South Dakota proposes open season on abortion providers. No bag limit. Like vermin.

[catsittingstill]

CBS has an article here.

I find the Jensen quote particularly telling.  He supposedly wrote this law to give a pregnant woman the right to defend herself against a "boyfriend" punching her in the abdomen to make her miscarry because he doesn't want to pay child support.  Meaning he supposedly thinks she doesn't have the right to defend herself against physical assault now.

The options here are many and none of them good.  1) He believes that women don't have rights.  2) He believes that women who have had sex don't have rights.  3) He never thinks about the actual human being in the "pregnant woman" scenario at all--she never crosses his mind.  4) He is arguing in bad faith for the purpose of convincing decent but not particularly sharp people to support a law permitting the murder of abortion providers.

His defense is that the law would apply only to people committing illegal acts, and abortion is legal, so abortion providers will be safe (ha ha.)

Here is the text of the actual bill.  The relevant part is that the redefinition (of murder to justifiable homicide) would apply: if there is reasonable ground to apprehend a design to commit a felony, or to do some great personal injury, and imminent danger of such design being accomplished.

That "or" means that the felony part need not apply.

The options here are twofold and neither of them good.  1) He and all twenty-two of the legislators who cosponsored the bill are so completely incompetent at writing basic directions that they are completely unfitted to be allowed to write laws--which will be interpreted from what is written, after all, not what they think they wrote.  2) He and all twenty-two of his cosponsors know perfectly well what they wrote and are arguing in bad faith to convince people who didn't read the actual text of the bill to support a law permitting the murder of abortion providers.

Make no mistake, the Pro-Life terrorists are out there, waiting with their sniper rifles and their bombs.  Since 1993 they have killed eight doctors and tried to kill another seventeen.  They use the "justifiable homicide" defense at their trials (unsuccessfully so far.)  They want you to know they might kill you, and to be afraid.  And many in the larger Pro-Life movement make no bones about publicly supporting Pro-Life terrorism.

If you're feeling kind of tired, having been repeatedly rallied to defend women from having our sexual behavior policed by the State?  That is the intent of the many-pronged conservative assault on women's basic right to be left the heck alone while we get on with our private lives.
 

Comments

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

Or (5) Jensen is a violent psychotic who has found social acceptance for his violence. I think a close look at Jensen's background would probably turn up violent sexual obsessions, perhaps an actual history of violence. But who pays any attention to state legislators?

The original national coverage of this bill comes from Mother Jones magazine, here: http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/02/south-dakota-hb-1171-legalize-killing-abortion-providers

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

If I understand right, the bill has 22 cosponsors. If 22 violent psychotics got into state government all that the same time, that would be very alarming. Not that what they're proposing is not already alarming or anything...

Yes I saw the Mother Jones article but thought CBS might seem a more neutral source to begin with.

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

Well...there's the violent ones, and then there's the ones with little empathy. The combination is a loser.

We really don't seem to be very good at keeping crazy authoritarians out of power, do we?

[smoooom.livejournal.com]

As I said in Toms blog, what about Justifiable Homicide against moronic politicians. Sorry, There are so many reasons to be thankful that I'm living in Canada. this kind of crap is just oe of them. Canada is not perfect, far from it, but we do SEEM to have a buffer against this kind of insanity.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I just want to make them back off.

And yes, Canada seems more sane to me too. Not perfect, but noticeably more sane. I wonder if it's something in the water...

[occams_pyramid]

Option 2.3) They accept that this law won't permit the murder of abortion providers because (and *only* because) abortion is legal. Next step in their plan, make abortion illegal.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

They already tried that part. Passed a law prohibiting abortion in order to send it to the Supreme Court and try to get Roe v. Wade overturned. The voters repealed it by referendum before it got a chance. It's no secret that the legislators are planning to bring it back as soon as they think they might get away with it.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

And why the legislators are more conservative than the people is a very good question.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Because, against any and all evidence, people seem to believe that the conservatives are the people to trust with money. Not necessarily with anything else, but with money and war. And right now, money is the most important thing on most people's minds, and what to do about a world that's chronically at least somewhat at war is a close second. So they want conservatives in place who will balance the budget... but not by cutting anything they use... and they don't want to let the conservatives do anything else stupid while they're in there to balance the budget. Which, for the conservatives, is a no-win proposition, since they cannot balance the budget without cutting things people like or raising taxes like they promised not to do. So they only way they can prove they're doing anything at all is to interfere with people's rights in noisy and dramatic ways... which, fortunately, the people don't like either, and are willing to override their representatives outright on the subject.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

The problem with option 2.3 is that a simple reading of the proposed law makes it plain that the action being prevented by the "justifiable homicide" doesn't have to be illegal.

[inamac.livejournal.com]

Perhaps some female senator (do they have any?) could propose a bill allowing a woman to castrate any man who looks at her admiringly. Just as an abortion preventative measure, you understand...

(Cynicism as a defence against rage and sorrow.)

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know.

I don't want to turn this into some kind "equal hurt on both sides" contest. Everybody will lose.

I want people to stop trying to hurt women.

[bigbumble.livejournal.com]

Rachel Madow named an interesting fictional (I think it is fictional anyway.) country the other night, Antiabortistan.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I feel like someone is trying to take me there.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

What I don't understand is why they never seem to get tired. I wish they would. I want a break.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Sheer psychotic rage? Over Obama's election?

I dunno, I have trouble fathoming it too.

[occams_pyramid]

Standard trick. It takes far less work to think up a loony idea for a new law than it does to organise opposition to it. So just keep thinking up crazy new laws until the opposition is exhausted.

The other trick being of course to make the law far worse than you really need, then 'compromise'. Some of the opponents will think they won.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm concerned that this is what they're working up to.

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Maybe they're all so rich they don't have to put in time making a living, or fixing their own houses, or looking after their own kids, or whatever. But in South Dakota, I find this difficult to believe.

[kittyguitar.livejournal.com]

I think a woman's right to complete her pregnancy is just as important as any other reproductive rights she may have, and I would like to see specific laws in place to protect it. Like identifying pregnancy loss as a specific source of "bodily harm" under the law, for instance. It bothers me that one side of the abortion debate is using this very important premise as a foot-in-the-door, forcing the other side to oppose it or appear as though they do.

Ultimately, while a fetus may not have full human status it does have value, especially to the woman who has chosen to carry and give life to it. The loss of it is a real loss, and the taking away of it a real wrong. There must be some way for the law to protect women against this loss without taking away their other rights--mustn't there?

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

Let's think this through.

How is anyone going to interfere with a woman's completing her wanted pregnancy *without* committing an act that is already illegal under present law?

Seriously, what is he going to do? Light a black candle? Write a snarky facebook update? Complain to the city council?

So a woman's right to complete her wanted pregnancy is assured--just like her right to own her own money, cast her own vote, walk down the sidewalk or build a canoe.

We don't need specific laws to protect her right to complete her wanted pregnancy, just like we don't need specific laws to protect my right to make a canoe. And any unnecessary law is just one more chance for careless legislation to lead to oppression of women. Lets leave well enough alone.