Alabama just outlawed abortion

Alabama just threw more abortion sh*t at the wall to see how much of it sticks. No abortion at any state of pregnancy unless the woman's health is at risk.

Alabama abortion ban: Republican senate passes most restrictive law in US

Alabama’s Republican-controlled state senate passed a bill Tuesday to outlaw abortion, making it a crime to perform the procedure at any stage of pregnancy.

The strictest-in-the-nation abortion ban allows an exception only when the woman’s health is at serious risk, and sets up a legal battle that supporters hope will lead to the supreme court overturning its landmark ruling that legalized abortion nationwide.

The measure contains no exception for rape and incest, after lawmakers voted down an amendment Tuesday that would have added such an exception.

The legislation, which passed by a vote of 25-6, makes it a class A felony for a doctor to perform an abortion, punishable by 10 to 99 years in prison. Women would not face criminal penalties for getting an abortion.

It goes further than any other state has to restrict abortion. Other states, including neighboring Georgia, have instituted bans on abortion after about six weeks into pregnancy.

The vote came after a battle broke out over whether to allow legal abortions for women who become pregnant due to rape or incest, an issue that divided Republicans who otherwise supported outlawing abortion.

Last week, chaos erupted on the floor when Republican leaders stripped out the rape exception without a roll call vote, leading the final vote to be postponed. It got a full vote on Tuesday, but ultimately failed.

Lawmakers approved the legislation after a debate that stretched more than four hours, where minority Democrats introduced a slew of amendments in an attempt to block it.


“You don’t have to raise that child. You don’t have to carry that child. You don’t have to provide for that child. You don’t have to do anything for that child, but yet you want to make the decision for that woman,” the state senator Vivian Davis Figures told the bill’s proponents.

She introduced amendments that would require the state to expand Medicaid, force legislators who

vote for the measure to pay the state’s legal bills, or make it a crime for men to get vasectomies. All failed.

Figures questioned the backers’ resistance to adding an exception for rape and incest. “Do you know what it’s like to be raped?” she said. “Why would you not want a woman to at least have that exception for such a horrific act?”

If all human life was really sacred then everyone who wants to make abortion illegal would be against all wars and would be screaming for congress to fully fund every social program available. That they don't just shows how hypocritical they are.

“Human life has rights, and when someone takes those rights, that’s when we as government have to step in,” said the state senator Clyde Chambliss. “When God creates that life, that miracle of life inside the woman’s womb, it’s not our place as humans to extinguish that life. That’s what I believe.”

The Senate minority leader, Bobby Singleton, launched a filibuster in an effort to delay the vote, until Republicans approved a motion to end debate. “You just raped the state of Alabama,” he said. “The state of Alabama ought to be ashamed of itself.” The message to women, he added, is: “We’re just going to continue to kick ’em in the gut.”

As the vote was called, he concluded: “I would just like to say to all the women of the state of Alabama, I’m sorry.”

Unfuckingbelievable...

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Bollox Ref's picture

... sex.

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Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.

Centaurea's picture

@Bollox Ref ... they would.

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"Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep."
~Rumi

"If you want revolution, be it."
~Caitlin Johnstone

Cassiodorus's picture

@Bollox Ref Pre-abortion sex will never be banned because it's something heterosexual males do. What they want next is to bring back sodomy laws, and laws against interracial marriage, because those also target populations they don't like. The point of anti-abortion laws, in the first instance, is to target women's control over their bodies. It's got nothing to do with the "life of the fetus," that's a pretext, everyone knows that miscarriages happen all the time. This is misogyny, pure and simple.

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"I'm starting to believe that they want Donald Trump to get elected." -- Compton Jay

wendy davis's picture

@Cassiodorus

imo. remember when post-Handmaid's Tale margaret attwood would be challenged: 'roe-v wade is settled law! she'd always say: 'Wanna Bet?'

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Strife Delivery's picture

...state senator Clyde Chambliss. “When God creates that life, that miracle of life inside the woman’s womb, it’s not our place as humans to extinguish that life. That’s what I believe.

via GIPHY

This is my problem with religion:

I don't care what deity you believe in (or don't). What I do have a problem with here is when you use your deity and impose that upon everyone else through law.

I don't believe in your God; so don't impose "His" will upon me.

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@Strife Delivery

Boy, aren't we glad the Democrats protected the courts and a woman's right to choose?

SCOTUS is anti-choice thanks to Obama, and Schumer helped Trump and McConnell to pack the lower courts. You MUST vote for the LoTE - it's all about the Supreme Court stupid! Well who's stupid now?

Schumer Lets McConnell Fast Track 15 Judges Days Before Kavanaugh Hearings
Why is this important and what did Schumer get out of it? It’s important because these are lifetime appointments, and the GOP has been p
laying politics with judicial nominations for years.
Under President Barack Obama, McConnell blocked hearings on and confirmation of many Obama nominees, keeping seats open at the lower court level as well as the Supreme Court. Now, with Trump in the White House, McConnell is using his power to confirm as many appointees as possible, using the GOP’s majority party status, in the words of Rewire.News‘ Jessica Mason Pieklo, “to pack the federal courts full of radical ideologues.” As of this evening, Trump will have appointed 33 district court judges, 26 appeals court judges, and one Supreme Court justice, “leaving,” as Thomas Kaplan of the New York Times noted, “an ever-expanding imprint on the judiciary, nudging powerful appeals courts rightward.”

I called Schumer’s office three times and emailed two different staff people to ask the question on everyone’s minds and circulating on my feeds: Why? What did Schumer get in return?

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

wendy davis's picture

@Strife Delivery

quote from chambliss:

"Opponents said the bill’s backers would squander public money defending a ban that will likely be struck down. “Alabama taxpayers are going to be footing the bill for this unconstitutional action,” said the state senator Linda Coleman-Madison. But Chambliss said the cost was worth it if the legislation is able to prevent abortions. “That’s pennies per babyfrom heaven!,” he said"

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thanatokephaloides's picture

@Strife Delivery

This is my problem with religion:

I don't care what deity you believe in (or don't). What I do have a problem with here is when you use your deity and impose that upon everyone else through law.

I don't believe in your God; so don't impose "His" will upon me.

It's time to demand "Sean McCullough's Challenge" (from the old FidoNet HOLYSMOKE Echo). To wit:

"Cough up your God. Or admit publicly that it doesn't exist. One or the other, please, NOW."

Only dicks who attempt to impose their alleged deities' will on the rest of us via the civil law are subject to the Challenge; but all of those are.

"So there!" -- Marty Leipzig, FidoNet HOLYSMOKE Echo

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

I guess performing or obtaining an abortion will eventually result in capital punishment, all in the name of sanctity of life.

Still, I have to admire their perseverance and determination. The democrats with their waffling, bleating and overall lack of meaningful legislation doesn't inspire much confidence.

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@Snode “See? This is what happens when you don’t vote blue, no matter who. Never mind that our big tent includes forced birthers and that we have a laundry list of reasons why the mean old Republicans always seem to get their way even when they shouldn’t. Now give us money and we’ll pretend to care.”

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Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

The Aspie Corner's picture

@Dr. John Carpenter so that more resources can be stolen via military or corporate coup more countries can be liberated from communist and socialist dictatorship. That way, they can experience the liberty and freedom of capitalist super-exploitation. And if any of those conscripts happen to make it back from the back-to-back tours of duty we put them through, that's more cheap labor for capitalists. After all, the pieces of paper we tell our kids to get will amount to nothing more than minimum wage slavery on top of the mountain of debt in a few years.

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Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.

Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.

in federal court. Legislators punishing medical professionals is a step too far.

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WoodsDweller's picture

@QMS
This is an effort to put an abortion case before the Supreme Court where they hope to overturn Roe vs. Wade. Which demonstrates the folly of relying on a court case for such a fundamental issue, they should have used the last 50 years to pass a Constitutional amendment explicitly protecting abortion rights.

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"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone

@WoodsDweller
lobby group is willing to pay the supremes.
American Ju$tice

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wendy davis's picture

@QMS

guardian link:

"Civil rights groups have pledged to immediately challenge the ban in courts, which would mean abortion would remain legal in the state for now. But this sets up a fierce legal battle that anti-abortion campaigners hope will lead to the supreme court, and eventually result in overturning Roe v Wade, the landmark ruling that legalized abortion nationwide in 1973.

The legislation is poised for an immediate legal challenge and to be overturned at least by the lower courts.
The ACLU and Planned Parenthood “will file a lawsuit to stop this unconstitutional ban and protect every woman’s right to make her own choice about her healthcare, her body and her future. This bill will not take effect anytime in the near future, and abortion will remain a safe, legal medical procedure at all clinics in Alabama,” the ACLU of Alabama said on Tuesday."

i'd of course wondered if the AL house had already passed the same bill, and of course they had on april 30.

"The Republican-dominated House of Representatives voted 74-3 in favor of the proposal, which would make performing an abortion a felony.

Lawmakers say the legislation is purposely designed to conflict with the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion nationally."

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@wendy davis
Ring them bells.
Bob Dylan

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@wendy davis
not because they consider abortion a sin, but because they sought to impose their religious beliefs on everyone else.

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

mimi's picture

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Cassiodorus's picture

@mimi There was a civil war about that IIRC.

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"I'm starting to believe that they want Donald Trump to get elected." -- Compton Jay

TheOtherMaven's picture

@Cassiodorus

was in Alabama.

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There is no justice. There can be no peace.

thanatokephaloides's picture

@mimi

[video:https://youtu.be/CNtnJrowvZo]

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

The Aspie Corner's picture

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Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.

Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.

Jen's picture

The measure contains no exception for rape and incest, after lawmakers voted down an amendment Tuesday that would have added such an exception.

I would have said something about how they wouldn't be here nor would they have any kids if it wasn't for rape and incest and that's why they're so against aborting in those cases.

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Is it great yet?

WaterLily's picture

which in many ways remains a theocracy, a referendum to overturn the country's abortion ban
passed by a 2/3rds majority
.

MAGA! WOO!

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Hey.... I've been fighting the good fight for women's reproductive rights since 1972. Most people in the movement saw this one coming. However, my little optimistic voice says that there is too much precedence in abortion laws to cause SCOTUS to reverse Roe. In 2015, they declined to hear a fetal heartbeat law in SD which rendered it moot. I know that all bets are on Kavanaugh, but he promised Susan Collins of Maine that he would go with precedence on abortion if she would vote for his nomination, so we have him on record. That may not mean anything to that weasel, but now his decisions can give the whole court a black eye, so he may stick with his declarations to Collins.

We'll see....

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"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin

Shahryar's picture

@Fishtroller 02

they're weasels.

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@Shahryar

my optimism is about to be shattered.

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"Without the right to offend, freedom of speech does not exist." Taslima Nasrin

thanatokephaloides's picture

@Shahryar

I don't trust Collins, I don't trust Kavanaugh they're weasels.

enhydra lutris might take exception to your statement. Otters and ferrets don't deserve to be likened to slimoids like Collins and Kavanaugh.

(otters, including the sea otter (enhydra lutris) are weasels)

Wink

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Hawkfish's picture

@Fishtroller 02

I’d want to buy or invest in?

I’d rather see a fund to help people relocate to a saner location. Especially since climate breakdown will make the place more uninhabitable as time goes by. When only the RWNJs are left they will have their own set of plagues to deal with and it might dawn on them that they aren’t the chosen people but the Egyptians. Given that the chosen people were slaves, there would be a great deal of historical irony.

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We can’t save the world by playing by the rules, because the rules have to be changed.
- Greta Thunberg

@Hawkfish
Plus Wisconsin and don't even think of Minnesota. Lots of good sane people in Minnesota but they seem to be descended from polar bears.

Away from the coast, Alabama is safe from flooding.

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

Hawkfish's picture

@The Voice In the Wilderness

Tornadoes, former hurricanes and precipitation changes in general. Not to mention malaria, Zika and a whole bunch of other tropical diseases that are heading north as we speak.

Don’t get me wrong - I love the gulf coast and the National seashore - but I can’t see the place having anything to offer once that’s gone. A disease ridden theocracy is all that will be left.

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We can’t save the world by playing by the rules, because the rules have to be changed.
- Greta Thunberg

orlbucfan's picture

and miscarriage/stillbirth. I'm old and way past menopause, thank gawd. Rec'd!!

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Inner and Outer Space: the Final Frontiers.

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

travelerxxx's picture

@The Voice In the Wilderness

"It’s an extreme law, and they want to challenge Roe vs. Wade, but my humble view is that this is not the case we want to bring to the Supreme Court because I think this one will lose," he [Robertson] said.

In that case, the Alabama law is the one that should be pushed all the way to the Supreme Court. If that crew were to uphold it, we would see a constitutional amendment practically overnight.

So, I say, yeah Alabama, pass it. When a lower court overturns it (and they will) please, please take it to the (now) far-right Supreme Court. Let them go right ahead and uphold it. You think you've seen trouble before? You haven't seen anything like the trouble upholding this fascistic, authoritarianistic, medieval law will cause.

I really believe it's going to take something like this to get people off dead center and finally open their eyes.

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snoopydawg's picture

@travelerxxx

Utah, Michigan, Missouri and a slew of other states are all passing legislation making it harder for women to get one. This is unfuckingbelievable...

West Michigan lawmaker: Abortion 'should be painful'

Do women who undergo late-term abortions suffer as much as God wants them to?

State Sen. Kim LaSata doesn't think so.

Ever since the new state Legislature convened four months ago, LaSata and her Republican colleagues have been waiting for the chance to shove their deeply held religious convictions down the throats of Michigan's wayward women.

Over weeks of hearings, they've heard physicians warn that GOP efforts to outlaw the surgical procedure commonly used to end second-trimester pregnancies would make such abortions more painful and hazardous for the women who undergo them.

Tuesday, when the proposed ban finally came to a vote, LaSata's impatience with all those godless medical experts finally got the better of her.

"Of course it should be hard!" the senator from St. Joseph exclaimed. "And the procedure should be painful! And you should allow God to take over!! And you should deliver that baby!"

Of course LaSata abortion was available for her when she needed one... She says that it didn't work for her because Gawd intervened. So did LaSata have a happy ending after that? Oh hell no!

LaSata recounted her own unsuccessful efforts to abort a fetus her doctors warned her would not survive its birth.

LaSata told colleagues she had delivered a stillborn baby after her own D&E procedure went awry. LaSata cited her traumatic experience as evidence "of God looking out for me," and suggested that all women carrying medically unviable fetuses would be better off delivering their babies.

"You should allow God to take over and deliver that baby," she said, "and it shouldn't be made easier for you."

Sick sick sick and oh so cruel! Gawd made her carry her baby that she knew wouldn't survive because he's such a swell guy. Maybe gawd could have intervened and made the baby whole for her. Gawd aborts fetuses all the time when there is something wrong with them. Gawd gave man brains so that they could make their lives better.

What bills that don't allow exceptions for rape and incest means that girls as young as 9 have to carry their father's, uncle's, brother's and rapists babies. This brings unimaginable trauma to them. No 9 year olds are going to go to the store to buy pregnancy tests or have any idea that they are pregnant so they can have the procedure before the heart beat is detected. Wrong on so many levels, but beyond that it's just cruel.

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

travelerxxx's picture

@snoopydawg

The forced-birthers are beyond sick, they're evil. The fact that they consider themselves morally superior to the rest of us — to the point where they fully intend to cram their bronze-age beliefs down our throats — galls me to the point that ....... well, I'd better not say it in public.

I'm for gathering them all up together with Jeff Bezos and giving them a rocket ride to the first Bezosville in the sky. Everybody would be happy — Bezos would have a ready-made community and the religious maniacs would be closer to their imaginary sky buddy. And all the rest of us could breathe a sigh of relief.

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Strife Delivery's picture

@snoopydawg

"Of course it should be hard!" the senator from St. Joseph exclaimed. "And the procedure should be painful! And you should allow God to take over!! And you should deliver that baby!"

I know I already commented up above, but quotes like these just can't go unpunished.

Allow God to take over...

Hmm...

If I'm going down the interstate and I let go of the steering wheel while saying, "God, take over.", I'm not going to have an auto-pilot suddenly keep me in my lane.

Statements like hers are not only frightening, but infallible:

If say your loved one has heart surgery and you pray for success, let's look at the outcomes.
1) Surgery is a success because God stepped in (miracle).
2) Surgery is not a success but that's part of God's plan (?)

No matter the outcome on any action or incident/event in the universe there is always an underlying rationale to bend it towards God's light.

They excuse inaction/apathy by obscuring it behind the concept of God being a perfect being and we mere mortals don't understand His plan.

Hurricane happens - God's plan
Die during surgery - God's plan
Contract terminal disease - God's plan

I will never understand God's plan, but at the end of the day, I don't want to.

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thanatokephaloides's picture

@Strife Delivery

They excuse inaction/apathy by obscuring it behind the concept of God being a perfect being and we mere mortals don't understand His plan.

Hurricane happens - God's plan
Die during surgery - God's plan
Contract terminal disease - God's plan

I will never understand God's plan, but at the end of the day, I don't want to.

Never fear, Strife-meister.

"It would have to exist first."
-- Styx Allum, FidoNet HOLYSMOKE Echo

Wink

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

smiley7's picture

@thanatokephaloides
and zealots, in all colours, fund-raise; or, go to war.

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thanatokephaloides's picture

@Strife Delivery

They excuse inaction/apathy by obscuring it behind the concept of God being a perfect being and we mere mortals don't understand His plan.

Hurricane happens - God's plan
Die during surgery - God's plan
Contract terminal disease - God's plan

I will never understand God's plan, but at the end of the day, I don't want to.

"Hurricane happens - God's plan
Die during surgery - God's plan
Contract terminal disease - God's plan"

is the inevitable consequence of

KS>> KM*Your almost right, God's word is the only answer.

KS>> To what question?

KM> Karl,
KM> To any question.

Oh, really....

"What would you like on your sandwich?"
"God's word"

"How do you fix a toaster?"
"God's word"

"What the hell are you doing to that sheep?"
"God's word" (This one could really happen)

-- Karl Schneider (KS), Kenneth McAbee (KM) and Quentin Fai, FidoNet HOLYSMOKE Echo
source (link is "godsword.she")

Wink

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"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Because his 14 year old girlfriends can't get abortions. Unintended consequences by these "Men of God".

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I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

travelerxxx's picture

@The Voice In the Wilderness

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