There was a four hour hearing in Amarillo, Texas, yesterday in a case that very likely will have national repercussions for abortion access for millions.
Yes yes yes we must all become citizen activists! This is exactly right. There can be no sitting on the sidelines at a moment when our basic rights are under attack. If you need guidance about how to *get* active there are many of us who can help you. But it's time for everyone to use your voices!
If you haven't signed up for Jessica's Substack yet, what are you waiting for? She is doing what we ALL should be doing. Get signed up, NOW, and get busy along side Jessica!!!!
Please reconsider your use of the label “Conservative”. The political party calling themselves Republican are no longer a party that honors conservative values. They are acting as reactionary radicals. Using the appropriate labels can help frame the situation better.
To be fair, anti-abortion has been a "traditional" conservative stance long before the current radicals came to the forefront. Perhaps the way they're going about eliminating access to reproductive healthcare is distasteful, but the endgame is in line with their goals. We need the non-radicalized conservatives to stop voting for these people simply because they'd rather see someone like Trump in office over a democrat.
I fought for legal abortion the first time. It is so sickening that I am fighting for it again! I’m so angry I can’t write all the things I am thinking.
I completely agree. Even though I am past child bearing age, I cannot look the other way! Women cannot have their own bodies legislated! This from people who get upset about vaccine mandate! I feel so helpless, I simply don't know what more to do, I vote but I live in Rhode Island!
I had someone ask me why I was bothering since I am too old to need one and I live in California where it’s still legal! 😡 I’m with you, I will do whatever I can to protect the rights of all women over their own body!!
No judge should have a lifetime term. The harm they can cause generation after generation is too great. This is all bullshit. I get that 1 judge does have this power, but he shouldn't. If this country doesn't fully wake all the way up, right now, we're done as a functioning democracy. Fence sitters and independent voters need to step up and vote for Democrats at every level. If not, it won't be too much longer when our right to do that will be taken away by a judge. Justice Roberts, I'm looking at you, for starters.
If this conservative hack judge rules for making women brood mares for all of these white misogynistic evangelical morons to take America back to the 17th century then they should have to get rid of Viagra too ! Since men use Viagra for impotence issues which is NOT the intended use of this drug but a side effect (very profitable) . Viagra was intended for use with persons that have pulmonary hypertension not impotence. Side note , in Canada it is much harder to treat women with pulmonary hypertension with Viagra because so many hurdles have to be passed before the doctor can prescribe for women !!! . Now one conservative judge who has plans to destroy half of the population 's rights because of his personal beliefs can make this decision ! Make it make sense !!
Agree 100% Viagra absolutely should be on the table as well - lets see how fast all those men vote for controlling women's rights, if men's rights are also being controlled!
Clearly the GOP doesn't look at the repercussions of an action like this. So much for pro-life when women will die because they will get backroom abortions..babies will be abused or neglected and die. It's just a horrific landscape for women.
I couldn't agree more. My grandmother, a nurse and Veteran of WWI, was well-known in the Glendale, CA, area for being able to direct girls towards safe abortions in the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, & 60s. Girls would arrive on her doorstep, some victims of botched back alley abortions. She instilled in my mother, and me, the unfairness, indignity, danger, and societal scorn imposed on these women and girls. She didn't live to see Roe, unfortunately, but I know she would have fully supported access to SAFE abortions.
I am also now old enough to remember the pre-Roe days and the back street butchery. It was horrible, and that is why I now am appalled that these extremist organizations are given oxygen. It just goes to show, sadly, that until there is an Equal Rights Amendment enshrined in the Constitution, women, ALL women, will be second class citizens.
84 year old male, and I totally agree with you. I grew up reading about young girls and women dying from botched back alley abortions, and cheered Roe V Wade. I am totally frustrated now. We definitely need an Equal Rights Amendment for women's rights and LGBTQ+ protection. Also desperately need a Voting Rights Amendment.
You must be very proud of your grandmother…I’m sure that wasn’t easy to do back then. I’m 62 and when I was in high school I read a book by a local author, Paul Zindel, “My Darling, My Hamburger” where one of the characters has a backroom abortion and almost dies. That resonated with me so much and I can’t fathom going back to those days.
The cruelty is a feature, not a bug. They want society to be legally divided into Good, Straight, White People vs. Sinners. And in their view, Sinners deserve to suffer all the time.
The radical right are never satisfied. I fear what's next... birth control, the right to own property, to be educated, work outside the home and the right to divorce an abusive spouse? With the Republican caliphate intent on taking away religious freedom and installing Christian Nationalism, I see all women's rights banned. After all, we didn't have these when the Constitution was enacted and they want to return America to this time when it was truly "great."
I have spent the past six years researching the life and times of Victoria Woodhull and her sister, Tennessee. Much of what has been written about her is just plain spin, born from a game of telephone from a small biography published in 1871 which was based on an interview with her -- IOW, her own spin.
Most know Victoria as "the first woman to run for president" in 1872. She was much more, and her sister potentially even more. How she was treated in the press was shameful, even long after she left public life. Interestingly, she was the first target of Anthony Comstock's law (she won the case on a technicality after being financially ruined by the lawsuits) because her newspaper published birth control information and was mailed throughout the country.
The overriding theme of Victoria's and her sister's (Tennessee Claflin) life was the status of women in the second half of the 19th century. Both gave speeches to sold-out audiences railing against just what this action in Texas is all about. Namely, The Subjugation of Women (also -- for those interested, read the book by that title by John Stuart Mill, whose wife was actively involved in the writing. Woodhull was a devotee of Mill). All of the discussions, Woodhull's, Claflin's, and Mill's were about the injustices of 19th century society against women.
What is **very** sad is that we are still in the same place now.
The fact that one state court can have THIS much power over the entire of the US, in fact over 52% of the nation speaks very strongly toward the authoritarian society places like Texas and Florida would like us all to be living under.
Killing machines are fine for everyone, buy all you want, but Plan B is a crime??? Where are the laws that force men who are the cause of unwanted pregnancies to be punished? Why are there still rapists in TX?
And what is this constant predilection they have for dicking around in people’s underwear (no pun intended)? Between women and the LGBTQ community being disenfranchised rest assured these are some VERY TWISTED folks. Some with very twisted skeletons I’d bet. This is gonna take a much bigger, angrier Womens March than 2017’s.
One more affront to women, nearly all originating with white men. We will not have it! When this judge comes down with his ruling — little doubt how he will rule - there will be another wave of fury. Abortion pills are available from Europe and the last time I looked, interstate commerce regulations prevent surveillance of mail boxes. The fury of women being oppressed by the white male establishment will know no bounds.
This is so infuriating! Is there no judicial oversight? These judges need to be held accountable for lying in confirmation hearings. If he's not ruling based on established law, isn't that dereliction of duty?
Arguing that mifepristone complications will take time and resources from other patients seems a dangerous argument to make. My guess is that pregnancy is more likely to result in complications and that those would be more time and resource consuming. And data for that should be available.
And that doesn’t even begin to take into the vastly greater amount of time and resources required by the birth and rearing of a child.
How long before they take away rights to birth control? They want women to have all these babies- will fathers support them all, will the gov't enforce the fathers role and require support or will the gov't hand over more financial help to those that don't have the finances to care for these children? Unlikely- so we end up with more living in poverty or on the street! Love that men are making all these life altering decisions for women! Thought the Republicans were shouting about not letting government run our lives - yet that's exactly what is happening - women's rights, religious rights, gun laws, everything in our lives- either they want to take away our rights or put on more restrictions!
Assuming that the judge decides that the approval for pregnancy was "wrong," will that mean that other uses are also banned? Specifically, the drug's use for intractable Cushing's Syndrome in Type 2 diabetics. There might be others: Googling gets you nothing but debates on termination of pregnancy.
If not, what is to prevent doctors from prescribing it "off label." That certainly is happening with the diabetic drug now in short supply because of its side effect of weight loss.
I really have no idea what kinds of restrictions there are for off-label prescriptions. Does anyone know?
The ridiculousness of all of this is encapsulated in the active support of ivermectin for the treatment of covid. I treated my horses and dogs with ivermectin in its on-label use for parasite infestation, the human use on-label is the same.
But NOOOO! Use ivermectin to treat covid! And now people are actually dying because of doing this.
And then there is the outrage of people who refused the vaccine because it violated the right to have autonomy over one’s own body! How does that jibe with the whole abortion rights question?
You nailed it- historically, from the genesis of this nation up through this very day we imbue the judiciary with their power- they adjudicate law because we allow it. That judge has no business ruling on medical matters and the plaintiffs have absolutely no traction, no background, no aptitude, no cognizance, nothing that lends itself to rendering even the pretense of a thoughtful argument- it is dangerous, sinister theater and no way should these malicious antics supercede science and expertise and healthcare.
Just no.
This is bigger than negotiation through future votes, more pressing than weighing countermoves and assembling a cogent response to a vacuous and ill-intentioned complaint. This degree of nefarious foolery demands immediate denouncement; this meritless dogpile should not have matriculated into its present form. This os a hideous sham, an absurd mockery, a perversion of the mechanations of our justice system that has seen itself deformed beyond recognition, AND beyond utility.
Exactly right. The proper response to these sinister **law-breakers-in-fact** is to send in a SWAT team to cart them all off for attempting to commit outrageous, irreparable harm to American women and families.
If you believe these villains aren’t law breakers then the laws are wrong and vile and must be changed immediately and forever for threatening the lives and most basic rights of our citizens.
Question for you - how do you not just sit there roll your eyes and say "for fucks sake" or "are you fucking kidding me" or "what the fuck are they doing now"....is it just me?
What gets me is that this isn't something new that just hit the market or is about to. Its been around for 2 decades. That a judge can unilaterally declare an injunction on something that is happening that he has no proof has caused harm (its not like a railroad that isn't maintaining their car wheels and causing accidents and chemical spills...) just because he feels like it.
Yes yes yes we must all become citizen activists! This is exactly right. There can be no sitting on the sidelines at a moment when our basic rights are under attack. If you need guidance about how to *get* active there are many of us who can help you. But it's time for everyone to use your voices!
If you haven't signed up for Jessica's Substack yet, what are you waiting for? She is doing what we ALL should be doing. Get signed up, NOW, and get busy along side Jessica!!!!
Thank you!! Just subscribed.
Welcome!
And thank YOU, Daniel.
CALL. TO. ACTION!!!!
Please reconsider your use of the label “Conservative”. The political party calling themselves Republican are no longer a party that honors conservative values. They are acting as reactionary radicals. Using the appropriate labels can help frame the situation better.
I have pared way back on its use, but it’s hard to keep calling them radical extremists without sounding shrill.
Words matter. Intent matters. When we are fighting for our democracy acts and facts matter. Thank you for what you do.
Try "reactionaries".
They are radical extremists. Call them out!
To be fair, anti-abortion has been a "traditional" conservative stance long before the current radicals came to the forefront. Perhaps the way they're going about eliminating access to reproductive healthcare is distasteful, but the endgame is in line with their goals. We need the non-radicalized conservatives to stop voting for these people simply because they'd rather see someone like Trump in office over a democrat.
I fought for legal abortion the first time. It is so sickening that I am fighting for it again! I’m so angry I can’t write all the things I am thinking.
I completely agree. Even though I am past child bearing age, I cannot look the other way! Women cannot have their own bodies legislated! This from people who get upset about vaccine mandate! I feel so helpless, I simply don't know what more to do, I vote but I live in Rhode Island!
I had someone ask me why I was bothering since I am too old to need one and I live in California where it’s still legal! 😡 I’m with you, I will do whatever I can to protect the rights of all women over their own body!!
I'm with you, sister!
Yea I have nothing nice to say either. It's unreal, just totally unreal that so many are again fighting for basic rights in a "free" country
No judge should have a lifetime term. The harm they can cause generation after generation is too great. This is all bullshit. I get that 1 judge does have this power, but he shouldn't. If this country doesn't fully wake all the way up, right now, we're done as a functioning democracy. Fence sitters and independent voters need to step up and vote for Democrats at every level. If not, it won't be too much longer when our right to do that will be taken away by a judge. Justice Roberts, I'm looking at you, for starters.
If this conservative hack judge rules for making women brood mares for all of these white misogynistic evangelical morons to take America back to the 17th century then they should have to get rid of Viagra too ! Since men use Viagra for impotence issues which is NOT the intended use of this drug but a side effect (very profitable) . Viagra was intended for use with persons that have pulmonary hypertension not impotence. Side note , in Canada it is much harder to treat women with pulmonary hypertension with Viagra because so many hurdles have to be passed before the doctor can prescribe for women !!! . Now one conservative judge who has plans to destroy half of the population 's rights because of his personal beliefs can make this decision ! Make it make sense !!
Agree 100% Viagra absolutely should be on the table as well - lets see how fast all those men vote for controlling women's rights, if men's rights are also being controlled!
amen!
Trans men’s rights are also being controlled. We can get pregnant too.
Clearly the GOP doesn't look at the repercussions of an action like this. So much for pro-life when women will die because they will get backroom abortions..babies will be abused or neglected and die. It's just a horrific landscape for women.
I couldn't agree more. My grandmother, a nurse and Veteran of WWI, was well-known in the Glendale, CA, area for being able to direct girls towards safe abortions in the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, & 60s. Girls would arrive on her doorstep, some victims of botched back alley abortions. She instilled in my mother, and me, the unfairness, indignity, danger, and societal scorn imposed on these women and girls. She didn't live to see Roe, unfortunately, but I know she would have fully supported access to SAFE abortions.
I am also now old enough to remember the pre-Roe days and the back street butchery. It was horrible, and that is why I now am appalled that these extremist organizations are given oxygen. It just goes to show, sadly, that until there is an Equal Rights Amendment enshrined in the Constitution, women, ALL women, will be second class citizens.
84 year old male, and I totally agree with you. I grew up reading about young girls and women dying from botched back alley abortions, and cheered Roe V Wade. I am totally frustrated now. We definitely need an Equal Rights Amendment for women's rights and LGBTQ+ protection. Also desperately need a Voting Rights Amendment.
Second class is too high a rating? Women will be rated in the same category as livestock.
What shocks me is that there are women that are okay with being livestock.
Yes. I don’t get it. It’s like there’s a piece missing.
You must be very proud of your grandmother…I’m sure that wasn’t easy to do back then. I’m 62 and when I was in high school I read a book by a local author, Paul Zindel, “My Darling, My Hamburger” where one of the characters has a backroom abortion and almost dies. That resonated with me so much and I can’t fathom going back to those days.
Thank you, Dawn. I am proud of her. I can't fathom the cruelty of this situation, either.
Wow! That’s an incredible story! Not to mention, there is huge racial component here.
The cruelty is a feature, not a bug. They want society to be legally divided into Good, Straight, White People vs. Sinners. And in their view, Sinners deserve to suffer all the time.
The radical right are never satisfied. I fear what's next... birth control, the right to own property, to be educated, work outside the home and the right to divorce an abusive spouse? With the Republican caliphate intent on taking away religious freedom and installing Christian Nationalism, I see all women's rights banned. After all, we didn't have these when the Constitution was enacted and they want to return America to this time when it was truly "great."
I have spent the past six years researching the life and times of Victoria Woodhull and her sister, Tennessee. Much of what has been written about her is just plain spin, born from a game of telephone from a small biography published in 1871 which was based on an interview with her -- IOW, her own spin.
Most know Victoria as "the first woman to run for president" in 1872. She was much more, and her sister potentially even more. How she was treated in the press was shameful, even long after she left public life. Interestingly, she was the first target of Anthony Comstock's law (she won the case on a technicality after being financially ruined by the lawsuits) because her newspaper published birth control information and was mailed throughout the country.
The overriding theme of Victoria's and her sister's (Tennessee Claflin) life was the status of women in the second half of the 19th century. Both gave speeches to sold-out audiences railing against just what this action in Texas is all about. Namely, The Subjugation of Women (also -- for those interested, read the book by that title by John Stuart Mill, whose wife was actively involved in the writing. Woodhull was a devotee of Mill). All of the discussions, Woodhull's, Claflin's, and Mill's were about the injustices of 19th century society against women.
What is **very** sad is that we are still in the same place now.
Short answer: Yes. They also want to ban being any form of queer and re-establish POC as being second-class citizens legally.
The fact that one state court can have THIS much power over the entire of the US, in fact over 52% of the nation speaks very strongly toward the authoritarian society places like Texas and Florida would like us all to be living under.
Killing machines are fine for everyone, buy all you want, but Plan B is a crime??? Where are the laws that force men who are the cause of unwanted pregnancies to be punished? Why are there still rapists in TX?
And what is this constant predilection they have for dicking around in people’s underwear (no pun intended)? Between women and the LGBTQ community being disenfranchised rest assured these are some VERY TWISTED folks. Some with very twisted skeletons I’d bet. This is gonna take a much bigger, angrier Womens March than 2017’s.
Just to be clear, it is a federal court, located in the state of Texas. But point taken, and the same.
And the decent men will join us in this March for our lives.
We trans men absolutely will. Many of us still have a uterus too.
One more affront to women, nearly all originating with white men. We will not have it! When this judge comes down with his ruling — little doubt how he will rule - there will be another wave of fury. Abortion pills are available from Europe and the last time I looked, interstate commerce regulations prevent surveillance of mail boxes. The fury of women being oppressed by the white male establishment will know no bounds.
This is so infuriating! Is there no judicial oversight? These judges need to be held accountable for lying in confirmation hearings. If he's not ruling based on established law, isn't that dereliction of duty?
Arguing that mifepristone complications will take time and resources from other patients seems a dangerous argument to make. My guess is that pregnancy is more likely to result in complications and that those would be more time and resource consuming. And data for that should be available.
And that doesn’t even begin to take into the vastly greater amount of time and resources required by the birth and rearing of a child.
How long before they take away rights to birth control? They want women to have all these babies- will fathers support them all, will the gov't enforce the fathers role and require support or will the gov't hand over more financial help to those that don't have the finances to care for these children? Unlikely- so we end up with more living in poverty or on the street! Love that men are making all these life altering decisions for women! Thought the Republicans were shouting about not letting government run our lives - yet that's exactly what is happening - women's rights, religious rights, gun laws, everything in our lives- either they want to take away our rights or put on more restrictions!
Justice Thomas wants to take aim at birth control, which has the same issues in his mind as the caselaw on abortion.
Assuming that the judge decides that the approval for pregnancy was "wrong," will that mean that other uses are also banned? Specifically, the drug's use for intractable Cushing's Syndrome in Type 2 diabetics. There might be others: Googling gets you nothing but debates on termination of pregnancy.
If not, what is to prevent doctors from prescribing it "off label." That certainly is happening with the diabetic drug now in short supply because of its side effect of weight loss.
I really have no idea what kinds of restrictions there are for off-label prescriptions. Does anyone know?
The ridiculousness of all of this is encapsulated in the active support of ivermectin for the treatment of covid. I treated my horses and dogs with ivermectin in its on-label use for parasite infestation, the human use on-label is the same.
But NOOOO! Use ivermectin to treat covid! And now people are actually dying because of doing this.
And then there is the outrage of people who refused the vaccine because it violated the right to have autonomy over one’s own body! How does that jibe with the whole abortion rights question?
Correct. I agree. Which is why it really is about control and not abortion.
Aye.
And you don’t see any federal judge getting ready to ban that!
Nope.
Lupus. It’s also a treatment for lupus.
You nailed it- historically, from the genesis of this nation up through this very day we imbue the judiciary with their power- they adjudicate law because we allow it. That judge has no business ruling on medical matters and the plaintiffs have absolutely no traction, no background, no aptitude, no cognizance, nothing that lends itself to rendering even the pretense of a thoughtful argument- it is dangerous, sinister theater and no way should these malicious antics supercede science and expertise and healthcare.
Just no.
This is bigger than negotiation through future votes, more pressing than weighing countermoves and assembling a cogent response to a vacuous and ill-intentioned complaint. This degree of nefarious foolery demands immediate denouncement; this meritless dogpile should not have matriculated into its present form. This os a hideous sham, an absurd mockery, a perversion of the mechanations of our justice system that has seen itself deformed beyond recognition, AND beyond utility.
We do not consent.
Exactly right. The proper response to these sinister **law-breakers-in-fact** is to send in a SWAT team to cart them all off for attempting to commit outrageous, irreparable harm to American women and families.
If you believe these villains aren’t law breakers then the laws are wrong and vile and must be changed immediately and forever for threatening the lives and most basic rights of our citizens.
Question for you - how do you not just sit there roll your eyes and say "for fucks sake" or "are you fucking kidding me" or "what the fuck are they doing now"....is it just me?
I have to do a lot of meditation.
What gets me is that this isn't something new that just hit the market or is about to. Its been around for 2 decades. That a judge can unilaterally declare an injunction on something that is happening that he has no proof has caused harm (its not like a railroad that isn't maintaining their car wheels and causing accidents and chemical spills...) just because he feels like it.