I was still thinking about the implications of the SCOTUS guns opinion from Thursday, when the monumental Roe decision came out on Friday. But now I see a through-line in both cases, so let’s see if I can make sense of that.
First, 3 quick thoughts on the Roe decision:
1. If the pro-abortion side believed their own propaganda, they’d be pretty happy about this ruling.
They keep proclaiming that something like 80% of Americans are super pro-choice. But if that were the case, the decision would cause a blue tsunami, since it will make abortion a live political issue in every state, and galvanize the abortion-enthusiast majority.
Of course, polling on abortion depends heavily on how the question is asked, and I think most people are somewhere in the middle, probably leaning more pro-life when the issue is clearly delineated. That is, they don’t want abortion completely banned, but they want restrictions to kick in pretty early in a pregnancy.
Only a very extreme fringe subscribes to the pro-infanticide “abortion until the moment before birth” position that many top Dems are revealing themselves to hold.
I think those folks are going to be in for a nasty surprise as the debate unfolds.
And I think most Dems are decent enough to recognize what a terrible position that is, and to know that their party-line claim about an 80% pro-choice majority is as trustworthy as Bill Clinton at a sorority sleep-over.
Which is why there was no joy in Roe-ville this weekend. There were f-bombs and angry chanting and a little foaming at the mouth. And just a few, presentable talking heads, reciting the 80% statistic.
But that’s just whistling past a graveyard.
One with 63 million graves.
2. An inconvenient old interview with Joey Gaffes aired on Friday – on Tucker and all over the net – which demonstrated how far left the Democrat party has moved on abortion. Biden told the interviewer, “I do not view abortion as a choice or a right. I think it’s always a tragedy.”
That’s a fossil from the old days, when Dems said “safe, legal and rare.” If you’ve been watching for the last 10 years or so – and especially for the last 48 hours – those days are over.
Now it’s all, “Shout your abortion!” and “Abortion is health care!” and “Won’t someone rid me of this meddlesome child?!”
You’re probably thinking: all of us go through immature phases during which we make the mistakes typical of callow youth, so we can forgive Biden this particular gaffe.
Except that he made his comments in 2006. When he was 63 years old.
I know: how was he not at least 110 years old in 2006? That was only 16 years ago, and he seems like he’s in his late hundreds now.
But nope. He was just a spry 63, so we’ve got to cut him a break, because he was caught up in youthful exuberance when he gave that interview.
You know, the kind of youthful exuberance you feel when you first fall in love, or have your first drink, or… collect your first several years of social security checks.
3. As in many political issues lately, I don’t see how people can avoid noting the huge gulf in behavior that makes our side look better than our opponents’.
I really don’t enjoy saying that, because I know that we’re all flawed and fallen, and our side has plenty of absolute morons and idiots. I’m looking at you, Crybaby Kinzinger. And Mitt. And Susan Collins and John Cornyn and—
The point is, we’ve got some real boneheads and squishes on our side.
But the left is unrelentingly, unrepentantly, incorrigibly, metaphysically awful! You can see the difference in many different areas.
When the Tea Party used to have huge rallies, there was never any violence or property destruction or even profanity, and when the rallies were over, the public spaces where the rallies happened were left cleaner than they were before.
The same goes for almost 50 years of protests on the anniversary of Roe: no profane signs, no violence. Just mournful protesting, and often prayer.
The only exception was January 6th, and while parts of that were ugly and worthy of punishment, in scale and scope – only a few hundred people were involved in any violence, which produced no deaths and relatively small amounts of damage, and was over within 3 hours — that doesn’t begin to compare to the dozens of deaths, literally billions of dollars in damage and months-long “peaceful” rioting that leftists indulged in for most of 2020.
When lefties throw big rallies for climate change or Earth Day or Sacrifice to Gaia week, the grounds afterwards are always piled high with garbage.
Have you noticed that when a trial or a SCOTUS decision is expected to go the leftists’ way, state governments don’t have to deploy the national guard, and businesses don’t have to board up their windows, and nobody has to brace themselves for days or weeks of rage? That only happens when the leftists don’t get their way.
I’ll pick just one example of a leftist celebrity’s reaction to Friday’s SCOTUS ruling, mostly because of how well it represents the overall zeitgeist on that side.
Quasi-famous actor Michael Rapaport is the kind of person for whom we should pray and wish that he will get well soon. (See how mature and restrained I can be? Sure, my first draft said that Rapaport was “the kind of guy who should be beaten within an inch of his life, dragged to the nearest national border and tossed out, with a warning that if he ever comes back, he’ll regret it.”
“But that’s why pencils have erasers,” I was told during my childhood in the 19th century. I guess I can update that to, “that’s why keyboards have a delete button.”)
Anyway, Rapaport posted a series of obscene and incoherent tantrums on Twitter and social media, and in all of them, nary a rational thought was expressed.
My favorite bit was when he referred over and over to the way that evil right-wing Christians “are going to reap what you sew, you sick friends!” (Of course he didn’t use “friends,” but that’s my gentlemanly way of substituting a different “f” word while recreating the “thoughts” of those without the self-control or vocabulary to express themselves like coherent adults.)
To which I have two responses:
First, it’s “sow” – not “sew”—you dolt. You sow seeds; you sew clothes. What sense would it make to say that you’ll harvest (reap) materials that you’ve stitched up, Mr. Einstein?
Second, do you even know where “reap what you sow” comes from, Mikey?
Hint: it’s a certain Good Book that usually drives you hateful Christophobes into paroxysms of rage, during which your head rotates 360 degrees while you projectile vomit all over the closest priest.
So stop quoting the Apostle Paul to us, you theocratic fascist!
Now here’s the commonality I see in both the Roe and the 2nd Amendment cases from last week: in both cases, conservatives trust the people to manage their lives and make decisions more than they trust bureaucrats and unelected judges.
And progressives do the opposite.
In the Roe case, SCOTUS said that the court in 1973 took the issue out of the people’s hands and made up a new law that they imposed on the entire country. On Friday, they corrected that mistake, and sent it back where it belongs: to the deliberations and decisions of a free people in the 50 states.
I saw a meme on Friday that summed it up well:
Screaming Dem protestor: Unelected judges should NOT DICTATE ABORTION POLICY!!
SCOTUS: That’s literally what we just said.
In the guns case, arrogant bureaucrats in NY were forced to include in their law that people “may carry” (as opposed to “shall carry,” in more 2nd-amendment-friendly states), but they added a bad faith “proper cause” test: citizens who wanted to carry a gun for self-defense had to ask a politician’s permission to do so.
They had to show a proper cause for why they deserved to exercise their right to self-defense.
Thomas backhanded that specious argument, pointing out that we don’t need to show proper cause to exercise our other enumerated rights – to speak freely, to worship as we like, to face our accusers in court, etc.
To no one’s surprise, the NY bureaucrats consistently disagreed with citizens who thought they should be allowed to protect themselves with a gun. The plaintiffs in that case, Koch and Nash, were both turned down. Both of them were law abiding citizens, with no criminal records or mental defects. Both were well trained in the use of guns.
Nash was turned down once. Then, after a rash of burglaries in his neighborhood, he foolishly thought that the increased risk should merit his being able to be allowed to carry. Just as if he were a free citizen, in a free country.
But nope. Those NY pols enjoyed their power trip, and they knew better than Mr. Nash whether he deserved to defend himself. They turned him down again.
So he joined with Mr. Koch, filed a suit, took it to the SCOTUS, and whipped their arses in court.
Cue Ray Charles (backed by the Voices of Jubilation singers) singing “Oh Happy Day!” (A piano, a synthesizer, Mr. Ray Charles, and more dashikis than I’ve ever seen in one place. And watch to the end, when the sharp-looking brother in a tux escorts Charles off the stage. Goosebumps!)
Despite all the problems our country is going through, this last week left us all a lot to be thankful for. Our highest court gave us rulings that states can’t discriminate against people on the basis of their religion (the school case in Maine), and that we have a right to defend ourselves.
Then on Friday they shredded the emanations and dispelled the penumbras, and gave the issue of abortion back to the people.
Sure, I’d like to give John Roberts a kick in the rear, and I shake my head in dismay at Breyer, Sotomayor and Kagan.
But I’m proud of the three Trump-appointed justices, and I’m especially proud of Alito and Thomas. And for the first time in a while, I’m proud of our Supreme Court.
So, I guess… Greatest Pride Month ever!
It’s been a long 17 years, but November is coming!
Martin Simpson 