Category: Culture Wars

Democracy Fatigue

The Daily Escape:

Fall arrives in Ouray, CO – October 2022 photo by Gary Ratcliff

Why is authoritarianism growing at home and abroad? There is a relatively new notion called democracy fatigue: Political passivity and disgruntlement that stems from the exhaustion of seeing endless politicking, but never seeing change that makes lives better.

We’ve had a constant barrage of existential crises: Covid, climate change, Russian imperialism, immigration, inflation, and growing economic insecurity. With needing to act on all of these (and a few more), the ideals of political compromise and letting everyone have their say, seem sadly dated.

On the American Right, many joke that what would make things better is a ‘benign dictatorship.’ Because democracy doesn’t get things done. Politicians everywhere are taking the opportunity to go with “the big lie”. It’s become about lying until your ideas are accepted as fact. From Heather Cox Richardson:

“After World War II, political philosopher Hannah Arendt explained that lies are central to the rise of authoritarianism. In place of reality, authoritarians lie to create a “fictitious world through consistent lying.” Ordinary people embraced such lies because they believed everyone lied anyhow.”

And distrust of democracy is growing. From Hal Gershowitz:

“…in the US, Germany, and Japan, somewhere between 20% and 40%…would embrace “a strong leader who does not have to bother with parliaments and elections.”

Hal reminds us that last April In France, Emmanuel Macron managed to once again defeat right-winger Marine Le Pen, but by a much narrower margin than in their last face off in 2017. Elsewhere:

  • In traditionally liberal Sweden, a coalition of right-wing parties, anchored by the far-right Sweden Democrats, took control of Parliament.
  • Hungary’s uber authoritarian, Viktor Orbán secured his fourth consecutive term as Prime Minister.
  • And most recently, in Italy, a coalition led by far-right leader Giorgia Meloni won and will put together Italy’s first far-right government since World War II.

Beyond these are the far-right British National Party, and the Norwegian Progress Party. While these are fringe parties, they can exert influence on whatever party leads in parliamentary democracies.

Freedom House, founded in 1941 and primarily funded by the US, also paints a bleak picture. It publishes an annual assessment of “Freedom in the World” which notes that authoritarianism is having a great run. Freedom House says in 2020, the number of countries  they listed as “no longer free” grew to the highest level in 15 years. Countries registering declines in political rights were also the highest in 15 years.

They note that a total of 60 countries suffered declines over the past year, while only 25 improved. As of today, some 38% of the global population live in Not Free countries, the highest proportion since 1997. Only about 20% of the world’s population now live in Free countries. The balance (41%) live in Partially Free countries.

The rise in authoritarianism may be due to the fact that in a sea of uncertainty, people are looking for a life raft. So they are willing to listen to and vote for those who articulate the importance of “traditional” values, and to assure them that the purported attack/assault on those values is a threat to them and their families.

The longing for benign dictatorship continues among America’s technology elites, whose denigration of politics flows from a Silicon Valley ideology that mixes libertarianism with authoritarian rule. They seem to want politics to work the way their products do: With elegant solutions implemented by smart, creative makers.

Their message is that surely, there’s a right way to get the job done: Fill the potholes, build the roads, keep our streets safe, get our kids to learn reading and math.

But whose potholes should get filled first? Should we keep our streets safe through community policing or long prison sentences? Should teachers be given merit pay, are small classrooms better, or should we lengthen the school day?

All of these issues can engender deep political fights. That’s because politics is disputes about values, not technical solutions. One person’s “right” is not another’s because people prioritize different values: Equity versus excellence, efficiency versus participation, security versus justice, short-term versus long-term goals.

Trump’s continuing control of the Republican Party is due to his ability to exploit grievance. His “America First” message continues to resonate with millions of voters who view the Democratic Party’s policies as an assault on America’s traditional values.

For the upcoming midterm elections we need to remember that constitutional democracy is not a gift from the gods.

It can be wrested away if we fail to uphold our democracy by voting this fall.

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Saturday Soother – September 17, 2022

The Daily Escape:

View from Schnebly Hill Road, Sedona, AZ – August 2022 photo by Cathy Franklin

As we discussed yesterday, DeSantis is one of many Republican politicians who are working overtime to convince MAGA-land that they are yuuge Christians. Here’s DeSantis in February, talking to students at the very Christian Hillsdale College:

“Put on the full armor of God. Stand firm against the left’s schemes. You will face flaming arrows, but if you have the shield of faith, you will overcome them, and in Florida we walk the line here. And I can tell you this, I have only begun to fight.”

The Tampa Bay Times takes issue with their governor: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“The biblical reference DeSantis is using is from Ephesians 6, and calls on Christians to spiritually arm themselves against the “devil’s schemes.” In DeSantis’ speeches, he has replaced the ”devil” with “the left” as he tries to mobilize supporters ahead of his reelection in November and possibly a run for the White House in 2024.”

It’s dangerous that Republicans on the ballot in November are openly saying that the only true Americans are Christians. They’re portraying the battle against their political opponents as between good and evil.

The Tampa Bay Times (TBT) says that it has some religious leaders worrying that such rhetoric could mobilize fringe groups who may be prone to violence. From the TBT: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“Christian nationalism for many Conservatives has become a political identity, and unlike Conservative politicians in the past who used their faith to inform their arguments, DeSantis is more aggressive, using war imagery to describe the political debates as a battle over who will be the better American.”

The TBT quotes Philip Gorski, a comparative-history sociologist at Yale University who co-wrote the book “The Flag and the Cross: White Nationalism and the Threat to American Democracy”:

“The full armor of God passage is a favorite amongst certain types of Pentecostals who really do see the world in terms of spiritual warfare,”

They also quote Allyson Shortle, a political science professor at the University of Oklahoma who has co-written the book “The Everyday Crusade: Christian Nationalism in American Politics”:

“I think DeSantis has really stood out as someone who has effectively used this type of God talk and used these types of Christian nationalist talking points to curry favor…”

For Republicans, talking about the importance of faith is nothing new, and debates about how visible Christianity should be in our society — whether it be prayer in schools or religious symbols outside American courthouses — have been ongoing for decades.

But there is something different emerging: A strain of Conservative thought that sees the country’s politics as an open battle between good and evil. TBT quotes Marilyn Mayo, senior research fellow at the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism:

“There’s always been candidates who espouse Christian values, but what I think is very different is you have many people on the right and the far right seeing the current situation in the US as a battle, an absolute battle, between good and evil….And the good are the mostly white, Christian conservatives. And on the other side are the liberals, progressives, left-wingers, and certainly the LGBTQ community…. They really see this as a battle and paint the other side as…an evil force that needs to be defeated.”

Shortle says that Christian nationalism is the belief that a “true” American should be Christian. Some Christian national extremists say that the US is no longer a Christian nation, that it’s been taken over by secular forces.

Over the summer, Florida social studies teachers were alarmed that a civics training session led by DeSantis’ administration had a “Christian nationalism philosophy that was baked into everything” that was taught.

The initiative emphasized that the Founding Fathers did not desire a strict separation of state and church. State trainers also told teachers that the 1962 US Supreme Court case that found school-sponsored prayer violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment was unjustly decided.

In July, DeSantis was endorsed by Moms for Liberty, a group that focuses on adding Christian nationals to school boards across America. It has more than 200 chapters and 95,000 members in 38 states. At the group’s first national summit, DeSantis said that he intended to “leave Florida to God and to our children better than I found it.”

And what is “better” is in the eye of the beholder.

On to our Saturday Soother. We had our first sub 50° night on Thursday. Soon the indoor plants will return to the sunroom.

Take a few moments of your Saturday and listen and watch “Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5” by Heitor Villa-Lobos. He wrote a series of nine suites between 1930 and 1945. Here the 5th is played by Hauser on cello and Petrit Çeku on guitar in 2017 at the Lisinski Concert Hall in Zagreb:

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Saturday Soother – August 20, 2022

The Daily Escape:

Stormy view from House Mountain, Sedona, AZ – August 2022 photo by Ed Mitchell

Tens of thousands of teacher openings are unfilled as students head back to American classrooms. That’s prompting states and school districts to try everything they can to address the teacher shortage.

Except increase their pay. The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) has tracked teacher compensation for 18 years. Here’s the headline:

“…teachers are paid less (in weekly wages and total compensation) than their nonteacher college-educated counterparts, and the situation has worsened considerably over time.”

EPI tracks what they call the relative teacher wage penalty, the relative wages and total compensation of teachers compared to other college graduates. Here are the EPI’s findings:

  • Inflation-adjusted average weekly wages of teachers have been relatively flat since 1996. The average weekly wages of public school teachers (adjusted for inflation) increased just $29 from 1996 to 2021, while inflation-adjusted weekly wages of other college graduates rose from $1,564 to $2,009 —a $445 increase.
  • The relative teacher wage penalty reached a record high in 2021. It was 23.5% in 2021, up from 6.1% in 1996. The penalty was worse for men than for women. The penalty for men rose from 18.6% to 35.2%.
  • The great portfolio of teachers’ benefits used to be a selling point, but it hasn’t been enough to offset the growing wage penalty. The teacher total compensation penalty was 14.2% in 2021 (a 23.5% wage penalty offset by a 9.3% benefits advantage).
  • The relative teacher wage penalty exceeds 20% in 28 states. Teacher weekly wage penalties estimated for each state range from 3.4% in Rhode Island to 35.9% in Colorado. In 28 states, teachers are paid less than 80 cents on the dollar earned by similar college-educated workers.

The EPI has a chart showing the relative erosion of teacher wages vs. other college graduates since 1980:

The EPI focuses on “weekly wages” to avoid the comparisons of length of the work year (i.e., the “summers off” issue for teachers).

Add to this the general decline in working conditions for teachers, and many who are eligible for retirement are leaving. Republicans in particular are politicizing education. Some are pushing the idea of “parental rights.” That is happening in Florida, Texas and in other states. It’s clear that in some school districts parents want the right to censor what’s being taught. Some Conservatives are pushing for a camera in every classroom across America. Tucker Carlson called for cameras in classrooms to “oversee the people teaching your children, forming their minds.”

This comes under the guise of “transparency in the classroom”, parents keeping an eye on teachers, so they won’t teach the dreaded Critical Race Theory (or groom kids to become trans, or gay). Teachers naturally bristle at the idea of video auditing.

Forcing teacher compliance with imposed politicized curricula won’t make these jobs any more desirable.

Some states are relaxing licensing requirements to make it easier for people to fill some of those unfilled jobs. Florida, which has about 8,000 open teaching positions, is allowing military veterans without a bachelor’s degree and no prior teaching experience to apply for a temporary five-year teaching certificate while they finish their bachelor’s degrees.

The biggest issues to solve are better public school funding, which can help end the teacher wage penalty. That requires towns to raise taxes. Second, the politicization of education is changing the amount of parental control in the day-to-day operations in some school districts. That’s making teaching an even lower-status job than it is now.

According to the BLS, there are currently 300,000 fewer teachers nationwide compared to before the pandemic. Part of this is job satisfaction. A survey from the American Federation of Teachers found that 74% of teachers were dissatisfied with their job, up from 41% two years ago.

If teachers and staff are underpaid, under-resourced and are now being second-guessed in the classroom, they’re not going to stay. So replacing them will become an even bigger problem.

Enough of this week’s problems, it’s time for our Saturday Soother! Let’s put Trump’s secrets and Liz Cheney’s political prospects on pause. We’re facing moderate drought conditions here in CT, so lawn mowing has ceased, and our grass is brown and crunchy.

But, it’s time to empty our minds, so that we can begin filling them up again on Monday. Start by grabbing a cold glass of lemonade and a seat in the shade.

Now, watch and listen to Antonin Dvorak’s “4 miniatures”, for 2 Violins and Viola, played here by the Musicians of Lenox Hill at Temple Israel of the City of New York in  April 2019:

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VA Post Office Closed Because of Segregation Exhibit

The Daily Escape:

Drone view of Cape Kiwanda SP near Pacific City, OR – August 2022 photo by headstandphotography

This story is another example of what’s wrong in our nation. It describes the increasing politicization inside our federal bureaucracy. The US Postal Service (USPS) has closed a post office located in the Montpelier VA Railroad Depot because of an exhibit the USPS called “unacceptable”.

The exhibit was about racial segregation.

The post office opened there in 1912; the exhibit has been there since 2010. According to the Roanoke Times, USPS spokesman Philip Bogenberger emailed on Aug. 9, saying:

“While we attempted to address the issue with the property owner, that effort was unsuccessful, and it was decided that the proper course of action was to suspend the facility and provide service to our customers from nearby postal retail units,”

The property owner is the Montpelier Foundation. The display is on a panel on one exterior wall of the depot and on panels inside the 1912 station. The post office has its own entrance, separate from the rooms in which the display is shown. Among other things, the exhibit depicts the depot’s waiting room during Virginia’s racially segregated era.

Here’s a photo of the now closed Post Office:

And here’s a (blurry) photo of the offensive exhibit:

The train station was built in 1910 by the industrialist William duPont. He had moved there in 1900 to live with his family in Madison’s’ historic mansion. Because the US was racially segregated, duPont built the station with separate waiting rooms for Blacks and Whites. The post office opened in the building in 1912 and it has been a post office ever since.

In 2010, the Montpelier Foundation created the exhibit. It tells of African American life in Virginia’s Orange County and the nation during segregation, as well as the train station’s history with the duPonts.

Adding to the current controversy, Elizabeth Chew, Montpelier’s interim president and CEO, said that despite what the USPS spokesperson said:

“The US Postal Service did not contact the current CEO or chief of staff, nor did it contact the previous CEO or chief of staff.”

In order to close a post office, the USPS is required to make a determination in writing, and then make it available to the customers served by that post office. It may not close it until at least 60 days afterward.

The overall question of why close this particular post office after more than 100 years, and without proper procedures, has gotten Rep. Abigail Spanberger, (D-VA) involved. She wrote Gerald Roane, the USPS’s Virginia district manager, inquiring about the abrupt discontinuation of service for Orange County residents:

“…I am concerned by this abrupt discontinuation of mail service that has prevented those we serve from receiving the important items they rely on…I am also extremely frustrated by the lack of transparency, forewarning regarding the closure, and information following the closure that my constituents and local officials have received.”

Spanberger is right to ask: “who decided this, and why”? This was an historical exhibit, not a political statement. It’s important to be reminded of that repressive time so that it is never repeated. It seems that this is cancel culture of a bureaucratic kind that doesn’t want our little ones to feel guilt or shame for the racist and segregationist actions of their parents, grandparents, and ancestors.

In our federal bureaucracy, new policies are first vetted by subject matter experts, usually lower level staffers with deep knowledge of the area. Ideas that pass muster are then elevated to managers who are familiar with the proposed policy’s broader implications. Finally, proposals go to that thin layer of political appointees who are there to assure that any policy meets the goals of the administration.

Ultimately, agency heads or cabinet secretaries make the final call. So in this case, who are the ones trying to hide racism and segregation from the rest of us? Were they waiting for today’s atmosphere of outrage and victimhood to right a grievous wrong of exposing this chapter of local history?

How deeply in our federal bureaucracy have these Republican termites buried themselves?

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Sunday Cartoon Blogging – August 14, 2022

(Tomorrow’s Monday Wake Up Call will appear on Tuesday)

Let’s talk about the religions that are implicated in two news items this week.

First, the attempted assassination of Salman Rushdie in upstate New York on Saturday. He was hospitalized after suffering serious injuries in a stabbing attack. We don’t know for certain that this was someone carrying out the death threat that Iran’s then-leader Grand Ayatollah Khomeini put on Rushdie in 1989. But it seems to be the most likely explanation.

Police detained a suspect named Hadi Matar, 24, who is California-born, but moved to Fairview, New Jersey in 2014. NBC NY News reported that a review of Matar’s social media accounts showed he is sympathetic to Shia extremism and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps causes. One of Matar’s former high school classmates told The Daily Beast that Matar “was a very devout Muslim” who participated in debate and had several friends.

If religion is behind this, the attempted revenge has occurred two generations later.

Second, Polio was found in wastewater samples from New York City. Polio has been eradicated in the US since 1988. Finding it in NYC water samples follows a confirmed case of Polio in Rockland County, NY, just 35 miles north of the City. The County announced that an analysis of more wastewater samples revealed that the polio viruses have been circulating in the area since May.

Worse, the 20 positive samples detected in the two counties are genetically linked to the virus that paralyzed the unidentified man in Rockland County.

The broader context of both stories is that religions played a part in each. The Polio case in Rockland was found in a resident of one of the orthodox religious towns where a predominantly Hasidic Jewish community lives. Rockland County currently has a polio vaccination rate of 60.5% among 2-year-olds, compared to the statewide average of 79.1%.  This same group had a measles outbreak (312 cases) in 2019, and low COVID vaccination rates.

There is a strong anti-vaxx mentality in this community, and that helps create fertile conditions for a formerly eradicated disease to be revitalized. Polio is entirely preventable, and yet, many parents remain hostile to vaccination.

In the Rushdie attack, we’re speculating about the influence of religion. Saying the attacker is sympathetic to Shia Islam isn’t sufficient to make it a religious attack. But Wrongo would be surprised if it turned out to be solely either personally or politically motivated.

On to cartoons. Despite the above, most of the news this week was about the FBI search.

The truth is revealed:

Trump explains:

 

Beach reading is different this year:

Reactions to IRS have changed:

GOP policy wonks are thinking they may need to change:

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Sunday Cartoon Blogging – August 7, 2022

The Labor Department on Friday reported that the economy added a seasonally adjusted 528,000 jobs in July, far more than the 258,000 economists expected to see. And the headline rate of unemployment  fell to 3.5%, back to the multi-decade low we experienced just before the start of the pandemic.

With the upward revisions to the last two months, there are now 22,000 more jobs than there were just before the pandemic. Further, the mix of these new jobs skews away from the lower paying sectors toward higher paying ones. The WSJ reports that in July, there were about a million more jobs combined in the so-called goods-producing sectors—manufacturing, construction, mining and logging—plus the retail trade and warehousing and transportation sectors, than in February 2020. And there were about a million fewer jobs in the remaining service-sector industries.

Leisure and hospitality jobs, which were the most hard-hit during the pandemic, rose by 96,000, but are still -7.1% below their pre-pandemic peak. And within the leisure and hospitality sector, food and drink establishments added 74,100 jobs, but are still about 635,000, or -5.1% below their pre-pandemic peak.

But it wasn’t all good news. The number of people employed as a share of the working-age population was 60% last month, below February 2020’s 61.2%. If it could return to that percentage, there would be millions more Americans working. An interesting fact in the employment report was that there were 656,000 more people out sick last month than in July 2019. On to cartoons.

The Kansas vote dropped on the wicked witch:

What Kansas taught us this week:

Pelosi sparks a flame:

Alex Jones finally grabbed by his appendage:

The US kills another al-Qaeda leader, but nothing changes in Afghanistan:

RIP Bill Russell:

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Sunday Cartoon Blogging – July 31, 2022

Q: Why do people take an instant dislike to Justice Samuel A. Alito?  A: It saves time.

Alito spoke in Rome dismissing criticism from foreign officials who he said “lambasted” his opinion that overturned Roe v. Wade. Alito spoke at a conference promoting religious liberty, saying:

“I had the honor this term of writing I think the only Supreme Court decision in the history of that institution that has been lambasted by a whole string of foreign leaders who felt perfectly fine commenting on American law…”

Alito called out Prince Harry as making a particularly hurtful comment. What Harry said at the UN:

“This has been a painful year in a painful decade….Climate change wreaking havoc on our planet, with the most vulnerable suffering most of all. The few weaponizing lies and disinformation at the expense of the many. And from a horrific war in Ukraine, to the rolling back of constitutional rights here in the United States, we are witnessing a global assault on democracy and freedom, the cause of Mandela’s life.”

Alito said in response:

“But what really wounded me…was when the Duke of Sussex addressed the United Nations and seemed to compare the decision…with the Russian attack on Ukraine…”

To quote Charlie Pierce:

“The conservatives on the Supreme Court are now not simply ruling like political animals, they’re behaving like political animals as well.”

This guarantees that Alito will be forever known internationally as a dickhead. On to cartoons.

Manchin had a surprise:

The GOP’s burning its mid-term chances by walking away from the PACT act:

And this incarnation of GOP plumbers need tech support:

The stuff of nightmares:

Change brings things to light:

DHS scrapped the effort to collect agency phones in order to try to recover deleted Secret Service texts:

Putin’s staff misunderstands:

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Right-Wing Lobbying Group Designated a Church by IRS

The Daily Escape:

Sunrise, high tide, Sea Street beach, East Dennis, MA – July 2022 photo by Bob Amaral Photography

The fallout from the Trump years continues. On Monday, ProPublica reported that the IRS had decided that the Family Research Council (FRC), a Right-Wing political lobbying group, qualifies as a church for tax purposes:

“The Family Research Council’s multimillion-dollar headquarters sit on G Street in Washington, DC, just steps from the US Capitol and the White House, a spot ideally situated for its work as a right-wing policy think tank and political pressure group.”

The FRC is now a church, thanks to the IRS and its Commissioner, Charles Rettig. You can be forgiven for not remembering that Trump appointed Rettig to be Commissioner of the IRS in 2018. He got the job by writing a 2016 op-ed saying Trump didn’t have to release his tax returns, despite every major presidential candidate having done so since Nixon.

ProPublica noted that the FRC says on its website that it is a:

“…nonprofit research and educational organization dedicated to articulating and advancing a family-centered philosophy of public life. In addition to providing policy research and analysis….[the] FRC seeks to inform the news media, the academic community, business leaders, and the general public about family issues that affect the nation from a biblical worldview.”

Now that the IRS has blessed FRC as a church, it is no longer required to file a public tax return, (known as a Form 990), which reveals key salaries, the names of board members and related organizations, large payments and/or grants by the organization.

And unlike with charities, IRS investigators can’t initiate an audit on a church unless a high-level Treasury Department official has approved the investigation.

Right Wing Watch, an organization that monitors the activities and rhetoric of right-wing activists and organizations reported on the ties between FRC and Trump’s Jan. 6 effort to overturn the presidential election:

“The Family Research Council…was deeply involved in…Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election—a fact made all the more apparent by revelations during the June 23 public hearing of the House select committee investigating the conspiracy that led to the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol.”

You probably remember the head of the FRC, Tony Perkins (not the deceased actor) by some of his grandstanding in the culture wars:

  • In 2005, Perkins was against disconnecting life support for Terri Schiavo, a woman who had been in a “persistent vegetative state” for a number of years.
  • In 2008, Perkins called the passage of California Proposition 8 (which prohibited same sex marriage in the state) “more important than the presidential election”.
  • In 2018, Perkins said, regarding Trump’s adulterous past, he should be given a “Mulligan“, because Trump was “providing the leadership we need at this time…”

In 2010, The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) designated the FRC as a hate group. From the SPLC:

“Part of FRC’s strategy is to pound home the false claim that LGBTQ people are more likely to sexually abuse children than heterosexual people. The American Psychological Association, among others, however, has concluded that “homosexual men are not more likely to sexually abuse children than heterosexual men are.”

Designating the FRC as a church for tax purposes is part of a disturbing trend. The WaPo reported in 2020 about the growing list of religious groups seeking church status from the IRS.

The potential cost of becoming a church is that the organization can no longer conduct political operations on behalf of politicians or lobby on legislation. In practice, that is simple to get around. The FRC now has its church arm alongside a separate lobbying arm called Family Research Council Action.

The arms separate their messaging on two websites, with the FRC hosting issues-based content supporting its Christian worldview while the Family Research Council Action explicitly endorses candidates. Both arms are registered at the same address and both share all five of the part-time employees the FRC lists on its tax form, including Tony Perkins.

These “churches” sure have figured out how to run a scam on the US government.

It’s past time for the IRS to end this charade and tax churches. Biden should fire IRS Commissioner Rettig, who was also the guy in charge when the IRS politically targeted Trump “enemies” James Comey and Andrew McCabe for invasive tax audits.

These people and their “churches” are simply Republicans with a talent for abusing the bible and raising obscene amounts of money. Thomas Jefferson said it best:

“In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own.”

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More Rights May Be Flushed By The Supremes

The Daily Escape:

Denali from Byers Lake, AK – June 2022 photo by Todd Salat

In his concurring opinion to the decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, that dismantled Roe, Justice Thomas basically begged Red states to send the Court more culture war cases that they could dismantle.

The Houston Chronicle reports that Texas GOP AG Ken Paxton is ready to do just that:

“Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton last week seemingly expressed support for the Supreme Court potentially overturning past rulings on cases involving the LGBTQ community following the downfall of Roe v. Wade on Friday.”

Paxton, in an interview, said he would support the Supreme Court revisiting the cases mentioned in Thomas’ concurring opinion. Here are the decisions Thomas would like a shot at overturning:

He questioned a number of earlier Court rulings, including Obergefell v. Hodges, which established the right of same-sex couples to marry, and Lawrence vs. Texas—a 2003 decision in which the court ruled against the state of Texas regarding its 1973 law criminalizing the act of sodomy.

Thomas also mentioned Griswold v. Connecticut, which established the right of married couples to use contraception without government interference:

“In future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell….We have a duty to ‘correct the error’ regarding these established in those precedents.”

For those who don’t fully understand legal shorthand, the judicial theory Thomas is pursuing is that these issues should be in the hands of state legislatures, and not be decided by the courts.

Conservatives in other states have also expressed support for Thomas’s opinion, including Utah Senate President Stuart Adams, who said he would support the Supreme Court reconsidering same-sex marriage. Utah’s constitutional ban on same-sex unions still exists and could be reinstated if the high court were to overturn its earlier decision.

We shouldn’t forget that Obergefell was a 5-4 decision. Lawrence v. Texas was also a 5-4 decision. Since these cases were decided, the Court has moved three seats to the right. We should expect that both of these decisions will be overturned, assuming some state AG sends a case up to the Supremes.

After all, the Court’s Conservatives haven’t gotten more liberal on these issues in the last 10-15 years.

Some more history: Griswold v, Connecticut was decided 7-2, Loving v. Virginia was unanimous; and Brown v. Board of Education was unanimous. All of that said, while history shows that very few 5-4 decisions get overturned, in this time of Conservative Justice grievance, that’s not the way to bet. Even if those cases had been 6-3, 7-2 or 8-1, it wouldn’t matter to the current Justices on the Court.

Pundits are talking as if they would be shocked if the Court reverses Obergefell and Lawrence. That’s because they’re comforted that Thomas’s revolutionary concurrence wasn’t joined by other Justices. But all of them voted to end Roe, and Alito said:

“…abortion is not mentioned anywhere in the Constitution. Therefore, there is no right to an abortion.”

We should also remember that the Court used nearly word for word, the failed Robert Bork’s reasoning why there isn’t a Constitutional right to privacy in Griswold v. Connecticut.

If there’s no right to privacy because the Constitution does not explicitly state there is such a right, then according to the Court’s Conservative 6, all of the rest of our privacy rights are in play. That means nearly nothing in the Fourth Amendment may remain, because you have no right to privacy in your home or in your vehicle.

But if you bet that the Court’s Conservative majority will somehow find that the founders explicitly wanted corporations to have a right to privacy, you’ll earn some folding money.

The naked desire by the Furious Five to achieve their ideological goals as quickly as possible is most likely, uncontrollable. Chief Justice Roberts is being increasingly sidelined because he wants to (at least) try to hide their ideological agenda. But the Furious Five doesn’t have any interest in hiding what they’re doing.

No more calling “balls and strikes” as Roberts said during his 2005 Senate confirmation hearing.

In closing, the music world has reacted strongly to the Supreme Court ruling on abortion. NPR has a nice roundup of what artists are saying and doing in response. Check it out if you have time.

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