Showing posts with label anti- abortion zealots. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anti- abortion zealots. Show all posts

Monday, February 13, 2023

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

 

The good:

...We [the College Board] have made the mistake of treating FDOE [Florida Department of Education] with the courtesy we always accord to an education agency, but they have instead exploited this courtesy for their political agenda. After each written or verbal exchange with them, as a matter of professional protocol, we politely thanked them for their feedback and contributions, although they had given none.

In Florida’s effort to engineer a political win, they have claimed credit for the specific changes we made to the official framework. In their February 7, 2023, letter to us, which they leaked to the media within hours of sending, Florida expresses gratitude for the removal of 19 topics, none of which they ever asked us to remove, and most of which remain in the official framework.

They also claimed that we removed terms like “systemic marginalization” and “intersectionality” at their behest. This is not true. The notion that we needed Florida to enlighten us that these terms are politicized in several states is ridiculous. We took a hard look at these terms because they often are misunderstood, misrepresented, and co-opted as political weapons. Instead we focused throughout the framework on providing concrete examples of these important concepts. Florida is attempting to claim a political victory by taking credit retroactively for changes we ourselves made but that they never suggested to us.

FDOE’s most recent letter continues to deride the field of African American Studies by describing key topics as “historically fictional.” We have asked them what they meant by that accusation, and they have failed to answer. The College Board condemns this uninformed caricature of African American Studies and the harm it does to scholars and students...

The College Board finally blasts the DeSanctimonious racist political hit job on the Board's AP African American Studies curriculum.  The full statement is a proper evisceration of Bootsie's attempt at white- washing of American history and, as the Board now admits, should have come much sooner.

The bad:

...The day after leaving the White House, [Mr. Ivanka Trump Jared] Kushner created a company that he transformed months later into a private equity firm with $2 billion from a sovereign wealth fund chaired by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Kushner’s firm structured those funds in such a way that it did not have to disclose the source, according to previously unreported details of Securities and Exchange Commission forms reviewed by The Washington Post. His business used a commonly employed strategy that allows many equity firms to avoid transparency about funding sources, experts said.

A year after his presidency, Trump’s golf courses began hosting tournaments for the Saudi fund-backed LIV Golf. Separately, the former president’s family company, the Trump Organization, secured an agreement with a Saudi real estate company that plans to build a Trump hotel as part of a $4 billion golf resort in Oman.

The substantial investments by the Saudis in enterprises that benefited both men came after they cultivated close ties with Mohammed while Trump was in office — helping the crown prince’s standing by scheduling Trump’s first presidential trip to Saudi Arabia, backing him amid numerous international crises and meeting with him repeatedly in D.C. and the kingdom, including on a final trip Kushner took to Saudi Arabia on the eve of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.

New details about their relationship have emerged in recently published memoirs, as well as accounts in congressional testimony and interviews by The Post with former senior White House officials. Those revelations include Kushner’s written account of persuading Trump to prioritize Saudi Arabia over the objections of top advisers and a former secretary of state’s assertion in a book that Trump believed the prince “owed” him...

A truly epic and ongoing corruption scandal that, since the House will be busy pursuing Hunter Biden's dick pics, will be left to the Senate or a Special Counsel to investigate.  You may not want to hold your breath.

The ugly:

GOP lawmakers see a major flaw in their states’ near-total abortion bans: Some local prosecutors won’t enforce them.

Republicans in Georgia, Indiana, South Carolina and Texas — frustrated by progressive district attorneys who have publicly pledged not to bring charges under their state’s abortion laws — have introduced bills that would allow state officials to either bypass the local prosecutors or kick them out of office if their abortion-related enforcement is deemed too lenient.

In Texas, one of several bills lawmakers are pushing would allow the state attorney general or a private individual to ask a court to remove a district attorney who fails to prosecute abortion-related offenses and other “crimes of violence.” They also plan to introduce a bill to allow any resident to bring civil claims against anyone suspected of “aiding and abetting” an abortion.

In Georgia, legislators want to create a prosecutorial oversight commission that could discipline or remove local prosecutors who demonstrate a “willful and persistent failure to perform his or her duties.”

A bill introduced in the South Carolina House would give the state attorney general the power to prosecute abortion cases — something currently under the purview of local district attorneys.

And in Indiana, proposed legislation would allow a legislatively appointed special prosecutor to enforce laws when a local prosecutor declines to do so...

The forced birth zealots won't stop, and neither must we.


Sunday, August 7, 2022

Indiana's Repressive Abortion Ban Gets Blowback


The sweeping ban on abortions just passed by the Christofascist Republicans in Indiana is rightfully getting blowback from the business community:

Indiana’s new sweeping ban on abortion produced immediate political and economic fallout Saturday, as some of the state’s biggest employers objected to the restrictions, Democratic leaders strategized ways to amend or repeal the law, and abortion rights activists made plans to arrange alternative locations for women seeking procedures.

The Indiana law, which the Republican-controlled state legislature passed late Friday night and Gov. Eric Holcomb (R) signed moments later, was the first state ban passed since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade in June and was celebrated as a major victory by abortion foes.  [snip]

The Indiana ban, which goes into effect Sept. 15, allows abortion only in cases of rape, incest, lethal fetal abnormality, or when the procedure is necessary to prevent severe health risks or death. Indiana joins nine other states that have abortion bans starting at conception.  [snip]

After the legislation was signed into law, Eli Lilly, the pharmaceutical giant and one of the state’s largest employers, warned that such laws would hurt its employee recruiting efforts and said the company would look elsewhere for its expansion plans.  [snip]

Salesforce, the tech giant with 2,300 employees in Indiana, had previously offered to relocate employees in states with abortion restrictions, though it didn’t respond on Saturday to a request for comment on the Indiana law.

The Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce also warned the ban was passed too quickly and without regard for how it will affect the state’s tourism industry.

Living in a hermetic bubble, as do the misogynist zealots of the right, can cause laws like the one in Indiana to pass, even as they suffer an unexpected, shocking defeat in equally red Kansas.  They don't fear consequences because consequences haven't been visited upon them so far.  But,

In Washington, Republican leaders have been largely silent on Republican-led states’ push to ban abortion. Polls consistently show that near-total abortion bans like the one in Indiana are unpopular with the general public.  [snip]

Another political strategist, Jonathan Levy, who worked on the Kansans For Constitutional Freedom Campaign, which is opposed to limiting abortion rights, said the Kansas vote showed that extreme antiabortion positions are “going to be rejected by Americans across the political spectrum. The American people want legislators to focus on how to keep food on the table, keep the economy afloat. They think the legislature’s priorities are out of whack,” he said.

What happened in Kansas may or may not happen at the ballot box in Indiana and other states that are enacting draconian anti- choice legislation.  But, freedom from repressive government (and church- supported) interference in the most personal decisions made by Americans must become a decisive issue in coming elections, and it's one worth fighting all the way for as long as it takes.