Wednesday, March 8, 2023

News bits: Abortions wars; Election wars; More abortion wars

I post about abortion wars because it is one of the culture war issues where we can often or usually clearly see radical right progress. What is happening with that issue is also coming to us now with other issues the authoritarian-theocratic radical right has both (i) demagogued, and (ii) the power to conduct nationwide social warfare. Politico writes about how Christian nationalist (CN) Republican politicians in power are slowly forcing companies to comply with CN religious dogmas:
Walgreens won’t distribute abortion pills in states where GOP AGs object

The nation’s second-largest pharmacy chain confirmed Thursday that it will not dispense abortion pills in several states where they remain legal — acting out of an abundance of caution amid a shifting policy landscape, threats from state officials and pressure from anti-abortion activists.

Nearly two dozen Republican state attorneys general wrote to Walgreens in February, threatening legal action if the company began distributing the drugs, which have become the nation’s most popular method for ending a pregnancy.

The company told POLITICO that it has since responded to all the officials, assuring them that they will not dispense abortion pills either by mail or at their brick-and-mortar locations in those states.

The list includes several states where abortion in general, and the medications specifically, remain legal — including Alaska, Iowa, Kansas and Montana.  
“In my letter to Walgreens, we made clear that Kansas will not hesitate to enforce the laws against mailing and dispensing abortion pills, including bringing a RICO action to enforce the federal law prohibiting the mailing of abortion pills,” Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach said in a statement.
Some activists want people to boycott Walgreens for stopping sales in states where at least some abortion is still legal, at least for now. 

Q: Do you see this an an example of anti-democratic social warfare being waged by radical right authoritarian, theocratic CN warriors with the Republican Party being the CN's Department of War? If not that, what would you call it?

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The latest radical right attack on election integrity: The radical right is mounting major nationwide attack on election integrity. It will make widespread vote fraud easier. The WaPo writes:
At a time of hyperpolarization over voting and elections, Democrats and Republicans had largely managed to agree on one thing — that a little-known data-sharing consortium of more than 30 states has helped keep voter rolls updated and free of opportunities for fraud.

But the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), as the consortium is known, has been straining lately under the weight of accusations and misinformation from election deniers. Critics, some of whom have aligned themselves with the false stolen-election narrative of former president Donald Trump, have claimed that the group is actually a left-wing vehicle that shares sensitive voter data with liberal groups, encourages bloated and inaccurate rolls and enables the very fraud it is intended to stamp out. ERIC’s leaders deny these accusations.

Now, ERIC’s survival is in jeopardy, with Republican-led states withdrawing, others threatening to do so and heated disputes breaking out among members over how to save the organization. Should ERIC collapse, its boosters say the country would lose one of its most powerful tools for keeping ballot fraud at bay just as states are beginning to prepare for the 2024 election calendar.

“Why would people who purport to want more election integrity seek to damage the best tool out there?” asked David Becker, who helped found ERIC in 2012 with seven states when he led the elections program at the Pew Charitable Trusts and watched it grow over the ensuing decade. “The only thing I can come up with is they don’t actually want election integrity. They want more chaos.”

ERIC’s founding members thought they had devised the perfect way to impose sound voter-roll practices on states while keeping Republicans and Democrats happy in an area fraught with mutual suspicions. .... The system can also be used to help identify and prosecute those who have double-voted across state lines.
Q: Do you see this an an example of anti-democratic social warfare being waged by radical right authoritarian, theocratic warriors with the Republican Party being the authoritarian-theocrat Department of War? If not that, what would you call it?

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Abortion war in Texas: The Texas Tribune writes:
Federal court ruling may prevent Texas teens from getting 
birth control without parental permission

U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a former religious liberty lawyer, found that a federal program that gives teens access to birth control denies a parent “a fundamental right to control and direct the upbringing of his minor children.”

A federal court ruling Tuesday may make it nearly impossible for Texas teens to access birth control without their parents’ permission.

U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk ruled that Title X, a federal program that provides free, confidential contraception to anyone, regardless of age, income or immigration status, violates parents’ rights and state and federal law.

Kacsmaryk, appointed by President Donald Trump in 2019, is a former religious liberty lawyer who helped litigate cases seeking to overturn protections for contraception.
This is CN theocracy being forced on people by the federal courts. Attacks on civil liberties like this allow radical right politicians in Texas and congress to escape most accountability. All they have to do is say the court did it, not them. It's a great tactic because it works quite well.

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