What will the effect of overturning Roe v Wade on the Repuke party?

[NNadir]

It's been more than thirty years since the coat hanger days, and I feel that people are a little more than complacent about the right to choose - they don't remember (or in many cases, never knew) what life was like without the right to choose.

It seems certain that Roe v. Wade will now be overturned. In my somewhat paranoid mind, it even seems possible that the new Supreme Court will rule that a fetus is a person entitled to all the rights under the constitution and abortion will be illegal in all states.

The reality is that the wealthy will still be able to fly to Europe or Canada or some other place to terminate unwanted pregnancies, but the poor will just have more and more children.

It seems to me that many people vote Republican for all sorts of reasons that actually have little to do with their own bodies. It also seems that the power of denial and obfuscation has become the pre-eminent value of the so called "Values" party.

However, I'm thinking that the nature of reality is to fuck with fantasy and to make those who drink the Koolaid - or eat the lotuses - pay. I'm thinking that for the long term, the reality of the post Roe v. Wade world will be hell on those who brought it about. I think that the disaster of Repukism, though many will suffer, might well destroy the Repuke party for many years, just as the disaster of the last powerful corrupt one party state - the Soviet State - led to the destruction of the Communist Party.

What say you?

I would be interested in hearing any comments.

[wakeme2008]

1. IMHO, the real leads of the Repugs do not want to over Roe v Wade

The real leaders of the Repugs do not want an Marriage amend.

The real leaders of the Repugs do not want a Flag amend.

They want these wedge issues to play during every election cycle....

Just my opinion.

[abluelady]

2. I Agree

The Repugs with any brains are realizing what a failure this administration has been. Those who only want gays not marrying and abortions not allowed are still drinking the kool aid. If the issue of abortion goes away, the Repugs lose a tremendous number of voters.

[NewInNewJ.]

4. You are right

they will never overturn Row vs Wade. It is to their political advantage to keep the parties so far apart. It will never happen, if not by now,with the Repugs in solid power, why would it happen any other time. It is all a fake for their sake.

[DemGirl7]

5. There are no "real Republicans" anymore

those people are being pushed out of the party every day and have become nothing more than a bunch of urban legends. The so called Republicans that lead the party now, are just bunch of Neo-cons, and Fundies who have hijacked the party, and are driving it into the ground, with these stupid wedge issues.

[wakeme2008]

6. But

the largest single issue voting block are the Pro-Lifers. If Roe v Wade was over turned, IMHO, these single issue voters may not go to the polls or may start looking at the price of gas/health insurance/food/housing and look to which canidate sounds like they will tackle these issues.

[CTD]

9. I've been saying this for years.

And if they really wanted to do so (on any of these) they'd have done so by now. Or at least tried a lot harder.

These issues are no different than making sure OBL remains at large. If you resolve any one of these issues, you lose the ability to USE the issue to motivate those people who legitimately care about these issues to vote your candidate.

[firefox]

3. It would lead to a Constitutional Amendment to spell out rights

If you are talking about the rights under the Constitution, there will always be argument over interpretation. So if the political process feeds the Fundies for supporting the raping and pillaging of America and they actually pull it off, the women will see to it that a Constitutional Amendment settles the issue once and for all.

If the Dems were actually a party that strategized and supported pro-choice, they would have long ago announced that a serious attempt to reverse Roe v Wade would be answered with a Constitutional Amendment. It would have shut the marketing by the fascist down.

The talking point of the DNC should say that we are prepared to settle it once and for all with a Constitutional Amendment. They need to load the cannon and point it at the fascists that really do not give a dam.

The whole thing would lead to a discussion of federal power and a Constitutional Convention to clarify the 4000 words of the Constitution so that interpretation is not decided by political power but by intellectual determination. My humorous thought over the years is that now that the lawyers are here in such force an amendment on reproductive rights would exceed the entire length of the Constitution. We need to talk about the over reach of federal power that now exists and spelling it out for the fascists and everyone else. A challenge to Rowe v Wade will light the fuse to a lot more than the abortion issue.

[joemurphy]

7. Republicans have unwanted pregnancies too. It is a myth that

the people that run the Republican party are pro-life. My guess is that Roberts and Miers are more mainstream than we think. We'll see.

If Roe is overturned, it will be overturning around 40 years of jurisprudence that has constantly built upon Roe, Griswold, and other cases that posited a right of privacy. It would resurrect the feminist movement and destroy Republican ability to get any votes from thinking women for years to come. It would possibly throw the abortion issue back where it was before Roe -- squarely into the laps of state legislatures -- something I doubt Republicans want.

If Bush does turn his back on the fundies, they may abandon the Republican party and return to where they came from -- back to little angry communities with no real power or influence on American politics. Maybe they'll start worrying about their own souls instead of everyone else's. We can only hope.


Whatever happens, we're going to be in for an interesting ride.

[OnionPatch]

8. Well, I don't agree

that they won't overturn Roe V. Wade. They can still use it plenty even if it is overturned. They'll just get the pro-life base worked up before elections by warning them that "the Dem candidate is going to take our country back to the days when we killed babies!!"

Here's what I'm predicting: They will also go after birth-control since so many types of birth control have potential to cause an early "abortion" including the pill. That's when the moderates will realize what a huge mistake they've made.

I'm past the age of needing either, so I'm outa the woods. Good luck to the rest of you girls! You'll need it.

[TayTay]

10. I heard a doctor speak to this issue in May

at a Dem event. He said that if Roe is overturned then a 'black market' in drugs will spring up over night with people conconcting their own abortaficients. This doc said that there are about five fairly easy to get ingredients that would go into this pill and that it would be fairly easy to imagine the drugs becoming easy to obtain.

That doesn't mean they would be safe. There would be side-effects when people take bad medications that are not overseen properly. The anti-choice people cannot legislate out of existence the need for abortion that propelled the original case all those years ago. (Women have been having abortions since the dawn of recorded history. There is no reason to believe that this will stop just because Roe might be overturned. As in any case like this, the solution will just go underground.)

It is not difficult to imagine that people in states where local legislatures outlaw abortions will face a health crisis and action will have to be taken. Again, the need won't go away, only the legal means to address it. This will open up a whole new can of political worms as the daughters, wives and mothers of anti-choice people wind up in hospitals and morgues, as happened before. Remember, the people who are going after the right to a safe and legal abortion are also going after contraception. Since they can't effectively outlaw sex, they will be in a world of trouble. Anyone for the old adage: Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it.

[NNadir]

11. Good and interesting comments all.

I don't believe that the Repukes are not serious about over turning it. I believe that they are deadly serious, with emphasis on "deadly." I think we are kidding ourselves when we insist it won't happen. Who among us thought as the Clinton era drew to a close that any of these things were possible - global climate collapse, torture, arrest without trial, open corruption at the highest levels of government, a controlled press. This is just one more element.

It seems to me that the Repukes long since passed the place where they can plan, reason or control themselves. Events are spinning beyond their ability to judge outcomes.

The real tragedy is not that what they interpret as success may in fact kill them. Competence and prescience are not their fortes. What is really tragic are the innocent - mostly the poor innocent who will be caught in the crossfire.

It will be interesting if tragic to see what will become of the unwanted - and invariably poor - children who will result from this Taliban like scheming. I can tell you that services and help for these children will not be any sort of priority when the reality sets in.

[Warren DeMontague]

12. Actually, if the supreme court defines life as beginning at conception

the birth control pill will most likely be criminalized, as well.

[PlanetBev]

13. Roe v. Wade WAS almost overturned in 1992

With Casey v. Planned Parenthood. Scalia, White, Rehnquist and Thomas voted to overturned it. Scalia tried to strong-arm O'Connor and Kennedy into it and almost succeeded with Kennedy. At the last minute, Kennedy changed his mind. It looked so bad, that even Blackmun thought it was history.

Believe me people, the Republicans want to outlaw abortion. Don't buy that crap that they don't want it overturned because they'll lose it as a wedge issue. They know prefectly well that someday they'll be out of power, so they're going to smash the windows and grab everything they can while the opportunity lasts.

[NNadir]

14. My thoughts exactly.