Thought for the Day

[KnightHawk 2.0]

Donald Trump comparing himself to Jesus and Nelson Mandela is disgusting,despicable and downright shameful. But not surprising at all,because this is what the fraudster and charlatan always does. And him lashing out at prosecutors,state and federal judges,attorney generals and witnesses shows that he knows the walls of justice is closing in on him,and will be found guilty and convicted and sent to prison.

[Stavros]

Abortion has an ability to confuse, anger and fold policy making into a knot of contradictions. Thus the current situation in Arizona exposes some of the ways in which people seeking to justify either side end up in a loop out of which they cannot seem to free themselves, while the real issue -the decision making of a woman, her partner/family/medical professionals seems to be almost an irrelevance to the politics.

Thus

"Laws from the 1860s in states and territories like Arizona, enacted decades before women in the US had won the right to vote, helped lead the 2022 Supreme Court to the “inescapable conclusion … that a right to abortion is not deeply rooted in the Nation’s history and traditions.”And so, with the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision that replaced Roe, justices turned away from the ’70s idea that women should have certain rights and returned to the 1860s idea that states should have them instead.
The patchwork of access created by the Dobbs decision has created abortion rights states and abortion ban states. The decision by Arizona’s state Supreme Court to return to the 1864 law is just the latest evidence of the tortured fallout."

But

"The 1864 law in Arizona would ban nearly all abortions, except to save the life of the mother, in the key political battleground and carries a prison sentence for abortion providers, although the state’s Democratic attorney general said in a statement that her office will not enforce it."
Civil War-era abortion ban rises again, which is exactly what some Roe opponents wanted (yahoo.com)

This doesn't make sense -if the law states that it is illegal to abort a life, then surely the woman seeking an abortion, and the medical professionals who perform it must be charged with First Degree Murder -? What is more absurd, having a law that an Attorney General says will not be enforced, or the failure of the advocates to insist that the people responsible for 'murder' be put on trial?

Surely, until the logic of the 'Pro-Life' lobby is implemented as law and in full, citizens will not realize what in fact it means when a woman decides or a medical professional advises and they all end up in prison. It is why some add in get-out clauses, such as rape, incest, health of the mother etc, which by definition then means the 'right to life' is not the priority.

There is no solution to this mess, other than to respect the rights of the individual, and not insist that when a woman becomes pregnant in the USA, she must then hand over control of her body and her decision making rights to a middle aged man who has a bible tucked under his arm for reference, preferring it to the Constitution of the United States.

[Stavros]

Republicans have a Policy, which is that there is no Policy. Just make it up as you go -but wait a minute -does this mean the Supreme Court of Arizona is an irrelevance? That nobody, or rather, everybody in the State can just ignore their rulings, as if they were all optional?

"Nowhere encapsulates the GOP’s backpedal on abortion better than Arizona, whose state supreme court on Tuesday ruled to let an 1864 near-total abortion ban go into effect. That ban, which outlaws abortion in all cases except to save the life of a woman, was passed before Arizona became a state, before the end of the civil war and before women gained the right to vote.Kari Lake, a Republican running to represent Arizona in the US Senate and a diehard ally of Donald Trump, once called that ban “a great law”. But on Tuesday, the inflammatory politician became one of several GOP officials to denounce the ruling, urging the state legislature to “come up with an immediate commonsense solution that Arizonans can support”. On Wednesday, Trump also indicated that he thought Arizona’s near-total ban – whose revival was enabled by a US supreme court ruling he has repeatedly taken credit for – had gone too far. “It’ll be straightened out and as you know, it’s all about states’ rights,” he said."
Arizona’s abortion ban is a political nightmare for Republicans in the 2024 election | Arizona | The Guardian

Coming next -Republicans support a ban on the sale of battlefield weapons in gun shops, at gun fairs, and online....

Can someone turn up at the Republican Convention and seek to replace Trump in a Convention vote? After betraying the Pro-Life Movement, is it time for the Pro-Life Armada to call Time on Donald J. Trump?

[KnightHawk 2.0]

Someone should tell the fraudster and charlatan Donald Trump not too throw stones at glass houses,and for the second day in a row he doozed off in court. His new nickname is Drowsy Donald.

[Stavros]

Here is a thought, or a question, following the remark made by National Enquirer's David Pecker in the Trump Hush Money Trial, in relation to the claim Trump fathered an illegitimate child- Pecker said

"“What was the reason that you were willing to pay for this story at this point?” Steinglass pressed. Pecker replied:
"I had a number of reasons one, I thought it was very important that [Sajudin] wouldn’t be shopping the story to other media outlets. Part two, if the story was true, and I published it, it would be probably the biggest sale of the National Enquirer since the death of Elvis Presley." "
David Pecker tells hush-money trial about paying Trump doorman $30,000 to take a story ‘off the market’ – as it happened | Donald Trump trials | The Guardian

So between August 1977 and 2016 there was no story bigger than the death of Elvis to report to send sales soaring? I guess 9/11 never made it...?

[Stavros]

Benjamin Netanyahu has criticised the student protests on the campuses of US universities -he is free to do so though his thoughts are irrelevant. Mike Johnson appeared in public to endorse free speech at the same time condemning it among the students.

I am not diminishing the actuality, but this is how demonstrations go -in the days when I went on demos, mostly in London, I heard things that were either illegal or offensive, or both. I didn't like it, and on one occasion my companion and I were so offended we left the demo and went home.

Here's the thought: I am old enough to remember anti-Vietnam demos in the US, Kent State, for example, and a friend of mine at the time was a student in the UoW in Madison, where demos were broken up by tear gas -I don't know how many students who were not killed were injured, imprisoned and so on -let's just say that apart from the content, the current wave of demonstrations doesn't look like much when compared to the 1970s, some perhaps many of which were organized by the SDS.

I am not sure they achieve anything these days except to annoy a lot of people -and I don't recall the 'anti-American' protests on college campuses in the 1970s leading for calls for the University heads to resign. As for January 6....

[Stavros]

Is Idaho challenging Texas to be the cruellest, most anti-Woman State in the Union? I read this and wonder what on earth it is that the policy makers believe they are doing.

The US supreme court heard one of the most sadistic, extreme anti-abortion cases yet | Moira Donegan | The Guardian