The ACLU mailing that masquerades as a survey but is actually fear-mongering propaganda for the Democrats
Yesterday I got something in the mail from the ACLU that purported to be a survey. But although it had questions – all leading, all assuming I was on the left – it was the cover letter that grabbed my attention. Here’s how it started:
Dear Friend:
All across our country, an intense struggle is underway over the future of the rights and freedoms we cherish.
I can’t argue with that; seems fair enough.
Emboldened by the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, powerful forces in our country are driving to deepen their state-by-state assault on our civil liberties. They’ve made it clear they won’t stop until they’ve put abortion our of reach all across the country. And they aren’t stopping at abortion.
So they segue from Dobbs to the assertion that abortion will be banned everywhere if these nefarious unnamed “powerful forces” (which of course are understood to be the right) get their way. Of course, the lawyers at the ACLU are well aware that Dobbs actually gives each state control of its own policy on abortion, and that there is nowhere near majority support on the right for a national ban – and that Trump, for example, has made it crystal clear that he wouldn’t support one. But hey, it’s good fear-mongering for the left to assert otherwise.
And giving abortion decisions back to the states is just a gateway drug to the tyranny the right has planned for us all:
They’re attacking our right to use birth control and to vote.
No, they’re not.
They’re waging vicious assaults on the rights of transgender young people and using censorship and book banning to impose a whitewashed version of American history and current American reality on public school students.
The only “vicious assault” on transgender young people is the movement on the left to “treat” – with drugs and surgeries that often take away their “reproductive rights” to have children or to experience sexual pleasure – minors who lack the ability to consent. And the only strange and destructive version of American history and “current American reality” foisted on our young people is at the hands of the left.
The letter goes on it that general vein, segues into a pitch for donations, and then mentions the questions the survey will delve into. Note the way the conclusions are embedded in the questions:
– Are you concerned that, as state legislatures convene and as we look to the forthcoming elections, we are facing a new wave of efforts to ban abortion in state after state?
– Do you worry that racially motivated voter suppression could dilute the power of Black and brown voters in the 2024 presidential election?
– Are you alarmed by attempts across the country to censor talk about race and gender in our public schools, to muzzle schoolteachers, and to prevent students from having an open and equitable dialogue about our country’s history?
– Are you worried about efforts like the one in Texas to label gender-affirming medical cre as “child abuse” and to expose families to unwarranted government investigations?
After that, the letter goes on for some time about how the ACLU is fighting for abortion rights, and adds in bold letters for emphasis:
We don’t for a minute underestimate the seriousness of the threats we are facing – or the potentially devastating human impact of our opponents’ no-holds-barred assault. This upcoming election is not just about who will be president – it’s about our freedom, our future, and the trajectory of democracy.
Note the language in that first sentence, meant to panic women into feeling as though they and their children are under physical attack by the right and that it will only get worse: “threats,” “devastating impact,” “no-holds-barred assault.”
The ACLU and the Democrats know exactly what they’re doing with a pitch like this. They are purposely intensifying a primal type of fear. And I can assure you that the technique works. The women I know who are already voting for Democrats (and would never vote for Trump anyway) are fully energized to vote as though their lives and their children’s lives depended on it, and absolutely believe that the right is bent on the sort of program described in this letter and must be stopped at all costs. And from talking to some of them about this, I don’t think there’s anything that could change their minds.
And no, for the most part they are not and never have been radical leftists or especially politically oriented. For most of their lives, they voted for Democrats and followed the news in a surface manner, but didn’t hold especially radical views. And yet despite all of that, they accept radical moves on the part of the Democrats for whom they continue to vote, because pitches like the one in that letter strike them in very personal ways. The Handmaid’s Tale sort of scenario seems very real to them and exacerbates a primal fear of other people controlling one’s body and genitalia – and life – against one’s will. And the ACLU is one of many entities dedicated to fanning the flames of fear and dread.
Over last fifty or so years, women have become accustomed to abortion being legal everywhere, and states that are taking away what they see as a basic right feed into that fear, even if a woman lives in another state with unrestricted abortion. Harris’ recent Houston rally was an attempt to exacerbate that fear, as well. I think it may be that Draconian state abortion laws will backfire and cause the left to grow stronger.
I also believe that Trump’s approach is the correct one:
Trump, in the video, did not say when in pregnancy he believes abortion should be banned — declining to endorse a national cutoff that would have been used as a cudgel by Democrats ahead of the November election. …
While he again articulated his support for three exceptions — in cases of rape, incest and when the life of the mother is at risk — he went on to describe the current legal landscape, in which different states have different restrictions following the court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling on June 24, 2022, which upended the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
“Many states will be different. Many will have a different number of weeks or some will have more conservative than others and that’s what they will be,” he said. “At the end of the day it’s all about will of the people.”
But that’s nowhere near good enough for abortion absolutists on both sides. On the left we have those who want no restrictions, and on the right we have those who want an absolute ban.
On this blog I’ve discussed my own views on abortion many times, and so I’m not going to go into it again in any detail here. But I’ll add that, if we lose this election, I believe it will be due to this issue.
But I’ll add that, if we lose this election, I believe it will be due to this issue.
Some people will be equally sure it was due to nominating Trump. Some will be equally sure it was due to the selection of Vance as VP. Some will be equally sure it will be due to the media thumb on the scale. Some (and I’m one of these) will be equally sure it will be due to irregularities in ballot-counting in critical Dem-denominated precincts in swing states.
The election, if lost, will be lost by a narrow margin and there will be any number of plausible narratives chosen in advance to which the loss could be attributed, and they will all have equally good evidence.
The danger here is that the wrong narrative will be accepted and the wrong lesson learned.
But let’s assume for the sake of argument that the election is lost because Republicans are seen to be too restrictive toward abortion. Shall we follow a multitude to do evil, so we can win some elections–and then what? Say ha ha suckers, we ARE restricting abortion now that we have enough power? That’s not plausible, I think. If Republicans give up on it they give up on it forever. They will have brought into the tent people who won’t think abortion is very bad and those people will be part of the leftward ratchet. The argument that “you have to compromise to at least get some of what you want” is negated by embrace of this strategy.
I’m kind of tired of the leftward ratchet, and instead of deciding to embrace it, I think we might set ourselves the task of creating a rightward ratchet instead…
Fortunately the number of voters who can be won over by ACLU direct mail campaigns is diminishing daily as they age out; they will be helped along by legal euthanasia promoted by the very same people and enabled by the very same votes.
The day will come that the Republican candidate will be compared to Hitler for OPPOSING euthanasia; and maybe the next close election will see euthanasia brought into the GOP tent, too. Or opposition to Israel or something else a lot of us think represents part of the moral core of those who vote Republican.
As though the election will be a fair one….
In related “news”, PRECISELY THIS:
“Rogan Counters YouTube Trump Censorship, Vance Interview Imminent, Harris Makes Demands”—
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/joe-rogan-address-trump-interview-youtube-censorship-concerns-also-says-harris-interview
Key grafs:
It’s been awhile since I’ve received a begging letter — with the inevitable and phony poll — from the ACLU. But when I do, I always send it back (in their postage-paid envelope) having chosen most of the “answers” they want. And I say that my check for $300 is enclosed. Of course there’s no check.
Often then, about six weeks later, I get an individual first-class letter from them saying they’re eager to activate my membership, but my check wasn’t enclosed. Typically, they also include the original “survey”/donation form, along with another postage-paid envelope.
Rinse and repeat. I’ve seen a few of those forms return three or four times.
It’s a bit of guerrilla action that costs them money directly, in postage — also via extra work for their clerical employees — without costing me much effort.
Paul
Beautiful.
I am reminded of several times during the Obama years of getting the same survey to answer from the DNC. To me the questions were, like Neo wrote, “all leading, all assuming I was on the left,” and phrased such that I –or anyone not on the left– had difficulty agreeing with any of the choices.
The letter claimed that I had been chosen for the survey because I was a “community leader.” How they concluded that, I have no idea. Perhaps because I was a homeowner on the tax roll? I doubt they knew I was an officer in my HOA, as that information was not easy to find. The letter ended by requesting that I contribute money to the DNC and or/ the Obama campaign.
I considered writing a snarky reply, but figured that anonymity was better. Paul Nachman had a good approach.
The DNC apparently got the idea that I was not likely to be a contributor, as it stopped mailing me after those two tries.
The ancient religious cults would perform human rites for social, clinical, criminal, political, and climate progress. They still do. Keep women affordable, available, reusable, and taxable, and the carbon-based “burden” of evidence sequestered in sanctuary states.
That, and Democratics legalized diverse sexual orientations (e.g. pedophilia, sadomasochism) under cover of political congruence (“=”) of couples and couplets.
American Civil Liberties Unburdened
In a similar vein, Harris is giving her final speech tonight from the Ellipse. From the leaked text it will be what we’ve heard for the last week. Trump will use the military to go after everyone who opposes him, etc etc etc.
I can’t see this helping move voters, but as has been mentioned before, laying the ground work for post election violence and attempted assassination/coup. If he wins as now expected, all the stops will come out to keep him from office. It’s not going to be a pleasant Nov-Dec
Another thing to consider before deciding that any particular Republican position has cost us the election, is that the volume of lies about Republican positions is widespread.
In this mailing, the ACLU lies and says Republicans want to take away your birth control and your right to vote. (They said the same about Romney). They lie about Trump planning to be a dictator. On Twitter Doug Emhoff lies about Trump being an antisemite:
How do we know that an election wasn’t narrowly lost due to an issue that is simply being lied about? In that case, it makes no sense to change the Republican position away from abortion or anything else: they will simply lie and say that Republicans will take away your right to an abortion or whatever lie they care to make up.
100% agree!
Such butchery on Children should be a Capital Crime – from any parent allowing it, to teachers & schools promoting it, and to Doctors-Nurses-Shrinks & Hospitals involved in the butchery. Add politicians in on the Capital Crime if they voted to support such butchery. Add News Media also if they are involved in the butchery.
In ref to Abortions – neo closed with this:
Agree — *IF* REPs & Trump lose; however, I don’t see a majority of American MOMs going along with any more brainwashing and/or butchery of their Children—even if the mom is pro-abortion…
I doubt the ACLU has one salutary aspect to it. It’s dupes financing the malevolent.
Have just returned from a brief visit to the US.
I was dumbstruck by the unabashed lying like that The Boss’ letter from the ACLU contains. Caused me to doubt even the “and & the”… mostly TV ads but certainly posters and flyers in public display. Even the lowest of LIVs would almost ‘have to’ know the lies were lies.
I’m not usually a “despair”-oriented person…I really do go in hope. But it was so open and so totally detached from reality…made me pray harder for whatever comes of next week and the days until…?
“…pray harder…”
Indeed.
Here’s Lee Smith with the chilling wrap up:
“Is the Left Preparing for War If Trump Wins?“
https://tomklingenstein.com/is-the-left-preparing-for-war-if-trump-wins/
H/T Powerline blog.
It would appear that the QUESTION that is the title of Smith’s piece is purely (if tactically) rhetorical….
File under: “The only thing we have to fear is
fearthe Democrats themselves.”“from talking to some of them about this, I don’t think there’s anything that could change their minds. And no, for the most part they are not and never have been radical leftists or especially politically oriented. For most of their lives, they voted for Democrats and followed the news in a surface manner, but didn’t hold especially radical views. And yet despite all of that, they accept radical moves on the part of the Democrats for whom they continue to vote, because pitches like the one in that letter strike them in very personal ways.
A willful refusal to consider reasoned, fact-based challenges to cherished assumptions is the primary characteristic of a “useful idiot”.
For “There are none so blind as those who will not see. The most deluded people are those who choose to ignore what they already know.” 1546 John Haywood
Long before Haywood, the same truth can be found in the Old Testament: “Hear now this, O foolish people, and without understanding; which have eyes, and see not; which have ears, and hear not.” Jeremiah 5:21 (King James version)
However much technological progress we make, human nature doesn’t change.
“We have met the enemy and he is us.”
I know of not a single male voter who is likely to be swayed by an appeal to unlimited abortion, paid for by the taxpayers and availble up to and through childbirth. (Are we still calling it “childbirth,” or have the lunatics come up with another euphemism, like “fetal escape syndrome,” or “front hole fetal leakage”?) I am aware, however that this does appeal to a certain, rather significant portion of the female electorate. So I propose that, should Trump fail to prevail in the election, it will be due to female voters. Based o. my knowledge of all relevant surveys, this seems to be a fact, not merely conjecture or opinion. I hate to beat a dead horse, but the 19th Amendment is now clearly seen to be a failed social experiment. Emotional decisions are never good ones except by pure inadvertance, and since too many women make their decisions based on emotion, it would seem that the ruin of our nation was a foregone conclusion. The question remains, however, whether that was the intent or an unintended, but entirely foreseeable consequence.
I think it may be that Draconian state abortion laws will backfire and cause the left to grow stronger.
Those have been my thoughts.
_______
About the general topic: It’s called “push polling.” Been around fo evah! I’m most familiar with the phone survey type, but neo’s is probably intended to generate lots of donations.
As a sidelight on the topic, there is this old, and kinda mediocre, film noir entitled “The Fearmakers” (1958) starring Dana Andrews. I found it fascinating nonetheless because it is a very early direct look at seemingly benign operations like “public relations” and “public polling” that can be turned into propaganda operations.
Every child protected in law and welcomed in life; ’tis the work of generations.
“On Twitter Doug Emhoff lies about Trump being an antisemite:
We all heard the antisemitic and racist speeches at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally yesterday.
It’s appalling to hear those slurs. But nothing will stop me from living fearlessly as a Jew”
Emhoff, you mamzer kapo, you never lived as a Jew. You married two shiksas, slapped another and knocked up a fourth. your meeskite daughter is a bonafide nazi ( has to wait another generation to be accepted however),and your ignorance of what Chanukah is about reflects the fact that the Maccabees revolted against traitorous scum like you.
the difference between Trump and Jewish liberals is Jewish grandchildren, and his are frum.
Your are naive again they will jail anyone who opposes the mutiliation of children we saw what happened to parents who spoke out against sexual assault against their girls
There is something demonic about this regime you keep entertaining because ukraine or project 2025 or someother rotgut
There is nothing draconian about these abortion restriction they are well within the boundaries of science and most eu member countries rules
Now considering how they want to reduce the population because skydragon by 80% that what they want to do with net zero and other exercises well we see where they are going
Most Americans are smart enough to see through blatant campaign falsehoods. But Dem propaganda is no longer aimed at voters. They are merely giving talking points to the MSM.
At a rally in 2020, Joe Biden essentially said that he didn’t need votes, just enough support to make the fraud stick. The MSM eagerly ran with a spun version of the story from there, labeling fraud evidence as “unsupported false claims” and “election denial”.
Setting the narrative is the name of the game. Reality be damned.
I have long thought that if the Rep had just shut up about abortion after Wade, the issue would have faded away, being replaced with something else
I am an old doc, an observant Catholic, and solidly on the “right” (though I’m a southpaw), and have never considered an absolute, total ban on abortions as a desideratum, despite ACLU fictions, er, flagrant lies. The ACLU has become an entity of evil.
I do consider wilful abortions a form of murder, killing an unborn human, hardly a “woman’s right to choose”. A spontaneous, involuntary abortion is correctly called a “miscarriage”. No mother has a “right” to kill their own 1 week-old child, perhaps born of a 38 week gestation; they are correctly prosecuted for murder. But it is fine to abort a 38 week gestation?
To suggest those on the “right” are thus characterized, as ACLU and others do is an offensive lie, and typifies Democrats, whose Party has become neo-Nazi.
My oldest son, now in middle age, weighed 2 pounds, 12 ounces as a preemie. Many aborted childern are more mature, weigh more. I remind him of that, since he lives in Massachusetts, a land of aborters.
The thing is, it is so easy to learn the truth nowadays if one really wants to. Even with biased search engines, anyone can google “did Trump really say…” and find out that what they are being told is a lie. I believe that in reality they don’t want to know the truth. The intense hatred they have for Trump they find intoxicating. The last thing they want is to to lose the high they get from expressing their righteous hatred with like minded friends.
Retired lawyer Steve wrote, in part:
I hate to beat a dead horse, but the 19th Amendment is now clearly seen to be a failed social experiment. Emotional decisions are never good ones except by pure inadvertence, and since too many women make their decisions based on emotion, it would seem that the ruin of our nation was a foregone conclusion.
That reminds me of when my mom (back in the 1960s) would be holding a League of Women Voters meeting in our home in Chicago and my dad — who was routinely a jokester — would tape signs around the living room’s walls saying “Repeal the 19th Amendment.”
Of course he wasn’t serious, but Steve clearly is, and I think his point is worth adult discussion.
It could be taken further. Perhaps only married men (leaves me out) should have the franchise. And maybe it should be limited to real-property owners.
This is probably all academic — how would you undo this “right”? Nevertheless, I think the quality of today’s American electorate would have appalled and horrified the Founders — hordes in the vast slums of Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit, Newark, St. Louis, Los Angeles, etc. are taking part in national decisions?!
I hope Neo will weigh in on Steve’s suggestion and my floated codicils to it.
I believe that in reality they don’t want to know the truth.
Chris+B:
You’re not the first to notice.
___________________________________________
Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind
Cannot bear very much reality.
–T.S. Eliot, “The Four Quartets: Burnt Norton”
___________________________________________
‘Twas ever thus.
https://x.com/eScarry/status/1851409985034420504
The more reality-proof one’s bubble-wrap cocoon, the less downside there is to emotional decisions. As I’ve said before, in that situation, the results of a bad vote rarely land on your porch with your ballot voting for it attached. At worst, “It’s a price we have to pay.” “We” being somebody they’ve never heard of. Never met nor would speak to if they should.
And nobody’s wrapped tighter in a cocoon than an AWFL. The women in the inner city are not so wrapped. The women married to or daughters of blue-collar guys in high-risk occupations are not so wrapped.
The women whose commute is a little dicey from time to time….
To the extent I discuss politics with women I know, the idea of policy as a rational issue is….I dunno, completely unknown, irrelevant and even vile.
One woman tried to convince me that the disproportional representation of blacks in prison–as a proportion of the black population–was a terrible thing. I started to say we need to compare the proportion of whites who commit crimes and are in prison with the proportion of blacks who commit crimes and are in prison. Book got shut hard on that one. She knew better but…didn’t care.
Lots of chatter about the problem with Women Voting in America.
3. Partisanship by gender
Men 52% R – 46% D. Women cause America’s problems because 51% are D – and only 44% are R.
With the chatter I have been hearing—it is amazing that the Republican party has support from so many Women Voters!?
Maybe Women are talking to each other too much? Let’s make a Law that makes it illegal for Women to talk to each other. Make it a Capital Crime? Well, that might be a tad too harsh. First offense like 5-years in prison with no parole, and 10-years with no parole for second offense. Third Felony offense would make them Habitual Offenders…
Taliban ‘bars Afghan women from hearing each other’s voices’
Yeah, those Taliban ‘Dudes’ have always known how to treat talkative Women!
Afghan training film for Women: Osama (film)
Michelle Obama in a recent Michigan rally for Harris has been beating the abortion drum.
–“Michelle Obama thinks American men ‘suck’: Gutfeld”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u1F30HensE
–“FULL SPEECH: Michelle Obama rallies for Harris in Michigan”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtQqGOOLh8o
She starts with a harsh woman-scolding for men. How men are too locked up in their selfish rage [not defined, beyond that some men don’t want to vote for Harris] to care that women’s lives are at stake.
She speaks in vague, yet emphatic terms. I’m wondering how are women’s lives at stake. What have I done now? 🙂
She eventually explains:
_____________________________________________
If your wife is shivering and bleeding on the operating room table during a routine delivery gone bad, her pressure dropping as she loses more and more blood, or some unforeseen infection spreads and her doctors aren’t sure if they can act, you will be the one praying that it’s not too late. You will be the one pleading for somebody, anybody, to do something.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/26/us/politics/harris-michelle-obama-michigan.html
_____________________________________________
Well, how often does that happen and is it really that simple?
If women want or need abortions, a bus ticket to Massachusetts or California will always suffice. Federalism is alive and well.
Life can’t be reduced to one issue like abortion. For Americans abortion is several spots down the list behind inflation, jobs, and illegal immigration.
Meanwhile other people argue that a fetus is essentially a human life and such life ought to be preserved too. I don’t see how that argument is waved away just because one doesn’t like Donald Trump.
Speaking as a man, I also don’t think lecturing men in such a condescending way works either, but that’s what Barack and Michelle Obama are now reduced to.
Smells like desperation. If Trump wins, that means the Obama legacy will hit some hard rocks.
Good.
I remember when the ACLU defended every single one of the Amendments in the Bill of Rights. These days I wonder if they’re even all that interested in defending the Third Amendment. I know they have problems with about half of them.
It’s sad that the people who work for that organization probably feel embarrassed and ashamed of the ACLU’s finest hour: defending the neo-Nazis who wanted to march in Skokie, Illinois. What a perfect storm to cause an ordinary American to turn his or her back on the First Amendment. Repellent clients, Nazis, who wanted to march in public with their vile symbols and speech. And their chosen location, Skokie, home to many Holocaust survivors. Not one person in a thousand would stand up and affirm the Nazis right to say offensive things, more, to offend those put through the most vile injustice.
But the ACLU stood up and said the First Amendment does not recognize the right to say things everyone agrees with; it recognizes the right to say things almost nobody agrees with. It recognizes the right to offend, deeply, with words, to hurt, with imagery, to show people just how terrible you are, how deluded, how ignorant. That the price of a free country is this: chubby Nazis marching through a Jewish neighborhood.
I’m very proud of a country where something like that could happen, even if the march never did. But that’s not who the ACLU is anymore, it seems. I think they are living proof of one of Robert Conquest’s rules of Politics: any organization that is not explicitly right-wing will eventually become left-wing.
It was inevitable. The Left in this country is now the establishment. They’re The Man. The ACLU was fine when the Right was the establishment; it was great to rebel against common decency and politeness, and better when the Constitution backed you up. But now, to truly rebel, you would have to embrace and defend right-wing thought, and even though the Constitution and Bill of Rights are still on their side, the idea of giving any aid and comfort to the right is just anathema to them. And so they allowed themselves to be part of the establishment, the people who like things just the way they are.
Sad.
Oh. Also Michelle O. proclaims that women absolutely have the right to bully their husbands and boyfriends into voting Kamala.
________________________________________________
So, are are you, as men, prepared to look into the eyes of the women and children you love and tell them that you supported this assault on our safety and to the women listening?
We have every right to demand that our the men in our lives do better by us.
________________________________________________
[I tried to get Chat to format Michelle Obama’s speech for readability and Chat consistently glossed over the parts like this I found interesting.]
No question about it. Never mind what other concerns men might have. That’s just toxic male rage … or something.
Aside from taking offense at Michelle Obama’s misandry, I wonder how she and the Harris campaign imagine this is an effective appeal to male voters who are leaking away from Harris.
Or maybe it’s a defensive effort to shore up the women’s vote which Harris shouldn’t be worrying about — unless her campaign is really going south.
I remember when the ACLU defended every single one of the Amendments in the Bill of Rights.
==
So, you’re 114 years old?
The abortion discussion, as it currently seems to run (not necessarily here, since I’ve not read these comments since I’m about to head to bed,) is troublesome.
Dobbs said that the Constitution does not grant the power to the federal government to a say on abortion, at least as I read it. Point being that, if you assume Dobbs is the law (and I understood it correctly,) then federal elections can’t have any bearing on abortion rights… at least until the make up of the Court is rejiggered.
But both those on the left and the right seem to act as though Dobbs merely requires Congressional action to ban/permit abortion on a national basis. Is the assumption that they can get lower federal judges to throw Dobbs out? To what end, since presumably their opponents will just appeal to higher courts until it once again hits the Supreme Court which will just reaffirm Dobbs?
It also seems to be a reflection of the idea that the Supreme Court less reasons to a conclusion, but reasons backwards from the conclusion the Justices want. And I’ll admit: choosing Justices because you already know their conclusions looks a lot like those Justices reasoning from a politically-motivated conclusion.
Point is, the reaction to Dobbs on both sides seems to indicate a certain contempt for the Court, and by extension the justice system as a whole.
Or, again, a lack of understanding Dobbs on my part. Considering the alternative, it’s certainly what I’m hoping.
It is curious reading about Mrs. Obama’s speech in Michigan in this thread and seeing how she brings up the abortion stuff, along the way essentially daring men who favor limitations thereon to say so to ladies’ faces.
In the waning days of the 1988 campaign, I arrived very late to a Dukakis rally at Western’s campus across town from where this speech the other day was. It happened that as I was getting as close to the main hall as I was destined to get that day, Dukakis posed a very similar scenario in what for him was pretty forceful oratory, almost daring Bush the elder (at the time) to say plainly to women’s faces that he, Bush, would tell them ‘no’ in some or indeed any scenarios in which abortion would come up. (Not in those specific words, you understand; it was a long time ago.)
The coincidence is interesting, if not exactly charming to me.
It worries me, the notion that there are so many people in the voting public for whom it is possible that abortion might be the #1, #2 and #3 (…) issue. The economy could crash, the speech police could start arresting people, trial by jury could be thrown on the discard pile, their 401(k)s could be confiscated to cover the government debt, but as long as they can rest assured that those annoying “fetuses” can be eliminated whenever they decide it’s time, they can be okay with all of the rest. I really don’t understand it, I guess.
Paul at 5:23 p.m.
I once wrapped a brick in packaging paper and attached one of those return envelopes to one side. It fit just perfectly. Then I dropped it into the postbox.
Don’t know if it was delivered as I made sure there was no return address, but it was fun to think of them paying first class postage on a brick.
“…fear-mongering propaganda for the Democrats.”
You don’t say!
Well, it certainly works (or at least used to)…
Here’s Jayanta Bhattacharya:
“The Most Devastating COVID Report So Far“—
https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/most-devastating-covid-report-so-far
@ Phillip Sells > “It worries me, the notion that there are so many people in the voting public for whom it is possible that abortion might be the #1, #2 and #3 (…) issue.”
It worried me back in the 1970s, as a college student, because even then I knew that killing babies was no way for a civilized society to go on.
I was behind the “women’s lib” movement so long as it was about equal pay for equal work (because that wasn’t the norm then, although sometimes the work was deemed different for trivial reasons so men could “legitimately” be paid more) and removing barriers to women in certain professions if they really wanted to work there (and there were a LOT of legal and informal barriers at the time). Abortion was NOT part of the message getting out at the beginning, but it surfaced as soon as the actual inequities were legislatively dealt with, which really wasn’t that difficult because society was moving that direction anyway.
That’s when we started hearing from the radfemlibs and the feminazis about putting men down and raising abortion up, for all the wrong reasons in both cases.
I jumped off that ship toot sweet (that’s tout de suite for huxley).
To pursue the right to kill babies as your summum bonum is insane.
@ Niketas > “How do we know that an election wasn’t narrowly lost due to an issue that is simply being lied about? ”
In some cases, we do know. I can think of a couple from the not too distant past, but it’s gotten too late tonight for me to spend time looking them up.
Johnson-Goldwater comes to mind, though.
@ TommyJay > “About the general topic: It’s called “push polling.” Been around fo evah!”
I get similar mailers, calls, and texts from Republicans all the time.
They all use the same template, left or right.
I put them in the trash, but I like Paul’s solution.
I’ve also used that sometimes for the incessant charity begging letters that erupt if you make any kind of donation to any worthy cause. At this point, I throw those in the trash as well and stick to a very few organizations that actually use the money for the stated purpose, and not for overhead (IOW salaries and perks and paying for the begging letters).
Speaking of propaganda…
The latest soap opera…
“What’s good for
GMBoeing is good for the country”…“Air Force overpaid Boeing for soap dispensers on aircraft by almost 8,000%, DoD IG report says”—
https://justthenews.com/government/security/air-force-dramatically-overpaid-soap-dispensers-military-aircraft-dod-ig-report
(At least it’s one way for Boeing to stay competitive…)
+ Bonus:
“Harris campaign scrambles to hide alleged manipulation of social media to make itself look popular“—
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/harris-campaign-scrambles-hide-alleged-manipulation-social-media-make
File under: Corruption Nation.
@ Mitchell > “And so they allowed themselves to be part of the establishment, the people who like things just the way they are.”
I don’t think “allowed” is what happened at all. That was their goal: not to be part of the establishment, as then constituted, but to replace it with their own.
“But the ACLU stood up and said the First Amendment does not recognize the right to say things everyone agrees with; it recognizes the right to say things almost nobody agrees with.”
They said that only so long as they were the ones saying things almost nobody agreed with.
The ACLU defended the neo-Nazis to open the door to defending Communists, socialists, and all the other anti-constitutional -ists that plague us.
(PS: looking at what the Democrats support now, the ACLU may have defended the Nazis then because they agreed with them.)
Once those defenses had succeeded, to the point that the left became ascendant, the ACLU stopped defending any speech that went against their agenda.
‘I think they are living proof of one of Robert Conquest’s rules of Politics: any organization that is not explicitly right-wing will eventually become left-wing.”
They have never been Right-wing.
Any defense of conservatives (who do NOT include neo-Nazis) has been to build precedents to defend leftists.
They don’t need the masks any longer.
Karmi
People vary in almost any kind of characteristic. But various groups seem to have more of a particular characteristic. In my experience, women, particularly AWFL, simply don’t want to talk about policy. There are, must be, exceptions. But the proportion of exceptions varies by group–that’s how groups are different, one from another.
“I can’t believe you’d support someone who…..” acts like Trump. Nothing about war, inflation, Bill of Rights. I hear that from both men and women but far more often from women.
I may be reading it wrong, but the vibes from men who say that seem to indicate they know better but hope I’ll be….ashamed or something. Women seem to be sincere.
It’s really precious that a party which had no problem with Chappaquidick and Clinton’s use of interns has suddenly gotten religion.
So, voting with regard to TDS only is better for the nation, worse, or maybe neutral?
Richard Aubrey
Tie between Worse & Neutral – from my point of view, i.e., for the most part both the Republican & Democratic parties suffer from TDS issues…
“But I’ll add that, if we lose this election, I believe it will be due to this issue”
For what it’s worth, speaking from the left, I agree with you. Since the Dobbs ruling, abortion-rights referenda have passed by large margins everywhere they’ve been on the ballot, including red states like Kansas. Also since that ruling, there has been a pattern of Democrats in special elections doing ten to fifteen points better than Democrats historically do in whatever district they were running in. These results were generally not predicted by polls. All that is needed for a Democratic landslide next week is that this election follow the same pattern.
It looks like that is happening. Early-voting records show that, of those who have already voted (about 53 million at this point), nearly half are Republicans. Yet surveys of those who have already voted show Harris leading by sixty-forty or better. That’s consistent with millions of Republicans (mostly women) voting for Harris due to the abortion issue. There have been enough horror stories from states with abortion restrictions to convince them that the country needs federal-level protection for abortion rights.
The Dobbs ruling will be remembered as the Republican party’s suicide note. It will not be a viable national party again until it purges the religious extremism in which anti-abortion ideology is rooted.
I discussed these issues in more detail here:
https://infidel753.blogspot.com/2024/10/why-i-anticipate-blue-wave.html
I attended an ACLU get together back and 1992 and concluded that I would need to stop supporting them at some point in the future. The meeting was filled with left wing snobs. I finalized my decision during the first GWB administration, and since that time the ACLU has become actively evil and anti civil liberties. It disgraces its name. Most left wing organizations do.
‘ACLU is fighting for abortion rights”
How does a surgical procedure have rights? I thought only moral agents had rights.
Infidel753
Abortion is a big issue, but so is Illegal Immigration.
Wow…“sixty-forty or better.” Humble me hasn’t seen that one—it must not be one of the DEMs internal polls or surveys.
You’re “from the left” – so you support Child Grooming & Child Butchery…Talk about REAL Horror Stories!?!
Yeah, brainwashing innocent Children—then drugging them into a stupor. Taking these same innocent Children and performing Vaginoplasty and/or Phalloplasty on them is beyond “horror stories” – it is Crimes against Humanity – at best…
Judging by the link you provided, you are anticipating a blue wave…
a poor seminar commenter, as Rush would put it,
they want to mutilate children, they want to murder children, they want to starve and freeze in the dark, that is the dem agenda,
Karmi: Here’s one national survey of people who already voted:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/10/21/harris-leads-trump-early-voting-abortion/75763483007/
I have seen four or five more that showed similar results. Here is one from just Arizona:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/10/29/2280661/-CNN-Harris-leads-53-44-among-Arizonans-who-have-already-voted
More than half of likely voters have already voted. There are more Republicans than Democrats among those early voters. Yet Harris is nine points ahead among them. Note that surveys of early voters are free of the uncertainties that afflict conventional polls — turnout among that group is 100% by definition, and they know how they voted, as opposed to anticipating how they expect to vote. My point is, everywhere where it’s been measured, the actual voting is looking nothing like the polls. It’s looking like a Democratic landslide.
Illegal immigration is indeed a major issue, but the actual record of election results over the last two years shows that abortion is the issue actually swaying real-world election results.
I am 100% opposed to every aspect of transgender ideology. So are many Democrats. Never assume your opponents are a homogenous group (no large group of people is all alike). Even many Democratic politicians are backing down on that issue or at least de-emphasizing it, because they know it’s a vote-loser. However, it does not affect as many people as abortion does, nor are its implications so widely understood. This election, at least, will be determined by the abortion issue.
Ray: The phrase “abortion rights” obviously refers to the right of women and girls who want abortions to obtain them. It is not an attempt to reify a surgical procedure and claim that the procedure itself has rights.
@Infidel753 – no one trusts Daily Kos except Child Groomers, Child Butchers, and Child Molesters…
A “blue wave” .. Er, OK.
You are a Democrat, so you support their agendas, one of which is Child Grooming & Child Butchery.
Karmi: The Daily Kos article is sourced from CNN. And I notice you didn’t respond on the USA Today survey. What is relevant is not whether you approve of the source, but what the data say.
“You are a Democrat, so you support their agendas, one of which is Child Grooming & Child Butchery”
I already responded to this in the paragraph you are quoting. I know better than you do what I support and don’t support. I feel strongly enough about the trans issue to have put this together:
https://infidel753.blogspot.com/2021/06/resources-on-trans-ideology.html
Again, no large group of people are all alike. There are plenty of disagreements among right-wingers, as even the comments on this one blog show. It’s absurd to imagine that there are not also disagreements among left-wingers.
One of the chronic problems with political discourse today, which exists on the left and the right in roughly equal measures, is that so many people refuse to read anything that doesn’t match whatever stance they already hold. This leads to extensive ignorance, and to gross oversimplification and misunderstanding of what the “other side” believes. In fact, it’s impossible to understand opposing views via paraphrases or summaries written by people on your own side. One needs to read their own words, unfiltered and unedited, on their own sites. That’s why I routinely read right-wing sites and blogs, including this one. It’s the only way of knowing what the range of beliefs among right-wing people actually is, whether I agree with them or not.
You were apparently unaware of the several widely-published surveys of early voters showing Harris far ahead even though almost half those early voters are Republican. It can never be to anyone’s benefit to be unaware of information. Limiting one’s sources of information to a bubble of sites that agree with what you already believe is fatal to accurate understanding of reality. A lot of leftists also do that. I don’t. It’s unwise for anyone to do so.
@Infidel753: You ever heard of “Fake News”? Daily Kos, USA Today, and CNN fall into that category. Have you seen the polls and surveys on what people think of “Fake News” sources?
By supporting the Democratic party you are supporting Child Grooming & Child Butchery…enough said on that.
Go talk to someone on Daily Kos – humble me has had enough of your Left-wing Baloney…
Yeah, right, everything that doesn’t agree with what you already believe is fake, and any information referenced by a source you don’t approve of can be disregarded. Well, we will see next week who had the more accurate view of what is happening. I think any non-ideological person can tell from the above comments which of us is more open-minded and in touch with reality.
Infidel753
What’s funny—is that I was probably the only one here that you had a chance to convince, and you failed miserably at that…
“The phrase “abortion rights” obviously refers to the right of women and girls who want abortions to obtain them.”
Oh, you mean access to a surgical procedure is a right? I missed that when I read the constitution. I didn’t see it. I’ll read it again.