection on either end. That's patently untrue. It can happen to anyone.
Danny Jay
____________________________________
The minority of your country are taking away the rights of gay and transgendered people, the rights of minorities to vote and have their history told, and of women to have authority over their own bodies.
Even the so-called Libertarians on Reddit can't decide if they should be pro-life or pro-choice, despite being the political group most associated with personal freedoms.
Congratulations, America, you now have a truly activist Supreme Court completely willing to ignore prior legal precedent, Stare decisis, in order to enact their warped political agenda.
The rest of the democratic world weeps at what is to come of your election process and personal rights hard worn through years of suffering and discrimination.
The next on the activist court's chopping block is the same birth control methods you, and most of us, have relied on to keep most pregnancies voluntary.
"If you thought the fight for birth control was a relic of the distant past—when a woman needed her husband's approval to get a checkbook let alone a prescription for the pill—think again."
https://bit.ly/3yah2Dj
Andrew V
____________________________________
Yet another reminder that elections have dangerous and damaging consequences. Oh, but her emails! A reminder too, that the tired old "both sides are the same" is complete bullshit.
One of the fundamental tenets of the GOP is being manifested daily, via state legislatures, Congress, and the courts, especially SCOTUS: that, no, all men are not created equal and certain people - depending on your race, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, and financial status - should NOT or NEVER be regarded as equal. And they're working relentlessly to make that the law of the land.
For those in the "both sides are the same" crowd, when choosing between the lesser of two evils you should always choose less evil. From democracy to privacy, that choice has never been more clear.
Steve Roth
____________________________________
I've spent the last two days on Twitter, in a mile-long Twitter thread, trying to get one of my Libertarian friends to read that NY Times article about Tucker. This guy is a data junkie. He won't read it, despite all the data in the article. He claims that calling Tucker racist destroys all cred for the article. He'd rather bury his head in the sand and focus on that single issue than read that article and have his beliefs challenged. This is what Tribalism has wrought, an unwillingness to entertain ideas and discussion from the other side, two separate realities. How are we ever supposed to fix problems in this country if we can't communicate with each other?
One of the most interesting panels I saw this year at SxSW was an augmented reality panel. Glasses/contacts that cut out of your field of vision extraneous data that has no meaning to you. Now imagine applying that tech to people. Think it can't happen?
x -dick huey
____________________________________
"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it."
-- Joseph Goebbels
"The bigger the lie, the more it will be believed."
-- Joseph Goebbels
"It would not be impossible to prove with sufficient repetition and a psychological understanding of the people concerned that a square is in fact a circle. They are mere words, and words can be molded until they clothe ideas and disguise."
-- Joseph Goebbels
"...the rank and file are usually much more primitive than we imagine. Propaganda must therefore always be essentially simple and repetitious."
-- Joseph Goebbels
It's the Nazi playbook, plain and simple.
Peter A. Barker
____________________________________
Well I'm not home alone, nor am I scared.
I'm pissed, and I'm done humoring these right-wing extremist assholes who are destroying the country.
SAVE THE USA - ABORT THE GOP
They aren't a party, they are essentially a domestic terrorism operation in the making.
But I can't thank you enough for continuing to write about these topics.
I am here for the music, but I genuinely believe that your analysis of our political mess is worth my time.
Please keep doing it. Please don't let them silence you.
Thanks, Bob.
Larry Kennedy
Harrisburg, PA
____________________________________
You do a huge service by speaking up. Most progressives have weaned out or lost touch or cut ties with right wingers during Trumps presidency. You, and maybe Howard are the only ones I can think of who have conservative people who read or listen to you. So it's imperative that you voice your views Bob, also because many progressive men get pretty quiet when it comes to abortion. Hell even a lot of left leaning women do as well. They don't want the vitriol. It's not a pretty sounding word. There are so many unarguable facts when it comes to women and their bodies but if someone is just going to yell "baby killer" over and over, they will never hear the rational reasons as to why abortion must remain an option and choice for women—and men. I bet there are thousands of men reading your letters who are grateful af they could help their girlfriend, sister, fling, wife, affair obtain a legal and safe abortion. They need to speak up too. As a woman and mother who has had 2 abortions at age 12 and 23, I am so grateful that you have the courage and intellect to articulate the issue.
Kathy Valentine
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