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UPDATED: The GOP’s War On Women And Children

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From breast pumps to Big Bird, and from food stamps to family planning, the GOP is waging a war on America’s women and children. Full-fledged Republican battles against women now include anti-abortion bills, anti-contraception efforts, bills that literally would allow women to die in hospitals across America to protect “conscience rights” of doctors, attempts to defund Planned Parenthood, and GOP-sponsored bills that reduce, hamper, or even attempt to eliminate women’s constitutional rights to abortion and reproductive health services.

Yes, despite the fact that 64% of Americans say unemployment and the economy in general are “the most important problems facing this country today,” the GOP has chosen to focus on effectively eliminating the constitutional right to abortion.

The New York Times reports, “A comprehensive global study of abortion has concluded that abortion rates are similar in countries where it is legal and those where it is not, suggesting that outlawing the procedure does little to deter women seeking it,” and adds, “the researchers found that abortion was safe in countries where it was legal, but dangerous in countries where it was outlawed and performed clandestinely.”

The Times quotes Dr. Paul Van Look, director of the W.H.O. Department of Reproductive Health and Research, as saying, “What we see is that the law does not influence a woman’s decision to have an abortion. If there’s an unplanned pregnancy, it does not matter if the law is restrictive or liberal.” Van Look adds, “Generally, where abortion is legal it will be provided in a safe manner… And the opposite is also true: where it is illegal, it is likely to be unsafe, performed under unsafe conditions by poorly trained providers.”

Not satisfied at attempting to end abortion, however, Republicans are attempting right now to end entire programs that provide food and health services to five million low-income Americans.

Republicans are even proposing “personhood” bills, which declare as a full-fledged human the two cells joined at the instant of conception – effectively outlawing abortion. Eliminating abortion is so far ahead of everything else on the Republican agenda — despite Speaker of the House John Boehner’s promise to focus on jobs — that they’re even willing to pass legislation that might make it legal to murder an abortion provider. And all this on the heels of the GOP’s attempt to redefine rape. And like something out of The Onion, or “Saturday Night Live,” there is even a Republican battle on breast pumps.

Yes, breast pumps. Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) has decided to attack First Lady Michelle Obama, the government’s role in health care, the President’s policies, and the needy, by saying, “I’ve given birth to five babies and I breast-fed every single one of these babies,” Bachmann said on Laura Ingraham’s radio show. “To think that government has to go out and buy my breast pump for my babies. I mean, you want to talk about the nanny state?”

But even her own state residents disagree. “The government isn’t buying nursing women breast pumps (nor telling them they must buy them),” writes Susan Perry in the Minnesota Post. “The IRS is simply permitting women to purchase a pump and other breast-feeding supplies with their flexible spending accounts — as they can now buy other health-related items, such as hearing aids, contact-lens solution and over-the-counter pain relievers.”

Read: “Sarah Palin’s Breast Pump Problem“

Children are not exempt from the GOP wrath either. Right now, a Republican lawmaker in Missouri has proposed a bill “eliminating the prohibition on employment of children under 14.” Marcus Baram in The Huffington Post says that state Senator Jane Cunningham “defends the bill, saying that it’s important to cultivate a work ethic in young people.”

Shameful. If parents want to “cultivate a work ethic” in their young children, let them cut the grass, get a paper route, volunteer at the local library, walk the neighbor’s dog, or babysit.

Of course, after gutting child labor laws, what do you think is the next logical move? Yup. Repealing minimum wage laws. There are currently Republican-led attempts to repeal minimum wage laws now in (at least) Nevada and Missouri, as well as a national conversation taking place across America.

Citing an op-ed in a local Massachusetts newspaper that the “free market” should determine wages, a letter to the editor titled, “Where’s GOP concern for US workers?,” sarcastically mocks the idea. “He suggests that the federal minimum wage law be eliminated and that the free market determine that wage, which he feels could be $7 per hour rather than $8 and therefore create more jobs. But why stop there? Just think how many jobs could be created if minimum wages fell to $5 or even $3. And, as he implies, if we cut back or eliminate paid sick days and some paid time off for personal needs, employers would be able to hire more workers.”

A New York Times editorial this week calls the GOP’s focus “out of control,” and asks, “Are there any adults in charge of the House?”

“On Tuesday, the House began debating the list of proposed cuts, and more than 500 amendments were filed, mostly from Republicans trying to cut still more out of — or end — programs they dislike. One would stop paying dues to the United Nations. Others would cut all financing for the health care reform law, or Planned Parenthood, or any foreign aid to a country that regularly disagrees with the United States at the United Nations.”

The United Nations is one of the most important institutions women and children have. Whatever its shortcomings, the United Nations helps provide food to millions of women and children, specifically. It is unconscionable for the GOP to attempt to deny them the small amount of funding we do.

U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., Susan Rice, last week called these efforts by the GOP “short-sighted.” The American Foreign Press writes, “According to the ambassador, out of every dollar paid in tax by Americans 34 cents goes to Social Security and Medicare, 22 cents to national security and just one tenth of a cent on UN dues.”

But taking food out of the mouths of women and children is not the only overseas mission Republicans have. The GOP is attempting to “eliminate the $440 million in funding for the State Department, foreign operations, and related programs “for international population control, family planning, and reproductive health.”

Typical. Republicans time and again want to do something and ignore the consequences. But taking money out of the mouths of women and children, and taking money out of family planning services is a one-two punch that adds up to insanity.

Back here in the U.S., Barbara Bush, wife of George H.W. Bush, took Republican Governor of Texas, Rick Perry, to task. Writing an op-ed in the Houston Chronicle, “We can’t afford to cut education,” the former First Lady cited Texas’ embarrassing statistics, including ranking “49th in verbal SAT scores, 47th in literacy and 46th in average math SAT scores,” and “36th in the nation in high school graduation rates.” She adds, “An estimated 3.8 million Texans do not have a high school diploma.”

Mrs. Bush then asks, “In light of these statistics, can we afford to cut the number of teachers, increase class sizes, eliminate scholarships for underprivileged students and close several community colleges?”

Gail Collins of The New York Times picked this up and wrote in response, “You may not be surprised to hear that Governor Perry has rejected new taxes. He’s also currently refusing $830 million in federal aid to education because the Democratic members of Congress from Texas — ticked off because Perry used $3.2 billion in stimulus dollars for schools to plug other holes in his budget — put in special language requiring that this time Texas actually use the money for the kids.”

Collins continues, writing, “the Perry government is a huge fan of the deeply ineffective abstinence-only sex education. Texas gobbles up more federal funds than any other state for the purpose of teaching kids that the only way to avoid unwanted pregnancies is to avoid sex entirely,” and reveals that Texas “refused to accept federal money for more expansive, “evidence-based” programs.”

Calling House Republican leaders’ cuts “draconian,” and “devastating to women and girls at every stage of their lives,” Nancy Duff Campbell, co-president of the National Women’s Law Center, writing in The Hill, says, “The same House Republican leaders who voted to extend lavish tax breaks for the very wealthiest are now insisting that those who can least afford it sacrifice the most.”

She details some of the cuts Republicans want to make to the federal budget this year, and she’s kind when she calls them “draconian.”

Many Americans aren’t aware of a forty-one year-old federal program called Title X, which House Republicans want to scrap. Why? Because it provides funding to five million low-income women and children in the form of family planning (which Republicans hear solely as “abortion,”) contraception, and health care.

The Republican bill in the House, according to Campbell, “gouges key federal early learning investments—Head Start, Early Head Start and the Child Care Development Block Grant,” and “slashes funding for programs that promote the health of pregnant women, infants and young children,” including programs that provide “food, counseling and other supports to millions of low-income pregnant women, new mothers and infants.”

Those new mothers and infants may be mighty surprised to learn that the GOP is also waging war on Big Bird. Yes, the GOP wants to pull the plug on PBS. Claiming, “public broadcasting’s furry friends are political animals,” ultra-conservative Republican Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina says that in Washington, D.C., “Sesame Street turns into K Street and Elmo is a lobbyist.” DeMint exposes his irrational fears. “At this rate, Americans can expect Big Bird to start filming commercials to hype ObamaCare.”

DeMint and the rest of his Republican friends have a plan to prevent that too. The House is doing everything it can to repeal “Obamacare.” And if they can’t repeal health care reform, they can sure defund it. And they’re trying.

Yes, the Republicans have gone overboard, and are attacking women and children, and those least able to help themselves. Ironically, and sadistically, the fact is that Republican efforts will lead to even more needy women and children, literally left out in the cold, un-fed, un-educated, without health care, or a future.

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OPINION

Chief Justice ‘Shaken’ by Public Reaction to Him Handing Trump Near-Total Immunity

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October 8, 2024

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Last year, when Donald Trump’s attorneys declared he had “total immunity” from prosecution, many in the legal community scoffed. No president in all of American history had ever proclaimed they could not be convicted for serious violations of law—most infamously, President Richard Nixon had to have been keenly aware he might be criminally prosecuted.

Just eleven days after Nixon resigned the presidency in 1974, TIME reported, “Nixon’s new status as a private citizen puts him in grave peril.”

In fact, TIME continued, “the Watergate grand jury had vigorously wanted to indict Nixon while he was President.”

The American public is aware presidents can be prosecuted for certain crimes, and there is a foundational expectation of that possibility. In February of 2021, after the Democratic House impeached Donald Trump, Senate Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell declared the ex-president should face criminal prosecution rather than impeachment.

“Donald Trump’s legal troubles are far from over, despite his acquittal in the U.S. Senate impeachment trial that ended on Saturday,” Reuters reported on February 16, 2021. “Minority Leader Mitch McConnell noted this just moments after voting to acquit Trump, saying the courts are the proper forum for holding the former president accountable for his role in the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters.”

READ MORE: ‘They Are Partners’: Experts Warn on Trump and Putin After Bombshell Woodward Revelations

We now know that after Special Counsel Jack Smith asked the U.S. Supreme Court to settle the claim of “presidential immunity” by Trump’s attorneys, it refused, waiting for a lower court to weigh in. Chief Justice John Roberts sent a “scathing critique of [that] lower-court decision and a startling preview of how the high court would later rule,” The New York Times reported last month.

“Behind the scenes, the chief justice molded three momentous Jan. 6 and election cases that helped determine the former president’s fate,” according to The Times’ reporting.

“’I think it likely that we will view the separation of powers analysis differently’ from the appeals court, he wrote,” The Times reported, offering this interpretation for the Chief Justice’s message: “In other words: grant Mr. Trump greater protection from prosecution.”

During oral arguments at the Supreme Court, Trump’s attorney, John Sauer, had literally argued a president could order a coup and be protected by immunity because it was an “official act” of the presidency.

Sauer also argued a president could order the assassination of a political rival and still have immunity from prosecution.

Chief Justice Roberts responded to the “momentous trio of Jan. 6-related cases…by deploying his authority to steer rulings that benefited Mr. Trump, according to a New York Times examination that uncovered extensive new information about the court’s decision making.”

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In short, the Chief Justice used his powers to intervene and craft an opinion that some experts have said creates new law—certainly nothing that is found in the U.S. Constitution.

“There’s no legal authority for it,” remarked CNN legal analyst Norm Eisen back in December.

Nor, as the “originalist” far-right justices on the bench have adopted, does Chief Justice Roberts’ ruling lie in the “history and tradition” of the United States.

And yet, despite decades of history starting with Richard Nixon, and despite the scathing dissenting opinion from Justice Sonia Sotomayor, CNN reports on Tuesday, Chief Justice Roberts “was shaken by the adverse public reaction to his decision affording Trump substantial immunity from criminal prosecution. His protestations that the case concerned the presidency, not Trump, held little currency.”

“The Roberts Court has been in sync with the GOP political agenda largely because of decisions the chief justice has authored: For Trump and other Republicans. Against voting rights and racial affirmative action. Against federal regulations over environmental, public health and consumer affairs,” CNN’s Chief Supreme Court Analyst Joan Biskupic reported. “Roberts, joined by his five fellow conservatives, found that the former president was entitled to presumptive, if not absolute, immunity for actions related to his official acts. Roberts’ view of official acts, as opposed to private ones, was vast.”

Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissenting opinion on Trump’s immunity blasted Roberts and the far-right justices, famously declaring:

“Today’s decision to grant former Presidents criminal immunity reshapes the institution of the Presidency.  It makes a mockery of the principle, foundational to our Constitution and system of Government, that no man is above the law. Relying on little more than its own misguided wisdom about the need for ‘bold and unhesitating action’ by the President, the Court gives former President Trump all the immunity he asked for and more.”

She also wrote:

“The President of the United States is the most powerful person in the country, and possibly the world. When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military dissenting coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune. Let the President violate the law, let him exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain, let him use his official power for evil ends. Because if he knew that he may one day face liability for breaking the law, he might not be as bold and fearless as we would like him to be. That is the majority’s message today.”

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Trafficking in Nazi Race Science’: Trump Blasted After ‘Vile Trifecta’ of Antisemitism

 

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‘They Are Partners’: Experts Warn on Trump and Putin After Bombshell Woodward Revelations

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16 hours ago

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October 8, 2024

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Political experts and top journalists are delving into reports from Bob Woodward’s new book, and issuing warnings about Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin as Americans face a historic and pivotal election just four weeks from today.

CNN obtained a copy of Woodward’s latest, titled, “War.” In it, the Watergate journalist delivers stunning revelations.

Donald Trump, the ex-president and Republican Party’s presidential nominee, has continued his secret relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the Christian nationalism-aligned autocrat and alleged war criminal. According to excerpts from Woodward’s book, Trump has spoken to Putin at least seven times since he left office in January of 2021.

Another bombshell: Trump sent Putin COVID tests at the height of the deadly pandemic while Americans were desperately seeking them. Putin warned the U.S. president to not tell anyone, “because people will get mad at you, not me.” More than 1.2 million Americans died from the deadly disease.

And still more: President Joe Biden knew months ahead of time that Putin would attack Ukraine, via a “treasure trove of intelligence,” including human intelligence from inside the Kremlin, and warned President Zelenskyy, who did not believe the Russian president would be so foolish. Later, as the illegal war was going badly, Biden administration officials warned Putin to not use nuclear weapons, which he had been considering. Reportedly, there was a 50-50 chance Putin would go nuclear.

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“’That fucking Putin,’ Biden said to advisers in the Oval Office not long after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, according to Woodward,” CNN reports. Biden added: “Putin is evil. We are dealing with the epitome of evil.”

Critics are expressing anger and astonishment amid the latest revelations.

David Rothkopf, the noted foreign policy, national security, and political affairs analyst and commentator shared his observations via social media: “So, let me get this straight, Donald Trump was sitting in Mar-a-Lago on a trove of stolen U.S. national secrets and while there, had Vladimir Putin on speed dial for regular private chats? After he tried to overthrow our government? And Putin is helping his campaign now? And there are people who would actually vote for this guy? It’s obvious he has no qualms about betraying the U.S. The question is why are those who support him willing to help him do so?”

The New Yorker’s Susan Glasser added, “This day is a reminder that Trump kept a trove of secret classified foreign intel at Mar-a-Lago. Will there ever be a trial???”

Matt McDermott, a Democratic strategist remarked: “Americans were dying by the tens of thousands and supply shortages were paralyzing our country’s pandemic response, and all Donald Trump cared about was helping Vladimir Putin. This is unconscionable.”

Dr. Norman Ornstein, the well-known political scientist and AEI emeritus scholar noted: “So Trump sent Covid tests to Putin when there was a shortage here. Meaning it is very likely that some people died as a consequence of his sucking up to his dictator buddy. Then add that he talked to Putin multiple times after leaving office. What top secrets did he share?”

Washington Post columnist Catherine Rampell wrote: “Hard to believe this guy is still a coin flip away from a second term.”

Dan Barr, Chief Deputy Attorney General of Arizona responded to Rampell, writing: “Trump’s fan boy fascination with Vladimir Putin will someday be fertile ground for psychobiographers, but for now it is disqualifying for him to be President of the United States. Ronald Reagan would certainly think so, as do all his former aides who now support @KamalaHarris.”

READ MORE: ‘Trafficking in Nazi Race Science’: Trump Blasted After ‘Vile Trifecta’ of Antisemitism

Some noted that as Trump secretly sent Putin COVID tests, “in at least three instances” he “played politics and deliberately delayed disaster relief as president” because he did not want to send it to Democratic areas of the country, according to PEOPLE.

Ian Sams, senior national spokesperson and senior adviser to the Kamala Harris presidential campaign, posted this to social media:

Alexander Vindman is the former Director for European Affairs for the U.S. National Security Council (NSC). His congressional testimony on the Trump-Ukraine alleged extortion scandal led to Trump’s first impeachment.

On Trump’s “7 meetings with Putin,” he warns: “It is reasonable there is a recording of these calls in an exquisite intel program. Trump would not be the target of the collection, but because Putin is a high-value target, Trump would be caught in the collection. The Russians definitely have a recording of every call.”

“Trump’s 7 calls with Putin also explain why Putin was emboldened to launch the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and sustain more than 2 years of war. Putin has made a huge investment in Trump and expects that investment to payoff,” Vindman adds. “It’s clear now more than ever that @realDonaldTrump was the decisive factor in convincing Putin to wage a wider war on Ukraine. Trump has taken the world to the brink of Armageddon. A second Trump term would have America—& with it the entire world—go over the precipice. Trump was, is, & will be a clear & present danger to the United States.”

Investigative journalist Dave Troy, who has written extensively about Vladimir Putin, in April at The Washington Spectator warned: “Trump’s Peace Plan? Nuclear Blackmail.”

On Tuesday he weighed in on the Woodward bombshells.

“The best way to understand Trump’s ongoing fealty to Putin is that they intend, together with Musk, Vance, Gabbard, Ramaswamy, Thiel, RFK, Orban, Kim Jong Un, and friends, to reorder the world using nuclear blackmail,” he wrote at the start of a lengthy thread on X. Troy concludes, “when you read that Trump sent Putin COVID tests in 2020, and has spoken with him seven times since being out of office, know why: they are partners.”

Watch MSNBC’s report below or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Trump Did This’: SCOTUS Blocks Biden Emergency Abortion Mandate in Texas

 

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‘Dangerous’: Musk Laughing at Idea of ‘Puppet’ Kamala Harris Being Killed Sparks Fury

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19 hours ago

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October 8, 2024

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The U.S. Secret Service reportedly intervened last month after tech billionaire Elon Musk, whose companies have received billions in taxpayer dollars through federal defense and intelligence contracts, subsidies, tax credits, and loans, posted a so-called “joke” on his social media platform X claiming no one is even attempting to assassinate President Joe Biden or Vice President Kamala Harris.

In a nearly two-hour interview with Tucker Carlson that posted Monday, Musk and the far right-wing host wisecracked about both his original post and his thoughts that led to the now-removed tweet.

After laughing about what will happen to Musk if Donald Trump loses his presidential bid, Musk suggested he will be imprisoned and wondered if he will see his children.

“I’ve been trashing Kampala nonstop,” Musk told Carlson, appearing to pronounce the Vice President’s name incorrectly. “Well, the Kamala puppet, I call her, you know, the machine that the Kampala puppet represents.”

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“Yeah, she’s irrelevant,” Carlson declared, waving his hand in the air dismissively.

“I made a joke, which I realized I deleted, which is like, ‘nobody’s even bothering to try to kill Kamala, because it’s pointless’,” Musk said, laughing with Carlson. “What do you achieve? Nothing. Just buy another puppet.”

“Nobody’s trying to kill Joe Biden,” Musk added. “It would be pointless.”

“Some people interpreted it as I was, as though I was calling for people to assassinate her,” Musk explained. “But I was like, but I was like, doesn’t it seem strange that no one’s even bothered to try?” he asked, laughing.

“Nobody tries to assassinate a puppet,” Musk concluded.

The Daily Beast reports Musk is a “longtime financier of Republican causes,” and “joined Trump last Saturday for his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania—the site of July’s assassination attempt. After jumping around on stage—a move that he was widely mocked for on his own site—the X CEO dished out some fear-mongering about how, if Trump doesn’t win, ‘this will be the last election.'”

Back in February The Wall Street Journal described Musk’s SpaceX as “a major national-security contractor” that “is deepening its ties with U.S. intelligence and military agencies.” The company has “a $1.8 billion classified contract with the U.S. government.”

“The Pentagon has more recently done business with SpaceX’s Starlink broadband service, including agreements to pay for Ukrainian internet links during Ukraine’s war with Russia,” The Journal also reported, noting Starlink has a $70 million U.S. military contract.

A short excerpt (bel0w) from the Musk-Carlson interview dropped Monday night, garnering 5 million views in about 13 hours. It prompted many to express outrage, anger over the violent rhetoric, and concern over a military government contractor joking about presidential assassinations. Some said they believed the FBI or Secret Service should get involved.

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Brad Moss, a well-known national security attorney, commented: “If one of my clients made this ‘joke’ their clearance would be suspended before the interview ended.”

National security expert Olivia Troye served as Vice President Mike Pence’s Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Advisor, and has had roles at roles at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, in the intelligence community (at the National Counterterrorism Center,
Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Department of Energy), and at the Department of Defense (DOD) according to her official biography.

“Joking about assassinating our elected leaders is not just tasteless—it’s dangerous,” she warned. “In today’s divided climate, we need responsible voices, not reckless rhetoric that normalizes violence. It’s un-American for Elon Musk & Tucker Carlson to make light of such serious threats. Our leaders—and all Americans—deserve better.”

Christopher Burgess, a writer, speaker and commentator on national security issues who served for over 30 years at the CIA, commented: “Reaction: DISGUSTING

Racist – Misogynist – Cultist

All on display in one 10-15 second sound bite – there is no place for this – anywhere let alone the United States of America”

“Nothing to see here,” remarked gun violence prevention advocate Shannon Watts. “Just a man with classified federal contracts worth billions fantasizing about the assassination of the President and Vice President.”

“Deport this clown,” urged Esquire columnist Charles P. Pierce.

Journalist Jon Ralston, CEO/Editor of The Nevada Independent remarked: “These people are grotesque, the vanguard of Team Trump, simpering fools joking about assassinations. Musk, once thought a visionary, is a pathetic troll on a site he has destroyed.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

READ MORE: Greene Mocked for Weather Control Claim as NC Lawmaker Pleads for Conspiracy ‘Junk’ to End

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