GOP Candidates Trying To Hide/Change Their Abortion Views

Nearly half a century ago, when the Supreme Court legalized abortion in Roe v. Wade, Republican officials were quick to take the anti-abortion side of the issue. They knew they couldn't do anything about it, but it gave them the opportunity to solidify the votes of anti-abortion voters in their corner. 

They claimed it was a moral principle to oppose abortion, because a human was created at the moment of conception - that meant abortion was killing a "person".

But an unexpected thing happened. A Republican president was installed in the White House, and he was able to appoint several Supreme Court justices. These new justices, combined with some right-wingers already on the court, overturned Roe v. Wade. 

That's when big troubles began for Republican candidates. They had not thought their stance through or realized how it would affect their party.

It turns out that the people they made happy by banning abortion were just a minority. Most Americans were happy with the Roe v. Wade decision and wanted to keep abortion legal. They believed abortion was a women's rights issue, and banning it put many women in danger medically.

Republicans were expecting a huge red wave in the 2022 election, but it didn't happen. Many Republicans were defeated because of the party's anti-abortion views. And several red states held votes on propositions that would legalize abortion, and those propositions won every time!

Then it got worse. The Alabama Supreme Court, acting on the GOP belief that life began at conception, riled that embryos in an IVF clinic could not be destroyed (even though they would never be implanted or born). That cast a chill on IVF, and many clinics stopped offering the procedure. The procedure is extremely popular with the public.

Now, facing another election where they stand opposed to abortion (and thereby IVF), many GOP candidates are either changing or trying to hide their views. It seems their "moral principle" is no longer valid when it threatens their election to office.

Many are now trying to find a middle ground, offering abortions legal until 6, 15, or 16 weeks. That makes no sense. Life either begins at conception or at birth (or viability), but it is not something that happens on a sliding scale of a certain number of weeks. They are now trying to compromise on an issue they once claimed could not be compromised.

It's one more principle that GOP candidates have abandoned. They are left with only two "principles" - more tax cuts for the rich and whatever Donald Trump wants. It's pathetic!

Seven Moral Principles On The Israel-Hamas War

The following is a post by Robert Reich: 

Last weekend, I met with a group of students to talk about what’s happening in Israel and Gaza. Some were Jewish, some were Palestinian, one was Israeli, some were from other nations in the Middle East.

 

The purpose of the meeting was to see what they could agree on, morally. 

As you can imagine, emotions ran high. 

I suggested that, at least for the purpose of our conversation, they not think of themselves as either “Pro-Palestinian” or “Pro-Israel” but instead look deeper into what basic moral principles were at stake. 

After several hours, they agreed to seven moral principles.

 

I list them here — along with the process we went through — in hopes that they might be helpful to you in thinking about and discussing this ongoing tragedy.

1. What Hamas did on October 7 was morally despicable. (Some of the students wanted to explain why Hamas did it — about the accumulated grievances and gruesome history suffered by many Palestinians, especially those in Gaza — but they finally came around to distinguishing between an explanation and a justification. In the end, even those who understood why Hamas did what it did on October 7 agreed that the killings and kidnappings of innocent civilians were not morally justifiable.) 

2. Hamas’s avowed aim to murder all Jews is morally despicable. (Again, we spent time distinguishing between an explanation and a justification.)

3. What the Israeli government has done since then in Gaza is also morally despicable. Some students initially wanted to defend Israel by saying that after October 7, Israelis could not feel safe as long as Hamas existed, and therefore Hamas had to be rooted out. This precipitated a discussion about how Hamas could be rooted out without the killing of innocent civilians, including large numbers of children. Which got us to our next principle. 

4. The murder or kidnapping of innocent civilians is morally wrong. This was not a difficult principle for them to agree on, although several argued that warfare always involved the killing of innocent civilians, while others charged that Hamas was intentionally using innocent civilians as shields. 

5. Israel’s policies toward Palestinians have been segregation and discrimination, based on ethnicity and religion, which are morally wrong. This was a hard principle for many of the students to accept, because they had different understandings of history. So the discussion was difficult. But all of them finally came around. (Most, although not all, decided that a so-called “two-state solution” was necessary, but we didn’t get into the specifics or how it could be achieved, because I wanted to keep them on the track of seeking moral clarity and agreement.)

6. It is morally wrong to urge genocide against any group — whether they constitute a religion, ethnicity, race, or nation. No disagreement on this. Some participants were initially unsure of whether universities should permit such advocacy on campus (the presidents of Penn, M.I.T., and Harvard temporized when asked this at a congressional hearing last week), but all finally agreed that it should not be permitted.

7. All of us have a moral obligation to do everything within our power to prevent and stop all forms of genocide, all killing of innocent civilians, and the promotion of hate. All agreed on this.

GOP Needs More Than To Dump Trump - It Needs Principles

If you've been paying attention to politics, then you'll know that House Republicans are probably going to vote to remove Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyoming) from her party leadership post this week. They are doing it because she refuses to accept the big lie that Trump won the election and was robbed because of massive voter fraud -- and she has been very vocal about that.

Cheney understands that clinging to Trump and accepting his lies is hurting the party. She is trying to save the party, and make it once again a mainstream party that could appeal to most voters. That's going to be a monumental task, since most GOP voters believe Trump's "big lie" about the 2020 election. But even if she were to succeed in getting the party to dump Trump, that would only be the beginning of her battle to save the party.

That's because the party seems to have abandoned its principles. This was evident in the 2020 party platform. In that document, they didn't even bother to lay out any principles or beliefs, but instead wrote that the party supported whatever Trump wanted to do. The problem with that is that Trump has no beliefs -- except to do whatever would make him and his family richer.

Jennifer Rubin describes this problem in The Washington Post. Here is part of what she wrote:

The MAGA cult, however, is not Cheney’s only problem. As became evident during the past administration, Republicans don’t believe in much of anything other than retaining power. Are they pro- or anti-Big Business? Protectionist of free-traders? Do they want to rebuild international alliances or go it alone? Are they climate-change deniers? Do they care about deficits (or only if they aren’t caused by tax cuts)? If you have not got a clue, you are in good company. 

If Cheney is to slay the MAGA dragon, it will be essential to not only explain what she is against — historical revisionism, lying, coziness with Vladimir Putin, white supremacists — but also what she is for. The agenda of the GOP in which she spent most of her adult life is badly out of date and, frankly, unappealing in the 21st century. Tax cuts for the wealthy and for corporations may excite the donor class, but actual voters — especially those non-college-educated, White voters the GOP has been courting — would just as soon sock it to the rich. Repeal of Obamacare excites the public about as much as cutting Social Security and Medicare (that is, not at all). Even Republican voters applauded massive government intervention to battle the pandemic and recession, shrugging their shoulders about deficits. Be it good or bad policy, withdrawal from Afghanistan wins something akin to 70 percent approval among voters.

The Western conservatism of Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush — as well as Cheney’s father, Richard — tilting toward libertarian especially on social issues and pro-immigration — is wholly at odds with a party dominated by White evangelicals playing on their congregants’ grievances and fears of replacement. On social policy, a third of Republicans are pro-choice and a majority support LBGTQ rights.

As a political matter, the GOP has cast its lot with a shrinking demographic (White, evangelical, older and rural voters) while alienating college-educated voters, women and younger adults. The base is too narrow to be sustainable, yet inching away from it risks losing whatever support Republicans can count on.

It would be much easier for Cheney and breakaway Republicans had the Democrats nominated Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) or Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) last year. However, much as Republicans would like to convince Americans that Joe Biden is a raving socialist, his policies do not strike a majority of Americans as extreme or exotic. They like the idea of subsidized child care, access to broadband and free community college.

There is no magic policy formula for breakaway Republicans, but they might start with three fundamental principles: Every legal voter should have easy access to a secure electoral system; America is not defined by race, religion or place of birth; and objective reality — be it in counting votes, measuring climate change or addressing a pandemic — is worth defending. That’s not much, but that is enough for starters.

Ginsburg Was Motivated By Principle - McConnell By Power

 

The following post is by former Labor Secretary Robert Reich on his blog. Once again, he hits the nail right on its head!

People in public life tend to fall into one of two broad categories – those who are motivated by principle, and those motivated by power. 

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died Friday night at the age of 87, exemplified the first. 

When he nominated her in 1993, Bill Clinton called her “the Thurgood Marshall of gender-equality law,” comparing her advocacy and lower-court rulings in pursuit of equal rights for women with the work of the great jurist who advanced the cause of equal rights for Black people. Ginsburg persuaded the Supreme Court that the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection applied not only to racial discrimination but to sex discrimination as well.

For Ginsburg, principle was everything – not only equal rights, but also the integrity of democracy. Always concerned about the consequences of her actions for the system as a whole, she advised young people “to fight for the things you care about but do it in a way that will lead others to join you.”

Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, exemplifies the second category. He couldn’t care less about principle. He is motivated entirely by the pursuit of power.

McConnell refused to allow the Senate to vote on President Barack Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court, Merrick Garland, in March, 2016 – almost a year before the end of Obama’s term of office – on the dubious grounds that the “vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president.” 

McConnell’s move was a pure power grab. No Senate leader had ever before asserted the right to block a vote on a president’s nominee to the Supreme Court. 

McConnell’s “principle” of waiting for a new president disappeared Friday evening, after Ginsburg’s death was announced.

Just weeks before one of the most consequential presidential elections in American history, when absentee voting has already begun in many states (and will start in McConnell’s own state of Kentucky in 25 days), McConnell announced: “President Trump’s nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate.” 

This is, after all, the same Mitch McConnell who, soon after Trump was elected, ended the age-old requirement that Supreme Court nominees receive 60 votes to end debate and allow for a confirmation vote, and then, days later, pushed through Trump’s first nominee, Neil Gorsuch.

Ginsburg and McConnell represent the opposite poles of public service today. The distinction doesn’t depend on whether someone is a jurist or legislator – I’ve known many lawmakers who cared more about principle than power, such as the late congressman John Lewis. It depends on values. 

Ginsburg refused to play power politics. As she passed her 80th birthday, near the start of Obama’s second term, she dismissed calls for her to retire in order to give Obama plenty of time to name her replacement, saying she planned to stay “as long as I can do the job full steam,” adding “There will be a president after this one, and I’m hopeful that that president will be a fine president.”

She hoped others would also live by principle, including McConnell and Trump. Just days before her death she said, “My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed.” 

Her wish will not be honored. 

If McConnell cannot muster the senate votes needed to confirm Trump’s nominee before the election, he’ll probably try to fill the vacancy in the lame-duck session after the election. He’s that shameless. 

Not even with Joe Biden president and control over both the House and Senate can Democrats do anything about this – except by playing power politics themselves: expanding the size of the court or restructuring it so justices on any given case are drawn from a pool of appellate judges.

The deeper question is which will prevail in public life: McConnell’s power politics or Ginsburg’s dedication to principle? 

The problem for America, as for many other democracies at this point in history, is this is not an even match. Those who fight for power will bend or break rules to give themselves every advantage. Those who fight for principle are at an inherent disadvantage because bending or breaking rules undermines the very ideals they seek to uphold. 

Over time, the unbridled pursuit of power wears down democratic institutions, erodes public trust, and breeds the sort of cynicism that invites despotism. 

The only bulwark is a public that holds power accountable – demanding stronger guardrails against its abuses and voting power-mongers out of office. 

Ruth Bader Ginsburg often referred to Justice Louis Brandeis’s famous quote, that “the greatest menace to freedom is an inert people.” Indeed.

Today's Republicans Have Abandoned Principles / Values

I have never voted for a Republican, but there have been Republicans in the past that I could respect. They were the loyal opposition, and they provided a valuable service to the country.

I disagreed with them on many issues (especially in the area of economics), but they were not my enemy. They were good Americans that loved their country -- they just had a different vision of what was good for all our citizens.

I can no longer say that. Today's Republican Party is not that of your father or grandfather. They have abandoned the principles and values they once held. They are now nothing more than a cult worshipping Donald Trump -- and they believe whatever Trump tells them to believe.

Here's how Republican Stuart Stevens describes the sad state of his once proud party in an op-ed for The Washington Post:

Here’s a question: Does anybody have any idea what the Republican Party stands for in 2020?

One way to find out: As you are out and about marking the new year, it is likely you will come across a Republican to whom you can pose the question, preferably after a drink or two, as that tends to work as truth serum: “Look, I was just wondering: What’s the Republican Party all about these days? What does it, well, stand for?”

I’m betting the answer is going to involve a noun, a verb and either “socialism” or “Democrats.” Republicans now partly define their party simply as an alternative to that other party, as in, “I’m a Republican because I’m not a Democrat.”

In a long-forgotten era — say, four years ago — such a question would have elicited a very different answer. Though there was disagreement over specific issues, most Republicans would have said the party stood for some basic principles: fiscal sanity, free trade, strong on Russia, and that character and personal responsibility count. Today it’s not that the Republican Party has forgotten these issues and values; instead, it actively opposes all of them.

Republicans are now officially the character doesn’t count party, the personal responsibility just proves you have failed to blame the other guy party, the deficit doesn’t matter party, the Russia is our ally party, and the I’m-right-and-you-are-human-scum party. Yes, it’s President Trump’s party now, but it stands only for what he has just tweeted.

A party without a governing theory, a higher purpose or a clear moral direction is nothing more than a cartel, a syndicate that exists only to advance itself. There is no organized, coherent purpose other than the acquisition and maintenance of power.

This is a sad fall. In Ronald Reagan’s America, being born an American was to win’s life lottery; in Donald Trump’s America, it makes you a victim, a patsy, a chump.

Trump didn’t hijack the GOP and bend it to his will. He did something far easier: He looked at the party, saw its fault lines and then offered himself as a pure distillation of accumulated white grievance and anger. He bet that Republican voters didn’t really care about free trade or mutual security, or about the environment or Europe, much less deficits. He rebranded kindness and compassion as “PC” and elevated division and bigotry as the admirable goals of just being politically incorrect. Trump didn’t make Americans more racist; he just normalized the resentments that were simmering in many households. In short, he let a lot of long-suppressed demons out of the box. . . .

This impeachment moment and all that has led to it should signal a day of reckoning. A party that has as its sole purpose the protection and promotion of its leader, whatever he thinks, is not on a sustainable path. Can anyone force a change? I’m not optimistic. Trump won with 46.1 percent of the vote in 2016, while Mitt Romney lost with 47.2 percent in 2012; no wonder Republicans have convinced themselves that the path to victory and power lies with angry division. Having ignored the warning signs for years myself, I know the seductive lure of believing what you prefer while ignoring the obvious truth.

Which is this: We are a long way — more than a half-century — from 1968, much less 1952. The United States is now a diverse, chaotic collection of 330 million people, a country of immigrants and multiculturalism that is growing less white every day. It is not some gauzy Shangri-La of suburban bliss that never existed.

I’d like to say that I believe the party I spent so many years fighting for could rise to the challenge of this moment. But there have been too many lies for too long.

The Guiding Principles Of The Texas Democratic Party

Texas Democrats met in Fort Worth on June 22nd and 23rd, and adopted the party platform. The platform is dozens of pages long -- far too long for most people to ever read (even Democratic voters). But the platform contained some guiding principles, and these principles effectively show what the party believes in, and neatly summarizes what's in the full platform. Here are those guiding principles:

Principles of the Texas Democratic Party

Texas Democrats believe democratic government exists to achieve as a community, state, and nation what we cannot achieve as individuals; and that it must serve all its citizens.

We believe every Texan has inalienable rights that even a majority may not take away:

• the right to vote;
• the right to fair and open participation and representation in the democratic process;
• the right to health care; and
• the right to privacy.

We believe in freedom:

• from government interference in our private lives and personal decisions;
• from discrimination based on race, ethnicity, national origin, disability, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression or any other improper grounds;
• to exercise civil and human rights; and
• of religion and individual conscience.

We believe in responsibility:

• that religion and individual conscience can never serve to excuse hatred and discrimination;
• that people are responsible for their actions;
• that we, who have benefited so greatly from our state and country, have a responsibility to support and give back to all our communities and public institutions; and
• that corporations are not people and should not be used to shield individuals from the responsibilities of their actions.

We believe in equal rights:

• guaranteed in Section 3 of the Texas Bill of Rights;
• equality under the law guaranteed in Section 3a of the Texas Bill of Rights; and
• that no state may deny any person equal protection of the laws or due process under the law as guaranteed in the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

We believe in equal opportunity:

• to receive a quality public education, from childhood through college;
• to find a good job with dignity;
• to buy or rent a good home in a safe community;
• to breathe clean air and drink clean water; and
• to have our voices heard and not be drowned out by the power of unlimited money to influence or buy elections and legislation.

We believe a growing economy should benefit all Texans:

• that the people who work in a business are as important as those who invest in it;
• that every worker should be paid a living wage of at least $15-an-hour;
• that good business offers a fair deal for customers;
• that regulation of unfair practices and rates is necessary;
• that the burden of taxes should be fairly distributed;
• that government  policy  should  not  favor  corporations  that  seek  offshore  tax  shelters, exploit workers, or pollute our environment; and all people, including those with disabilities.

We believe that our lives, homes, communities and country are made secure:

• by appropriately staffed, trained and equipped military, law enforcement and emergency services;
• by retirement and pension security;
• by responsible gun ownership;
• by encouraging job security where it is possible and providing appropriate assistance and re- training when it is not;
• by the preservation of our precious natural resources and quality of life;
• by ensuring that families have easy access to good food with clear understanding of the food quality and source, so they may make informed decisions on their family’s health and well-being;
• by compassionate policy that offers a safety net for those most vulnerable and in need; and
• by family values that are promoted through policies that value all our families.

We believe in America:

• made stronger by the men and women who put their lives on the line when it is necessary to engage our military to secure our nation; and
• made more secure by competent diplomatic leadership that uses the moral, ethical, and economic assets of a powerful, free nation to avoid unnecessary military conflict.

We believe in Texas:

• made stronger by the individual strengths of our diverse population;
• blessed with opportunities provided by agriculture, “old” and “new” energy sources, renowned medical and research institutions and high tech industries;
• and we believe in the need for an honest, ethical state government that serves the public interest, not the special financial interests of those who “pay to play.”