SCOTUS

Crossposted here because:
a) Michael and Nance *said* they wanted more,
and
b) Favorite Daughter hangs on moiv's posts and wanted to do her part, contribute to the conversation here. JJ

"A SUGGESTION FROM THE LIBERAL LION"

I don't try to be brilliant, it just comes to me.

So I wasn't surprised when, without even trying, I came up with the most innovative sarcastic social experiment since Swift's A Modest Proposal.

I've been thinking a lot about abortion and gay rights recently, as the Liberal Lion within me wakes up, indulges in a long, huge yawn, and takes stock of the current political climate. Though up and roaring through the Terri Schiavo debacle of 2005, he was soon lulled into a deceptively peaceful sleep by the conservative talk radio I've listened to of late.

But as I said, the Lion is now awake, and pontificating about politics in that annoying way Liberal Lions will.

"McCain is compromised by his base, not to be trusted." He growls. "And you can't trust a damn thing you see on television. Liberal media my tail -- I'd like to see one of them not in the administration's pocket. Obama is the Manchurian Candidate, can't be trusted either. Johnny Damon is the True Antichrist." (The Lion is decisive in his thoughts, and liberal to an almost paranoid degree. Also a rabid Red Sox fan.)

It's not just what happened on April 18 when the über-cons that Bush appointed to the Supreme Court set a dangerous precedent by refusing to consider risks to a woman's health to be a valid medical concern anymore. It's how and why it happened at all.

As Katha Pollitt points out in an excellently angry rant in her 'The Nation' column, it really does matter which party you vote for. A Democratic-controlled Congress would never have passed the draconian Partial-Birth Abortion Act. A Democratic President would never have signed it. And a pre-Bush SCOTUS would never have upheld it. (In fact they already didn't, once. But that was before people who really should have known better let the Rethuglican camel's nose into the tent.)

So, NARAL Pro-Choice America -- or whatever your latest bland, pandering brand name is -- maybe, much too late, you'll rethink your policy of supporting pro-choice Republicans, who made the majorities that set the agenda that led us to this very bad place. And maybe, Tom Frank and assorted liberal know-it-alls of the op-ed page and blogosphere who've been telling us to calm down because Republicans are all bark and no bite on abortion, you'll take a look at the real world. Sometimes politicians deliver on their promises. As for all you pro-choicers with qualms out there -- who think abortion is icky and "late term" abortion especially so, although you couldn't say exactly when that even is, and who wonder why women are so careless and shouldn't emergency contraception have taken care of this already? -- maybe it's time to start defending the right you say you believe in, instead of cutting the ground out from under it.

Yeah. What she said.