Ramen Noodle Nation: The Roe Bombshell Drops (So Storm The Ballot Box)

Thursday, June 23, 2022

The Roe Bombshell Drops (So Storm The Ballot Box)

<Not my image, but one I wish I'd created...

And will credit accordingly,

if I recall the source./

The Reckoner>

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It's been a busy week of repression for Chief Justice Roberts and his unsavory crew at the Supreme Court -- or "The Frightful Five," as I call them (Sam Alito, Amy Coney Barrett, Neil Gorusch, Brett Kavanaugh, Clarence Thomas). As we've seen from today's big ruling -- one that essentially vaporizes New York's concealed carry law, and others like it -- Roberts and crew are wasting little time punching the bingo cards that their far right political patrons have eagerly teed up for them.

Even without the impending doom of Roe v. Wade, this particular term stands out as a ghastly one. Acting in lockstep predictability, Roberts and company have hammered out rulings that continue the dismantling of church/state separation (Cronkin v. Makin), lay the groundwork for the eventual revoking of Miranda rights (Vega v. Tekoh), make it virtually impossible to hold brutal cops accountable for excessive force (Egbert v. Boule), and support their reactionary Republican buddies' efforts to keep their voter suppression projects proudly intact (Berger et al v. North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP et al).

Wait, I almost forgot -- if you're a Death Row inmate whose lawyer failed to advocate for you properly in state court, you can't bring any of those up in federal court, even if that alleged new evidence might prove your innocence (please, please, read the Cronkite News link below for those grisly details). Among all the current term's mis-decisions, I'd rank this one right near the top, because it will surely result in some tragedies. Executing an innocent man or woman is horrific, because there's no luxury of a second mistake.

And we haven't even gotten to the "good stuff" yet -- not only the case that's expected to deal a hammer blow to Roe (Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization), but rulings that could cripple environmental regulatory authority (West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency), and force asylum seekers to remain parked in Mexico indefinitely while their cases snake their way through an already crowded legal pipeline (Biden v. Texas.).

On one hand, none of these outcomes should surprise anyone. This is the scenario that the radical right has geeked itself to achieve, thanks to the judicial allies it's cherry-picked, the cases it's never stopped winged their way, and the endless gusher of dark money that funds it all. (How did Kavanaugh suddenly become debt-free, just in time for his nomination in 2018? We all know, I think. Ah, never mind.)

Thanks to all the outsized advantages that the right has gamed for itself, and the (largely) feeble response of its so-called "responsible opposition," the Republic of Gilead -- coupled with those now-familiar images of muzzled women, and red bonnets -- is edging ever so closer to our doorsteps. It's one reason I've sworn off watching The Handmaid's Tale, for now, because I don't think it's necessary.

As far as I'm concerned, the hit show's bleak dystopian reality is already unfolding in laboratories for autocracy like Florida, Idaho, and Texas -- whose empty suit legislatures are furiously vying to outdo each other in repressing anyone that they deem their enemies (basically, anybody who isn't straight, while, and male, with a dominionist mindset).

Ran over a demonstrator with your car? Have a "get out of jail free" card on us. (Florida, Oklahoma). Want to carry a gun in public, without any of those pesky permit or training rules? We have your back (Georgia, Indiana, South Dakota). Worried what your kids are learning? Cameras in classrooms are coming to close that loophole (Iowa).

Crazy or not, laws like these are gaining ground so rapidly, because real democracy doesn't exist in states like Idaho, where Democrats make up only seven of 35 State Senators, and 12 of the State House's 70 members. No Democrat has won the governor's office since 1995, nor any other statewide office since 2007. Whatever your political belief, it's not hard to imagine the abuses that result, when one side dominates so thoroughly. Without checks and balances, true democracy doesn't survive.

But even that rosy picture of red state dominance isn't enough for some Republicans. Much of the current repressive momentum is driven by simple numbers, as CNN reports: white Christians now make up just two-fifths of the US population. In contrast, one-fifth of Generation Z identifies as LGBTQ (plus 1 in 10 Millennials). You don't have to be a math whiz to understand the existential fury that such statistical realities arouse in those same white Christians.

Equally surreal, though, is seeing how many people continue to kid themselves, as Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor did recently -- when she tried to give a pep talk before the American Constitution Society. She voiced hope that the fatally polarized court could still "regain the public's confidence," and even offered encouraging words for Thomas: "He is a man who cares deeply about the court as an institution, about the people who work there."

When I read those words, I immediately found myself asking, "What the hell is she smoking? Whatever it is, I know folks who'd crave that same flavor."

This is the same Clarence Thomas whose insurrectionist wife, Ginni, has been deeply implicated in the conspiracy to keep Trump in power after his 2020 election loss. the same Clarence Thomas who refuses to recuse himself from cases involving his wife, when she's not trying to steer them in his direction. The same Clarence Thomas that he and his other half never discuss these matters personally.

If you believe any of those things, I have some Florida swampland you can help me drain. But presumably, the same Sotomayor who offered such mindlessly sunny assessments of one of the court's most malicious members isn't the same Sotormayor firing off blistering dissents about "a restless and newly constituted court."

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Whatever happens in the remaining cases, I only hope that people wake up and see these reactionary laws and rulings for what they are -- as a potentially fatal blow, if left unchecked and unanswered, to the freedoms they've taken for granted for so long. It's easy to ignore the crazy backwards alphabet that prevails in states like Idaho, if you don't live there -- until it lands on your doormat, and your state becomes the next one-party paradise.

Whatever you do, assume that democracy is on the ballot this fall -- as we've seen in Michigan, where Republicans nominated two 2020 election deniers for Attorney General and Secretary of State. It doesn't take much imagination to see whose bidding they'll do, if the right opportunity presents itself. We cannot assume that the "adults" will take care of things, or that the center will hold, simply because it always has in the past.

You only have to look at the final desperate months of Weimar Germany's democracy to see how that movie played out in the fall and winter of 1932, as its last Chancellor, Kurt von Schleicher, cobbled up increasingly unlikely coalitions and schemes, in a desperate bid to retain power -- only to see his right-wing allies welcome Adolf Hitler, under the delusion that they'd tamed him, somehow. We all know how that movie played out, too.

I leave the last word to Democratic Texas State Representative Trey Martinez Fischer, who strikes me as someone who does get it, who sees what's happening clearly, and has more than rhetorical action on his mind, as to what happens next:

"There is definitely a difference between action and words. Lamenting the state of affairs in the Republican Party at a cocktail reception is not the necessary action that we need... These folks are hoping they will wake up from this bad dream, but the better medicine is for them to pinch themselves that they are not dreaming."

I couldn't have said it better. Let those words ring out in our minds, and proceed accordingly. Because, at least in the short run, the ride doesn't look any smoother from here. --The Reckoner