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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsNOW President: We Will Politicize Hobby Lobby Decision
I think the message here is that the response has to be political. We have a politicized Supreme Court. We will meet them on the political grounds. We will defeat them. We need to reverse the 30-year campaign by the right wing to take over the federal courts and that's my organization's job and we'll be working with our allies and I think we'll succeed.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/06/30/now_president_we_will_politicize_hobby_lobby_decision.html
Liberalynn
(7,549 posts)We need to bring back the civil right's movement full steam and not just for women but for all minorities.
ReRe
(10,597 posts).... it's the ERA: The Equal Rights Amendment! Thank you so much for the Katie Perry video! That should be our theme song!
Can you see women coming down the streets of the USA this fall singing that song?
Marching and rallying to encourage women to get out and vote in November and to pass the ERA?
I can!
Liberalynn
(7,549 posts)I totally agree that we should do everything humanly possible to get the ERA passed for all women. I was just thinking in terms of how the HL decision has the potential to setback not only women s rights but the rights of other minority groups as well. All those of us whom are angry at how women and minorities are being treated by this country need to stand up together and alone, and fight back with everything we have.
If Ms Perry agrees I too think this song should become the "I Am Woman" anthem for this generation.
ReRe
(10,597 posts)... Helen Reddy's "I'm a Woman, W-O-M-A-N?" I loved that song. Happy 4th!
AndreaCG
(2,331 posts)That was the Helen Reddy hit.
ReRe
(10,597 posts)spooky3
(34,403 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)(No doubt one of the odd relationships brought about by Massachusetts's recognition of same gender marriage.)
ww.
Maybe it was a great feminist lyric in its time, but, in my opinion, it's not great for a feminist anthem today. Yes, it says women are great--but too much emphasis on housekeeping skills and sexual pleasing your man skills.
"Not that there's anything wrong with that."
ww.
liberalhistorian
(20,814 posts)the lady herself, Helen Reddy ,sing that at a "March for Women's Lives" in D.C. in 1986, when I was in college. It was worth the eight-hour all-night bus ride just for that! And to think that we are now going back even further after so much progress has been made. I really understand the sentiment behind the sign I see frequently now at rallies and marches, which says "I can't believe I'm still having to protest this shit".
ReRe
(10,597 posts)I was a very young adult around that time, a single mom. I used to sing "You and Me Against the World" to my wee son when I rocked him to sleep.
I am 52 and remember that song well. I think I still have that Helen Reddy 33 album somewhere.
Spirochete
(5,264 posts)ReRe
(10,597 posts)so I guess it was. My mind is playing "Mind Games."
90-percent
(6,828 posts)In these times, in terms of political influence, the BOTTOM 99% are the minority!
And those of us being discriminated against by the PTB's need to get our CIVIL RIGHTS back!
-90% Jimmy
Liberalynn
(7,549 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)I once posted something here about the 99% and some DUer whose screen name I've forgotten, chastised me (rightly, IMO) that I should have used 90%. The explanation was that the 99% gives multi-millionaires, like Bill Maher specifically, an out to exclude themselves and talk about the "really, really rich" (not a direct quote) as though they did not belong to that same group. (Even Hillary, at about 100 million as a couple--she was using "we" talked about the "really rich" as though she were in some other group.
Beartracks
(12,797 posts)tulsakatz
(3,122 posts)....& will likely increase democrats & moderates in the election!
In situations like this, I am reminded of the Virginia Governor's race. Before the election, McAuliffe was not likely to win. But after republicans shut down the govt & Virginia politicians single minded efforts to reduce reproductive rights, McAuliffe not only won but other democrats were also elected!! I believe all democrats won those elections but one has since resigned...
great video....thanks!
KaryninMiami
(3,073 posts)Blast it far and wide with consistently loud messaging about how the GOP and the Supremes endanger the lives and health of women and that they do not respect their privacy or their rights. This is an issue we can run on and win on but only if we/there is enough noise to compel women to vote out the GOP.
Zoonart
(11,832 posts)As a feminist who was around for the ERA push the first time around, may I remind you that it is a very heavy lift. Ratification by a majority of states is extremely difficult and requires a huge grass roots mechanism on the ground that I don't see happening. When young women get into the streets to protest... not just their grandmas... I will take heart. This revolution will not be tweeted.
Also... remember that the ratification of such an amendment also requires a constitutional convention, at which time- the entire content of the constitution is open to change. Pandora's Box indeed.
Sadly, NOW and NARAL, are barely present in our political dialog anymore, they seem simply to exist to self perpetuate their leadership with fundraising on empty promises like reviving the ERA. VERY SAD.
Buns_of_Fire
(17,150 posts)for ratification. But these days, good luck getting such an amendment passed in EITHER house.
Politicub
(12,165 posts)I think the ERA - or something even better - is possible. I'm sure there were naysayers about women's suffrage, too, but today women have the right to vote and the ability change history.
Men have been trying to control women since the dawn of history. Conservative and fundamentalist men understand that stripping women of the ability to control their fertility curtails freedom.
This is not then. This is 2014 and the SC has gone absolutely too far. If you don't feel the ground rumbling, you might check you pulse. Respectfully.
Tree-Hugger
(3,370 posts)" If you don't feel the ground rumbling, you might check you pulse. Respectfully."
Love that.
It's nice to be nice. I don't likes to fight.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Cheviteau
(383 posts)Your understanding of the process is a little skewed.
freshwest
(53,661 posts)rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)Last edited Fri Jul 4, 2014, 01:59 PM - Edit history (1)
underway. Now is a perfect time to re-energize the ERA. I hope Sen Warren will promote the new ERA.
Edited spelling error.
Beartracks
(12,797 posts)rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)TexasProgresive
(12,155 posts)It is the one that created the present constitution and the first 10 amendments, the bill of rights.There are 17 additional amendments which were proposed by congress and ratified by 3/4 of the states legislatures.
I don't think it is possible to get the ERA restarted by our present congress unless a super-majority of women demand it. These same women would have to threaten the state legislators to ratify the amendment. Of course there will be men supporting the ERA but this is a fight for women.
Maybe women need to take a page from Lysistrata and more than just withhold sex; a general strike on all that women do to make men's life easier. Let him crawl under the bed for his socks and underware and wash them his own self.
TheBlackAdder
(28,167 posts)In this day, a constitutional convention would NOT be something we would want.
Who knows what the outcome of it would be, after that can is opened?
An amendment is just fine.
TexasProgresive
(12,155 posts)There is debate among constitutional scholars (which I am not) that if a constitutional convention is convened it has the power to toss out the present constitution whole cloth and write a new one. That's what happened with the one and only convention.
Some people think that it would be restricted to add an amendment but I don't believer that is the case. It is a very scary thought that RWNJs would rewrite the constitution to suit their strange mental maladies.
And I imagine that the document would be full of misspellings.
Jim Lane
(11,175 posts)I wouldn't see a ConCon as trying to write a whole new Constitution. Most of the states that have called for one, though, have done so in response to the push for an amendment requiring the federal government to balance its budget. The righties would also push other stuff, of course, like "protecting traditional marriage" and criminalizing abortion (or at least overturning Roe v. Wade to allow each state to make the decision).
Even if the ConCon were to propose amendments against marriage equality or reproductive rights, they would have a tough time getting 38 ratifications. State legislators of both parties, though, would be happy to support the balanced-budget amendment. It's popular with the voters. Even more important is that state legislators who vote for it could claim credit for fiscal rectitude and yet not have to vote for the unpopular tax increases or spending cuts it would require. Along the same lines would be an amendment for Congressional term limits, which would get support from state legislators who see themselves as logical candidates to fill the resulting open seats.
Term limits would be bad and the balanced budget would be a disaster, yet those are the most likely outcomes of a ConCon.
TexasProgresive
(12,155 posts)It doesn't matter the reason it was called.
Jim Lane
(11,175 posts)That's why I didn't join the general cheering here when Vermont joined the ConCon call in the name of an amendment to overturn Citizens United. A few blue states following that course, joined by the 30 or so more conservative states that have called for a ConCon to implement a balanced-budget amendment or some other right-wing project, could well result in a convention that would, in fact, advance the right-wing agenda.
I really don't see a Citizens United amendment emerging from such a convention. Still less do I see it being ratified by 38 states.
Jim Lane
(11,175 posts)The convention of 1787 proposed the Constitution that was ratified, but did not propose the Bill of Rights. (It would make no sense to make simultaneous proposals of a new Constitution and changes to it.)
At the convention, there was a strong faction urging the inclusion of a Bill of Rights. The opposition, which prevailed, argued that the federal government being created was so limited in its powers that it would not be able to infringe citizens' liberties, and that including a Bill of Rights would convey a false impression of the government's permissible scope -- in other words, would expand rather than restrict the government's power.
The process of ratification of the Constitution revealed that there was considerable opinion favoring a Bill of Rights. Some states ratified the Constitution only when it became clear that a Bill of Rights would be added. Congress proposed those amendments and presented them to the states, the same process that's been used for all subsequent amendments.
TexasProgresive
(12,155 posts)I knew that but did not think it through. I knew that several of the states insisted on the inclusion of the bill of rights as a stipulation for ratification of the constitution. So yes, all 27 amendments to the constitution came to be by the "normal" ratification process.
Uncle Joe
(58,282 posts)Thanks for the thread, boston bean.
CanonRay
(14,083 posts)This is the first time I've seen NOW poke it's nose out since Monday. That was recorded on Monday, so I missed it. Has anyone seen NOW anywhere else this week? Thanks for posting this!
Sunlei
(22,651 posts)L0oniX
(31,493 posts)blkmusclmachine
(16,149 posts)and at home, in service to the wants of their husbands."
ReRe
(10,597 posts)... but he's not more powerful than the Constitution. If we can get an Equal Rights Amendment added to the Constitution, then there isn't a damn thing he can do about it.
L0oniX
(31,493 posts)Yea ...hows that play out for them? Bet HL won't want to say anything about that!
ReRe
(10,597 posts)They believe in the death penalty too, by damn.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)also an issue in this situation. Enough is enough.
ReRe
(10,597 posts)... like they interpret the Bible.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)ReRe
(10,597 posts).... people of their ilk, and their eyes cross.
Puzzledtraveller
(5,937 posts)Swede Atlanta
(3,596 posts)We had 5 Catholic, conservative males who had already decided the outcome they wanted. They absolutely want to overturn Roe v. Wade and probably even Griswold v. Connecticut that overturned state laws about who could obtain contraceptives.
With the end already in mind they just had to find their justification. They knew most of the public would be concerned about a slippery slope so they added all of the qualifying language in the decision "limited to closely held companies", "limited to the ACA contraceptives mandate and not other forms of health treatment (e.g. transfusions), etc. But they know that once the principle of allowing for-profit businesses to use alleged religious beliefs to shield them from compliance with otherwise valid law, it can never be limited as they suggest in their decision.
The existence of an ERA amendment would have had no effect on this decision. The reason is this....the contraceptives that are excluded under this decision involve those that prevent an egg (fertilized or not) from attaching itself to the uterine wall. The argument is that once the egg is fertilized it is a human life and the HL owners consider anything that prevents that sperm and egg from being born is murder.
There is no discrimination against women argument. The law would have to apply equally if men had a uterus and an egg could attach itself to the wall of the man's uterus. Since men don't have a uterus, there is no inequality by denying only women these forms of birth control.
JoeyT
(6,785 posts)though I'm still willing to throw my weight behind getting an ERA passed.
If they gave a damn about the constitution, there's a half a dozen things that would have stopped them already.
grilled onions
(1,957 posts)They will start to chip away at the 99% one group at a time. The minimum wage workers,women,minorities,gay/lesbian community etc. They don't care where they start but the goal is to weaken,trample down,dishearten until "we" give up--until we become silent. However we can shout it from the rooftops and we must. They cannot continue to get away with this. After all that grand statue in the NYC harbor isn't called miss liberty for nothing!
The Blue Flower
(5,433 posts)Success will not simply be reaching the goal, it will be the very act of organizing the energy, talents, and resources of those who have finally said, "ENOUGH!" I say let's all do what we can to get the ball rolling again--now 30 years after we began the work--and go as far as momentum will take us. Who knows what unexpected results will come of it? I just wrote to Elizabeth Warren on the subject. Do whatever you can right now and every day. The time is now.
Wounded Bear
(58,598 posts)Not the "left" or progressives.
The encroachment of religion in politics in this country is profoundly worrying and must be abated.
Dustlawyer
(10,494 posts)Representative Democracy and they are definitely slapping women, minorities, and non-Christians around these days! I am a white male who believes in the ideals expressed in our Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Currently, we have guys that look a lot like me who see the future in the Demographics and are willing to lie, cheat, and steal to retain the power they have had from the beginning. We are at a turning point where they have to go to extremes to retain power. We have all seen it, attacks on voting rights, extreme Gerrymandering, actual cheating by switching votes in Ohio, Bush v. Gore...
If we do not fight for Article V Constitutional Convention to get the money out of politics, we as a country are doomed. I believe that the fight over these issues, if we really fight for it and get the word out, our numbers will overwhelm. The Republicans will help us by spouting all the crazy crap they want like making us a secular, Christian government. The people on the sidelines will get going if we let them know what is at stake. The alternative is this this slow but steady circling down the drain.
freshwest
(53,661 posts)Last edited Sat Jul 5, 2014, 02:29 AM - Edit history (2)
That is not what Move to Amend is asking for to change that ruling. They want an amendment, not a convention:
We the People, Not We the Corporations
On January 21, 2010, with its ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are persons, entitled by the U.S. Constitution to buy elections and run our government. Human beings are people; corporations are legal fictions.
We, the People of the United States of America, reject the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United and other related cases, and move to amend our Constitution to firmly establish that money is not speech, and that human beings, not corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights.
The Supreme Court is misguided in principle, and wrong on the law. In a democracy, the people rule.
We Move to Amend.
"...corporations have no consciences, no beliefs, no feelings, no thoughts, no desires. Corporations help structure and facilitate the activities of human beings, to be sure, and their 'personhood' often serves as a useful legal fiction. But they are not themselves members of We the People by whom and for whom our Constitution was established."
~Supreme Court Justice Stevens, January 2010
ACTION ALERT: Tell the Senate Any Amendment Must Include Ending Corporate Personhood!
July 1, 2014
Senate Joint Resolution 19 is a proposed Constitutional Amendment to overturn Citizens United, but it doesnt address corporate constitutional rights at all.
Move to Amend has vowed that we will not support any halfway measures that don't amend the Constitution in two necessary ways:
1) Make clear that only human beings, not corporations have Constitutional rights;
2) Make clear that money is not speech and campaign spending can be regulated.
Tens of thousands of volunteers across the nation have been building a grassroots movement over the past four years from the bottom up. This movement came from everyday people taking this issue to their city governments, to town meeting debates, to candidate forums, to newspaper opinion pages, and to the ballot box directly. Nearly 600 cities and towns have now passed amendment resolutions.
Polling shows 80% of the American public believes that corporations should not have the same rights as people. State legislatures have been pressured to stand up as well, with 16 states passing resolutions calling for an amendment. Ending Corporate Personhood was a major theme in the demands that came from Occupy encampments across the country.
The plan is that this amendment will get a vote in the Senate this year -- before election season. We cannot allow a proposal that doesnt address corporate constitutional rights to get traction -- the amendment must match the demand of our movement: A Corporation is Not a Person! Money is Not Free Speech!
Fill out the form below to send a message to the authors of SJR19 -- let them know that Corporate Personhood MUST be included in the language of the amendment:
https://movetoamend.org/amend-sjr19
https://movetoamend.org/
It is a slow and tedious process, not funded by the right who will fund a convention to get their way. They announced their intent years ago, to dissolve the New Deal part of federal government and repealing all progressive amendments past the 10th, thus returning to states rights, or as they call themselves now, the Tenther Movement.
The ones asking for the convention are Paul Ryan and his ilk, and have already stated their plan, to repeal the 14th with its clauses of Birthright Ciizenship, Due Process and Equal Treatment under the Law when they get 38 state legislatures 'red' to vote for it. Most of our current liberties and laws hinge on that Amendment, which was needed to remedy what the fabled 4th didn't do to help minorities.
Now we see 2 states have been hoodwinked with this fallacy that an Article 5 Convention is required to overturn both Citizens United and the McCutcheon decisions. It is not, and to open the toolbox will allow the Koch brothers to rewrite and repeal whatever is in the Constitution that do not fit their agenda.
If it is held, this will be their agenda as they bus in their paid supporters to make it happen. They have gotten just about everything they have on their list, playing the CT, Tea, GOP and the general public who don't understand how the Koch brothers are coercing us to accept a convention they'll have a prominent hand in. The media and their think tanks have all the needed verbiage to make it pull the wool over our eyes, which they have done a good job of so far:
BERNIE SANDERS Uncovers 1980 Koch Agenda- "What Do the Koch Brothers Want?"
What else do the Koch brothers want?
In 1980, David Koch ran as the Libertarian Partys vice-presidential candidate in 1980.
Lets take a look at the 1980 Libertarian Party platform.
Here are just a few excerpts of the Libertarian Party platform that David Koch ran on in 1980:
We urge the repeal of federal campaign finance laws, and the immediate abolition of the despotic Federal Election Commission.
We favor the abolition of Medicare and Medicaid programs.
We oppose any compulsory insurance or tax-supported plan to provide health services, including those which finance abortion services.
We also favor the deregulation of the medical insurance industry.
We favor the repeal of the fraudulent, virtually bankrupt, and increasingly oppressive Social Security system. Pending that repeal, participation in Social Security should be made voluntary.
We propose the abolition of the governmental Postal Service. The present system, in addition to being inefficient, encourages governmental surveillance of private correspondence. Pending abolition, we call for an end to the monopoly system and for allowing free competition in all aspects of postal service.
We oppose all personal and corporate income taxation, including capital gains taxes.
We support the eventual repeal of all taxation.
As an interim measure, all criminal and civil sanctions against tax evasion should be terminated immediately.
We support repeal of all law which impede the ability of any person to find employment, such as minimum wage laws.
We advocate the complete separation of education and State. Government schools lead to the indoctrination of children and interfere with the free choice of individuals. Government ownership, operation, regulation, and subsidy of schools and colleges should be ended.
We condemn compulsory education laws and we call for the immediate repeal of such laws.
We support the repeal of all taxes on the income or property of private schools, whether profit or non-profit.
We support the abolition of the Environmental Protection Agency.
We support abolition of the Department of Energy.
We call for the dissolution of all government agencies concerned with transportation, including the Department of Transportation.
We demand the return of America's railroad system to private ownership. We call for the privatization of the public roads and national highway system.
We specifically oppose laws requiring an individual to buy or use so-called "self-protection" equipment such as safety belts, air bags, or crash helmets.
We advocate the abolition of the Federal Aviation Administration.
We advocate the abolition of the Food and Drug Administration.
We support an end to all subsidies for child-bearing built into our present laws, including all welfare plans and the provision of tax-supported services for children.
We oppose all government welfare, relief projects, and aid to the poor programs. All these government programs are privacy-invading, paternalistic, demeaning, and inefficient. The proper source of help for such persons is the voluntary efforts of private groups and individuals.
We call for the privatization of the inland waterways, and of the distribution system that brings water to industry, agriculture and households.
We call for the repeal of the Occupational Safety and Health Act.
We call for the abolition of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
We support the repeal of all state usury laws.
In other words, the agenda of the Koch brothers is not only to defund Obamacare. The agenda of the Koch brothers is to repeal every major piece of legislation that has been signed into law over the past 80 years that has protected the middle class, the elderly, the children, the sick, and the most vulnerable in this country...
Tomorrow it will be Social Security, ending Medicare as we know it, repealing the minimum wage. It seems to me that the Koch brothers will not be content until they get everything they believe they are entitled to.
Our great nation can no longer be hijacked by right-wing billionaires like the Koch brothers.
For the sake of our children and our grandchildren, for the sake of our economy, we have got to let democracy prevail.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024806298
http://www.sanders.senate.gov/koch-brothers
http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a7980koch
to kpete:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024806298
We've heard these memes for years, Americans have come to believe this is how it has to be. An explanation of their beliefs are here:
How Freedom Became Tyranny
Rightwing libertarians have turned freedom into an excuse for greed and exploitation.
George Monbiot - December 19, 2011
Freedom: who could object? Yet this word is now used to justify a thousand forms of exploitation. Throughout the rightwing press and blogosphere, among thinktanks and governments, the word excuses every assault on the lives of the poor, every form of inequality and intrusion to which the 1% subject us. How did libertarianism, once a noble impulse, become synonymous with injustice?
In the name of freedom freedom from regulation the banks were permitted to wreck the economy. In the name of freedom, taxes for the super-rich are cut. In the name of freedom, companies lobby to drop the minimum wage and raise working hours. In the same cause, US insurers lobby Congress to thwart effective public healthcare; the government rips up our planning laws; big business trashes the biosphere. This is the freedom of the powerful to exploit the weak, the rich to exploit the poor.
Right-wing libertarianism recognises few legitimate constraints on the power to act, regardless of the impact on the lives of others. In the UK it is forcefully promoted by groups like the TaxPayers Alliance, the Adam Smith Institute, the Institute of Economic Affairs and Policy Exchange. Their conception of freedom looks to me like nothing but a justification for greed.
So why have we been been so slow to challenge this concept of liberty? I believe that one of the reasons is as follows. The great political conflict of our age between neocons and the millionaires and corporations they support on one side and social justice campaigners and environmentalists on the other has been mischaracterised as a clash between negative and positive freedoms.
More at the link about the meaning of positive and negative freedoms and how words are used against us:
http://www.monbiot.com/2011/12/19/how-freedom-became-tyranny/
I do not wish to live under the Kochstitution and that is what will happen if we don't take the regular process of amending, but instead go for the heady idea of an Article 5 Convention. It is the fondest dream of the ultra conservatives and the Libertarians.
JMHO.
Dustlawyer
(10,494 posts)surgery on Monday. Thanks for spelling it out!
freshwest
(53,661 posts)Half-Century Man
(5,279 posts)The ERA should have stayed on the lips of every woman for the last 20+ years. My mother was and still is a very vocal advocate for the ERA. She was from the start. She is 78 now, it would be nice if she, as a human being, could be equal in the eyes of the law before she passes from the Earth.
I'll help.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)Women are the MAJORITY in this country.
redruddyred
(1,615 posts)not sure if I'm more angry at seeing the men at the pro-life rallies, or the women.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)littlemissmartypants
(22,548 posts)Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)redruddyred
(1,615 posts)especially as we were "already equal". the very fact of its non-existence is clear evidence that sexism is still very much alive.
phyllis schafly is the biggest hypocrite of all. if she is so against equal rights, then why was she out campaigning? why didn't she stay at home and cook and clean and pop out babies?
good for NOW. I wish there were a way this country girl could participate more actively.
Shrike47
(6,913 posts)She and her husband had 6 kids.
Of course, she was the child of privilege and the wife of privilege who made her name attacking the aspirations of other women and helping to keep other woman 'in their place.' She should be ashamed of herself, but she isn't, of course.
redruddyred
(1,615 posts)littlemissmartypants
(22,548 posts)I remember chanting ERA now. If I had a magic wand I would wave it for us to have laser like focus on this issue. I am frustrated by the myriad of what ifs and yeah buts that water this down into a tasteless soup. Laser focus. Attention and action are our most vital tools. This can only be done one mind at a time and I am sorry but it is sometimes a struggle for me to stay encouraged. Every day with everyone I meet I have to be willing to discuss a touchy subject and be prepared for the response (or lack thereof) AND then use my Power and Influence (aka "super powers) to persuade or to affirm The Message. I have to get up every day with my goals in mind and Stay Focused. All of us focused on that one goal, imagine that. We Can Do Anything!
Love, Peace and Shelter. Lmsp
Cha
(296,801 posts)Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)I supported the ERA the first time and I still do, only maybe more so now.
This is not just because we as a culture are all the poorer when any of our members are denied the rights of full participation in society. It is not just because we desperately need a counterbalance to patriarchy and patriarchal run amok. It is not jjust because of the inherent unfairness of glass ceilings. (One of these days I'll deliver a full-blown rant on that topic.)
This time around, at least, it is mostly because the only salvation for the species, for the biosphere is for us to stand up as one body and DEMAND an end to the injustices, the brutality, the general fuck-headedness of this Koch-head world. Partial solutions are no solutions. Yeah, I want to save the whales, but that's not where I'm putting my time and energy.
We have to move everything at once.
Humane and life affirming values incorporate feminist values, and will save the whales as well. I didn't put the word "radical" in my username thoughtlessly. "Radical" is the adjectival form of the Latin "radix," or root. Radical changes are those that stem from the root. They are the most fundamental kinds of change. And that's what we need to do now. I will add that healthy radical changes can only come from nonviolent means. A movement that is spawned in a violent birth will always have a bloody lifecourse. Witness the French, Russian and Chinese revolutions as classic examples. Peaceful revolutions work. They are the only kind of revolution that does work. (E.g. see Chenoweth & Stephan, Why Civil Resistance Works).
Our only possible course is through peaceful noncompliance. "Be the change you wish to see."
If your primary goal is equal rights for women, I stand with you. If your primary goal is economic justice, I stand with you. If your goal is to save the environment, I stand with you. My efforts and my passions are fully consistent with yours. All of these things need to happen at once. They are all facets of the same Big Change.
supercats
(429 posts)Just don't endorse Hilary, she might be with you on the ERA but economically and politically she will be against you unless you are the 1%. So why don't you back Elizabeth Warren instead? She's for everything you and the 99% stand for. Thats who I want to win in 2016.
DURHAM D
(32,605 posts)eShirl
(18,478 posts)the traditional process outlined in Article V of the Constitution, requiring passage by a two-thirds majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives, followed by ratification by legislatures in three-quarters (38) of the 50 states, and
ratification in three more of the 15 state legislatures that did not ratify the ERA during the 1972-82 ratification campaign, based on legal analysis that when three more states vote yes, this non-traditional process could withstand legal challenge and put the ERA into the Constitution.
http://www.equalrightsamendment.org/
AAO
(3,300 posts)Jim Lane
(11,175 posts)The key to Hobby Lobby was a statute, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which allows people to invoke their religious views as a basis for noncompliance with a law, even a neutral law of general applicability.
The sex discrimination in Hobby Lobby was by Hobby Lobby. It wasn't the government that said "condoms good - IUDs bad." The whole point of RFRA is that private actors may substitute their personal beliefs for those established publicly through the democratic process, provided that those personal beliefs have a religious basis.
The ERA would affect only public actions. Its key provision reads:
Note the important limitation -- "by the United States or by any State". The ERA would mean, for example, that a state government could not operate a men-only college. It would not, however, mean that the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival would have to start admitting men, or that the Catholic Church would have to start ordaining women, or that Hobby Lobby or any other nongovernmental entity would have to practice equality.
Anyone who wants to push for the ERA now should be prepared to explain what specific laws or court decisions its ratification would change. The rule that the state may not operate a men-only college, for example, is part of current law, under United States v. Virginia, 518 U.S. 515 (1996) (state of Virginia's operation of all-male Virginia Military Institute is unconstitutional, even though the state proposed to establish a "separate but equal" facility for women). AFAIK there is no longer any all-male public college or university in the United States.
To my mind, the ERA was sort of like the proposed Child Labor Amendment to the Constitution. The Supreme Court had held that laws prohibiting child labor were unconstitutional. Widespread dissatisfaction with that result led to Congressional approval of a constitutional amendment and its submission to the states. Some states ratified it, but it was still pending when changes in judicial attitudes rendered it unnecessary. The push for the amendment may well have been part of the process of swaying the judiciary, and the same is probably true of the ERA. One can honor the work of each amendment's proponents and yet believe that striving to ratify it now is not the best way to advance the cause that motivated it.
ETA: Progressives should give consideration to seeking the repeal or significant amendment of the RFRA, which has the potential to undermine women's rights and many other important goals.
boston bean
(36,218 posts)completely wrong and full of MRA baloney.
Jim Lane
(11,175 posts)For those who view Hobby Lobby solely through the prism of gender, and who conclude that the ERA would compel a different result, I offer the counterexample of race, and specifically the effect of the Equal Protection Clause.
Just as the ERA would expressly bar governmental discrimination based on sex, the Equal Protection Clause was, from its inception, interpreted as barring governmental discrimination based on race. (It was enacted as part of the Civil War Amendments that addressed the situation of blacks post-slavery.) That interpretation led to the Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 (1954), holding that racially segregated public schools were unconstitutional. Nevertheless, racial discrimination by private entities -- in employment, in housing, even in serving black customers at a barbecue shop -- was still legal in many states. It wasn't until the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that such private racial discrimination became illegal.
My comments in post #73 reported on how the American legal system actually addresses such issues -- specifically, how courts draw a sharp distinction between actions by government and actions by private entities. I'm not clear if you mean that my report is baloney (you think the legal system handles the questions differently from the way I describe, and so the ERA would affect private actors like the Catholic Church, the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, and Hobby Lobby) or if you mean that the distinction being drawn is baloney (you agree that the legal system does handle issues that way, but you think it shouldn't, and that it should instead treat governments and private actors identically).
A further question about the ERA and the Hobby Lobby decision: If you contend that the ERA would have compelled a different result, what about the case of a corporation that invokes the RFRA to justify a refusal to cover any contraception? This corporation's owners would say, "It's against our religious beliefs to pay for insurance that covers any procedure that causes people to not be fruitful and to not multiply and to not replenish the Earth. IUDs, condoms, birth-control pills, vasectomies -- we oppose all of it, for men and women equally." Do you contend that the ERA would somehow make that application of the RFRA unconstitutional?
Finally, I'm amused to find my post consigned to the MRA dustbin. I know almost nothing about the MRAs except what I've read from their critics here on DU, but I'd be surprised if they agreed with me. One of my points was that the Equal Protection Clause should be and has been interpreted to apply to sex discrimination, and that, for example, Virginia Military Institute, which operated since 1839 as an all-male institution, was therefore compelled to admit women. Do the MRA types champion that interpretation of the Equal Protection Clause? I'd guess they're more likely to be on the other side -- to agree with Scalia (dissenting opinion) that excluding women from VMI was perfectly acceptable.
Tuesday Afternoon
(56,912 posts)This is not to say that bean is wrong and that you are completely right.
Just that RFRA needs to repealed. Yes.
JustAnotherGen
(31,780 posts)Gothmog
(144,919 posts)In Texas, Wendy Davis is already running on the concept that she can peel off single suburban female voters from the GOP. This decision and the stupidity of Greg Abbot on equal pay will help