Kansas Roe, Roe, Roe’d the Vote, Now It’s Up to the Rest of Us
As Kansas voted down an anti-choice constitutional amendment in an overwhelming,18-point trouncing, the GOP’s bet on anti-choice politics has to look terrifying at this time.
The New York Times and a host of other media found this result to be “surprising,” probably because they insist on looking at everything through a red or blue filter, with a dash of purple thrown in just to keep things interesting.
This election had all the elements the right has been using to leverage their minority status to elect candidates; a date with low turnout expectations, lock-step unity among the leadership on this issue, and misinformation campaigns designed to lower opposition engagement.
Instead of a sleepy summer election, over 900,000 people voted on Tuesday, more than double the number of Kansas that cast ballots in the 2020 primary election.
Although the proposed amendment wouldn’t have banned abortion outright –it simply removed a pesky constitutional obstacle– the first act of Kansas far-right legislature would have been to pass a complete forced birther bill.
This quibble was the basis of the campaign in favor of the amendment, with advertising promising that a Yes vote would protect both the rights of the unborn and women. Text messages were sent to voters across the state saying
“Women in KS are losing their choice on reproductive rights. Voting YES on the Amendment will give women a choice. Vote YES to protect women’s health.”
It’s a little too late to turn back the clock on the enormity of the GOP’s political error in thinking they could shuck and jive their way past pro-choice voter support.
What they did, I hope, was to persuade a lot of election ‘consultants’ that Democrats and independents could indeed be motivated to show up over a singular core issue. Donald Trump’s insanity wasn’t that kind of issue. (Sadly, it will take a generation or more before his real role as an advocate for authoritarianism sinks into an understanding of this era’s history.)
Crass racism and rejection of the looming dangers posed by climate change simply give the GOP an opening to change the narratives to fear of looters and loathing of intellectuals aiming to take away jobs. And outside of Labor Secretary Pete Buttigieg, no high profile Democrat can undo that voodoo framing. (AOC and others who do know how to flip the script find their observations discounted by the “radical, leftist” labels.)
There will be a flurry of localities like San Clemente trying to distinguish themselves as ‘sanctuaries for life’. In California, anyway, they will be symbolic gestures aimed at fortifying the resumes (and fundraising) of small town wingnuts.
There is no easy way out for Republicans when it comes to Roe. Not only did they get what they wanted out of a Supreme Court ruling, the door remained open for additional “takeaways'' of things near and dear to significant voter blocks. The MAGAnuts in the party are already making claims about eliminating birth control, putting the gayz back in the closet, and even declaring desegregation a settled issue.
The anticipatory celebrations of a favorable forced birth ruling amounting to a competition at the state level for crafting the most cruel and outrageous legislation were politically stupid as stupid can be. The GOP has painted itself into a corner, one where the only possible way out is to yell and scream. Real loudly.
They will have to double down on their “depress the vote” strategies.
In Georgia, a determined group of Republicans is asking local election boards to cancel thousands of voter registrations, using a new power bestowed by the state’s voting law.
Now, any street corner redneck can avail themselves of legal experts to challenge the right of any suspicious person to vote. Yes, indeedy, the state GOP has lists of suspect names just waiting for volunteer constitutional experts to sign on to. Given the state’s rapid expansion of Hispanic voters, the ethnic persuasion of those being targeted won’t be hard to guess.
And while (the I’m the least racist type) GOP lawyers will be standing by to take these voter vigilante calls, people in economically challenged areas will be asked to take time off work and/or pay for representation to prove they have rights as citizens.
The GOP candidate for Maricopa County Supervisor Gail Golec, directed voters to steal the pens from Arizona election sites because she believed the markings from the official pens could be changed in the ballot certification process. She came in third, earned a rebuke from the local County Attorney, and is, of course, challenging the election.
The Republican National Committee has enlisted former Trump attorney Cleta Mitchell to organize a so-called Election Integrity Network centering on multiple battleground states including Arizona, Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.
While the public face of this effort is about training poll workers, it relies heavily on people who have spread false or unproven claims of irregularities and conspiracies.
Politico obtained audio recordings of training session speeches given by Mitchell, who expertly weaves the racist “great replacement theory” into her presentations:
In the tapes, Mitchell also disparaged the Democrats’ recent warnings about threats to democracy.
“They bring democracy to your doorstep. I wanna pause right here. We don’t live in a democracy,” Mitchell said, to a round of applause from the crowd. “But to the left, everything is about democracy, the democracy fund, the democracy this, the democracy that.”
“We live in a constitutional republic,” she said.
A Big Lie like the notion that electoral fraud is rampant has to be based on a more fundamental fear. In this case that more fundamental fear plays out as no matter what Republicans or Trump have done wrong, things are still better than they would be if the far-left Democrats were in charge.
The same people who bought into the conspiracy theories surrounding Operation Jade Helm in 2015 (including Texas Gov. Greg Abbott) are now locked in –ideologically speaking– to a worldview that could easily be ripped from the pages of a John Birch Society pamphlet.
Quick question to make my point. Which event caused more economic damage: the Black Lives Matter protests (where cities are purported to still be burning) or Texas Gov. Abbott’s blockade of the border with Mexico?
Answer: It’s not even close. And the Texas economy continues to bleed as the Gov. has doubled down on his faux drama. But if your TV is locked on to Fox News, you wouldn’t know otherwise.
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Why this matters, because this is where we’re headed if Democrats fail to capitalize on voter sentiment in the wake of the Roe decision. :
Welcome to Talibama, where a constitutional amendment banning Sharia Law was passed in 2014. That hasn’t stopped state officials from inspecting the attire of female journalists assigned to cover executions.
Ivana Hrynkiw, a journalist for Alabama’s preeminent news outlet AL.com, recounted how she was pulled aside by a prison official and told that her skirt was too diminutive to meet regulations. “I tried to pull my skirt to my hips to make the skirt longer, but was told it was still not appropriate,”
Hrynkiw had to borrow a pair of waterproof fisher waders from a photographer, but that was still not enough, as she was told that her open toes heels were not allowed. She had to go back to her car and put on a pair of tennis shoes before she was admitted.
Another female reporter, Kim Chandler of the associated press, was made to stand up in order to check the length of her clothing, and found to be compliant
Email me at: WritetoDougPorter@Gmail.com