The “Heartbeat” Bill Is Now Law in Georgia
Governor Brian Kemp signed the “Heartbeat” Bill into law today, making abortion after a fetal heartbeat is detected illegal beginning in 2020. This is another attempt to throw the topic of abortion into the now very conservative Supreme Court.
Governor Kemp said that the new law shows that Georgia is committed to life, thus overlooking the fact that Georgia just executed another prisoner within the past week. The law will not only severely limit access to abortions, but will also call for investigation of miscarriages if intentional termination is suspected.
Planned Parenthood is indignant and demonstrators wearing Handmaid’s garb have made appearances. These protestations have been futile. Governor Kemp and the GOP legislature have the power to act due to purging the voter rolls and other voter suppression tactics.
I remember when we won the battle to make abortion legal and never thought I’d live to see the day that we would lose that right. Even birth control is in the crosshairs of religious zealots. Democrats stand around and protest, expressing dismay at what is happening. They can’t be troubled to organize politically in anything like an effective way, which is why I’m so over them.
Comments
It's their damn hypocrisy that pisses me off
Did Georgia expand Medicaid? Do they have programs that help pregnant women get proper nutrition and health care or any of the other things that people who say they are committed to life? It's BS as we know that they are only pro birth and once that kidlet is born it's on its own.
Of course this will be overturned by the courts, but you're right that states are going to keep throwing crap at the walls to see what the Supreme Court says sticks.
Was Humpty Dumpty pushed?
Bets -- or no?
It's getting to where I'm not willing to lay any money on the table.
I’m worried too. The GOP has been packing the benches
with conservatives, while blocking even moderate candidates put forward by Democrats. It looks like things are going to get ugly.
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
Georgia did not extend Medicaid, but claims to want to
reduce infant mortality. I’m not sure how this is to be accomplished without access to medical care. But this is an illustration of how Republicans can sound more progressive than many Democrats, at least the corporate ones.
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
@Lily O Ladyclaims to want to reduce
That will be done via thoughts and prayers.
LOL! No doubt.
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
The right is anti-abortion, not pro-life.
Being pro-life only before birth is a joke. We need to stop using their framing.
Words
Yes, use their language and you've already lost.
Personally, I've been calling them Forced Birthers for a while now. They seem to not like that. Too bad.
I posted a different one of these a while back.
Note -- no babies were killed in the making of this film. These cells started out as "somatic cells", probably skin fibroblasts. They were reprogrammed into a "pluripotent" state resembling, but not identical to, that of embryonic stem cells. "Pluripotent" means "having many potentials", specifically, the potential to become any of many different cell types.
They were then treated, over many days, with a carefully worked out protocol of changing "culture media". This "differentiation protocol" transformed them into "cardiomyocytes": Heart muscle cells. And yes, it turns out that you don't need a human being to have beating heart cells. You don't even need a dish full of cardiomyocytes. One of these bad boys will beat in a dish, all by its lonesome.
Careful with that Petri dish, Eugene!
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJhf_YvTd0Q]
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
The GOP will not be confused by mere science.
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
Science will not confuse the right. Neither will anything else
known to human kind confuse the right. The right is born confused.
I used to work for Family Planning in PA...years ago...
I currently sit on the board of a reproductive rights PAC. I have been telling my two daughters for years that their generation had better hit the streets in protest for their rights or they will lose them. At what point are the next generations going to finally take this seriously?
"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin
All generations need to realize that this is an unending
fight. Adopting the metrics of the anti abortion movement gives those zealots legitimacy. And the fact that the anti abortion rights people call for the deaths of fully cognizant human beings who are engaged in a very private (or it should be) aspect of medical care invalidates their position IMO.
The lack of compassion exhibited by the anti abortion rights people is chilling. They call for surveillance, punishment and even death in their argument for fetal life. We all need to call them out in the most stark terms. No beating around the bush, no coming to the “middle” to compromise will keep them making more and more draconian demands, and succeeding!
Not long ago I came in contact with a paid Planned Parenthood lobbyist in Atlanta. She was careful to mitigate her speech so as not to offend. She seemed to feel that the mere presence of constituents leaving a brochure at the Gold Dome would persuade the representatives to our side.
The anti abortion people are willing to shock and win the battle before we can even consider if we want to take off the gloves. With the way SCOTUS is now constituted, it may be only a matter of time before Roe v. Wade is overturned. Time to get at least as tough as the competition!
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
A great obstacle is Roe v. Wade itself.
People forget that Roe did not hold simply that women had a right to an abortion. Rather, Roe established a different rule for each trimester. (The 2003 ban on partial birth abortions was declared unconstitutional because the language of the federal statute was "vague," not because the Court said that women had an Constitutional right to a late-term abortion.)
When the fetus could survive independently of the mother played a role in the reasoning of the Roe v. Wade Court and scientific advances have changed that time. No doubt, even today, a heartbeat can be detected sooner than a fetus can be kept by modern science outside the mother's body. However modern science has progressed since Roe was decided regarding how soon the fetus can survive independently. So, even under the language and reasoning of Roe, the first trimester may no longer be safe from a Constitutional standpoint.
Actually, little about Roe was clear cut. The Court had to do some gymnastics to find any Constitutional right at all to an abortion. I think there should be one, but I'm not at all sure that it's been there all along, since 1789. It's hard to argue honestly that anyone in 1789 thought the Constitution had something to do with legal abortions in any trimester. Which is why little about the Roe opinion is very straightforward.
Bottom line: Do all you can to make sure that your state laws and state Constitution read as you would prefer, on this issue as well as on all others.
It was all done all wrong.
Canada did it right, completely by accident. Quite a few years ago now they decided to "repeal and replace" their laws on abortion. The "repeal" part went smoothly, but then they couldn't agree on what to replace it with. So, effectively, Canada has NO law on the books regarding abortion - and the Canadians have gotten used to it being that way.
By the way, the Ninth Amendment says, quite baldly, "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."
Anyone want to make a Ninth Amendment argument on this subject?
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
Ninth Amendment doesn't work all that well, either.
The Ninth says only that the people retain the rights that the Constitution does not grant he federal government. However, at that time the people did not have any right to abortion that they could have refrained from granting the federal government. It had already been outlawed by the colonies/states. Roe forced states loosen their grip, claiming it was unconstitutional to prohibit an abortion, at least under certain conditions.
If Roe is overturned or narrowed, we're back to state law, which is why my prior post said to go that route. Whatever control we may or may not have over our respective state legislatures, it can't be less than the zero control we have over the SCOTUS.
Part of the problem in Georgia is the problem of voter
suppression and Gerrymandering. Over half of Georgians oppose the new law, but the GOP has the power and characteristically isn’t afraid to use it. Minority polling stations are closed, voting machines are limited, voter rolls are purged. This all happened under our former Secretary of State who is now governor. The fix is in in Georgia.
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"
You can always seek the aid of the Department of Justice.
Sorry. Very bad joke.
Voter registration and education would seem to be the only route. Once upon a time, ACORN could have helped, but the guy who used ACORN to make sure he got elected to the Illinois state senate made sure that ACORN ceased to exist.
Organizations set up with help from the Koch brothers filled the void quickly enough, but I don't think they register or educate voters in areas in which many minority voters live.
Stacey Abrams is supporting Fair Fight Georgia which
seeks roll back these abuses, but it’s an uphill fight. The GOP is in control and they want to keep it that way.
"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"