Matt, what position should dems take in red states if the median position is the heart beat ban? keep your position and hope it deviates less than your opponent or allow dems to move their position to the popular position?
Is this like one of those movies or TV shows where a character gets lectured about how people who are their actual biological relatives aren't their "real family" but instead some other people they aren't actually biologically related to are?
God, these comments are frustrating. Abortion is not a vice. It is not a recreational passtime. You do not need regulations to prevent people from getting abortions when they shouldn't because nobody gets an abortion when they don't have to. Americans, when polled, express that people shouldn't get abortions past viability unless medically necessary. What seems to not connect, however, is that Americans aren't just expressing their abortion views, they're describing their abortion practices. If you pass laws to strictly regulate hypothetical events which we know don't actually occur, all you've done is created a law which will be used for bad faith political ends by various bad actors.
I sympathize with you, but we go to the polls with the electorate we have, not the one we want. If there was "one weird trick" to get voters to accept this framing, I'd do it in a (non-fetal) heartbeat, but this is what we're stuck with. That means being pragmatic, and making the compromises you have to in order to win.
I like this discussion, but have to admit that I like the language of "who decides?" Americans don't like anyone trying to decide for them. Period. Not perhaps our best characteristic, but very potent. Let's leverage that.
The Ireland precedent is nearly irrelevant, because it ignores the societal framing.
The public vote on the abortion amendment in Ireland was the second opportunity ever (after marriage equality) a typical person had to vote against their society’s principal oppressor, the Catholic Church. The amendment’s supporters deftly exploited this.
It was a bit like framing something as anti-communist in a Central European country circa 1995.
I feel like much of Progressive messaging is dedicated to attempting to convince people of the absolute correctness of the Progressive position, and not convincing people with reservations about their positions that they should support them anyway.
I think it's worse than that in that often a lot of progressive messaging isn't even dedicated to attempting to convince people of the absolute correctness of the Progressive position but to telling the audience that they are bad people. (See, e.g., comments about "toxic masculinity" explaining why Trump picked up votes particularly with black and Latino men in 2020.)
Everything discussed here also applies in numerous other policy areas - housing, climate change, immigration, you name it.
On the issue of climate change in particular, Democrats need to find ways to message climate policies in non-climate terms. For example, improved fuel economy standards should be about saving Americans money at the gas pump, not about reducing carbon emissions (even though it will, of course do that). At the state and local level, banning gas powered leaf blowers should be about the fact that the blowers are obnoxious and people deserve peace and quiet in their own homes (which even Republicans should want), not about "sacrificing" for the climate (which will immediately make all Republicans opposed).
Of course, as Matt said, messaging only works if the policy is fundamentally popular. Building up infrastructure for clean energy and electric cars, then, years later, reducing drilling once the oil is no longer needed - popular. Preventing drilling of oil now, while the vast majority of the population is still driving gas cars - unpopular. This is not rocket science.
Interestingly, the Irish system - legal abortion through 12 weeks, with some exceptions after - could more or less be the "compromise" that John Roberts is driving toward in Dobbs right now (https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/02/politics/roe-v-wade-supreme-court/index.html). (Coincidentally, Roberts's in-laws live in Ireland, and he has a vacation home there.)
Of course, he'd need another conservative justice to go along, and maybe a liberal or two for cover.
When I was growing up (high school/college, etc) the sort of right-thinking liberal perspective was that the Supreme Court was good because it was willing to do unpopular shit like enforce a relatively broad version of free speech, uphold the rights of criminal defendants, and maintain separation of church and state.
But over the last 10-15 years there has been a much larger emphasis on the role the court is taking in striking down economic and environmental regulation, probably because the court has been doing a lot more of that. Additionally it is pretty clear that procedural criminal justice rights like Miranda and the 4th amendment have done nothing to protect vulnerable people from being abused by law enforcement. So the consensus has evolved to be that the Court has limited value in protecting vulnerable people and does a lot of damage to important and popular regulations.
Roe/abortion rights are a throwback to the earlier status quo where progressives think the court was doing something good and legislation would be bad.
But nobody likes to appear inconsistent so the consensus has coalesced around 2 arguments:
1. Roe is popular. This is a fine statement as far as it goes but as Matt and others have pointed out the holding in Roe goes a lot further than is actually popular. And the whole point of Roe is that it upholds a right that would be violated by legislation from the elected branches if it didn't exist, so it sort of elides the primary reason why liberals like it.
2. It is bad to have backsliding of rights/creates uncertainty to lose rights... this is a good argument if you are trying to prevent the rights from going away. But I think once Roe is overturned and like 20 states have "heartbeat" laws or whatever it ceases to really work.
This is a long way of saying that the arguments in favor of Roe, which basically amount to going back to an old school liberal view of judicial review and the supreme court, aren't very well suited for a world in which abortion is contested in the political realm as opposed to at the court. A lot of people say Republicans are like the "dog who caught the car" in terms of not knowing what to do now that Roe will be overturned. But in some ways Democrats are also not well prepared for this situation either, but this better change quick...
I feel compelled to point out that your views on Canadian Medicare are not entirely accurate. In fact rather a large percentage of the population of Canada actually has Bernie Care levels of health care. This includes virtually every Federal, Provincial and Municipal worker in Canada and their families. That's about a third of Canadians btw. And yes they get all those additional benefits and more. This is,of course, manifestly unfair and is the reason I have spent a fair amount of my own time embarrassing Canadian politicians across the political spectrum whenever the opportunity arises.
Sometimes this is easy. For example when the BC teachers unions are negotiating for additional health care benefits, in particular regular massage therapy for themselves and their families, it is but the work of a few moments to write a letter to the editor pointing out that many of the children in their classes don't qualify. Or qualify for the drug plans, eye care, dental care or any of the numerous other health care benefits they have negotiated for themselves.
It is definitely a Slow Boring process to make progress on these issues. But it can be done. So now Ontario, where I reside, now has a drug plan for children included in the basic care all residents receive. It is not comprehensive to be sure but it covers a lot of basic drugs. Next up on my personal campaign is dental. I do not see why any child should suffer because their parents are not part of the in crowd.
I can't get over how simple and reasonable the Irish law is. And it is literally in line with what the NRSC is claiming is the Republican position (see here, slide 15: https://www.nrsc.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Abortion_Updated.pdf). And it protects the vast majority of current abortions. And it would be popular. And ethical. Omg. Just do it already.
The Democrats really need to start acting like they believe their own "Democracy is in peril!" rhetoric, instead of simply using it as cover to smuggle in uncompromisingly dogmatic policy views. It's not simply disingenuous and hypocritical, it legitimately fuels the threat to our institutions. Screeching about SCOTUS while letting The Groups have the only say on actual abortion policy is a perfect example.
There is also a chance that purple state republicans take the Ireland approach on abortion. This would be seen as a win for the right and consistent with the types of policies they have been passing for the last 20 years. By not moderating, Democrats could surrender the middle to Republicans.
Both parties suffer from a purity test on abortion. Abortion is an important ethical issue, however it has little connection to the vast majority of politics.
I've long since accepted the Democratic Party, under its current leadership, is incapable of making the deft and nimble moves to adjust. I like Biden, and I still think he's been a better president than he gets credit for, but I can't see him adapting to a post-Roe world by moderating on abortion. Although it would be nice if he rediscovered his opposition to the Hyde Amendment.
I think that federalism / regionalism is going to make it hard to achieve a national compromise on abortion.
Pro-choice folks want abortion to be legal at any time and in any circumstance in New York and California, and they aren't willing to give that up in exchange for guaranteeing a minimum amount of legal abortion in Florida and Texas.
Meanwhile, pro-life activists want to ban abortion under all circumstances in red states and don't want to give that up so that they can moderately curtail abortion in blue ones. I think that this is especially hard for serious pro-lifers given that the vast majority of abortions happen in the "compromise window" (<= 12 weeks), so accepting that window wouldn't reduce abortions by much.
Matt, what position should dems take in red states if the median position is the heart beat ban? keep your position and hope it deviates less than your opponent or allow dems to move their position to the popular position?
Yet another example, it seems to me, where the leftish prefers strident sloganeering that bolsters in-group status to actually winning things.
"an exemption for the health of the mother"
Speaking of words, not all pregnant women are mothers. Some don't have any children.
Is this like one of those movies or TV shows where a character gets lectured about how people who are their actual biological relatives aren't their "real family" but instead some other people they aren't actually biologically related to are?
God, these comments are frustrating. Abortion is not a vice. It is not a recreational passtime. You do not need regulations to prevent people from getting abortions when they shouldn't because nobody gets an abortion when they don't have to. Americans, when polled, express that people shouldn't get abortions past viability unless medically necessary. What seems to not connect, however, is that Americans aren't just expressing their abortion views, they're describing their abortion practices. If you pass laws to strictly regulate hypothetical events which we know don't actually occur, all you've done is created a law which will be used for bad faith political ends by various bad actors.
I sympathize with you, but we go to the polls with the electorate we have, not the one we want. If there was "one weird trick" to get voters to accept this framing, I'd do it in a (non-fetal) heartbeat, but this is what we're stuck with. That means being pragmatic, and making the compromises you have to in order to win.
I like this discussion, but have to admit that I like the language of "who decides?" Americans don't like anyone trying to decide for them. Period. Not perhaps our best characteristic, but very potent. Let's leverage that.
The Ireland precedent is nearly irrelevant, because it ignores the societal framing.
The public vote on the abortion amendment in Ireland was the second opportunity ever (after marriage equality) a typical person had to vote against their society’s principal oppressor, the Catholic Church. The amendment’s supporters deftly exploited this.
It was a bit like framing something as anti-communist in a Central European country circa 1995.
I feel like much of Progressive messaging is dedicated to attempting to convince people of the absolute correctness of the Progressive position, and not convincing people with reservations about their positions that they should support them anyway.
I think it's worse than that in that often a lot of progressive messaging isn't even dedicated to attempting to convince people of the absolute correctness of the Progressive position but to telling the audience that they are bad people. (See, e.g., comments about "toxic masculinity" explaining why Trump picked up votes particularly with black and Latino men in 2020.)
Everything discussed here also applies in numerous other policy areas - housing, climate change, immigration, you name it.
On the issue of climate change in particular, Democrats need to find ways to message climate policies in non-climate terms. For example, improved fuel economy standards should be about saving Americans money at the gas pump, not about reducing carbon emissions (even though it will, of course do that). At the state and local level, banning gas powered leaf blowers should be about the fact that the blowers are obnoxious and people deserve peace and quiet in their own homes (which even Republicans should want), not about "sacrificing" for the climate (which will immediately make all Republicans opposed).
Of course, as Matt said, messaging only works if the policy is fundamentally popular. Building up infrastructure for clean energy and electric cars, then, years later, reducing drilling once the oil is no longer needed - popular. Preventing drilling of oil now, while the vast majority of the population is still driving gas cars - unpopular. This is not rocket science.
Interestingly, the Irish system - legal abortion through 12 weeks, with some exceptions after - could more or less be the "compromise" that John Roberts is driving toward in Dobbs right now (https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/02/politics/roe-v-wade-supreme-court/index.html). (Coincidentally, Roberts's in-laws live in Ireland, and he has a vacation home there.)
Of course, he'd need another conservative justice to go along, and maybe a liberal or two for cover.
When I was growing up (high school/college, etc) the sort of right-thinking liberal perspective was that the Supreme Court was good because it was willing to do unpopular shit like enforce a relatively broad version of free speech, uphold the rights of criminal defendants, and maintain separation of church and state.
But over the last 10-15 years there has been a much larger emphasis on the role the court is taking in striking down economic and environmental regulation, probably because the court has been doing a lot more of that. Additionally it is pretty clear that procedural criminal justice rights like Miranda and the 4th amendment have done nothing to protect vulnerable people from being abused by law enforcement. So the consensus has evolved to be that the Court has limited value in protecting vulnerable people and does a lot of damage to important and popular regulations.
Roe/abortion rights are a throwback to the earlier status quo where progressives think the court was doing something good and legislation would be bad.
But nobody likes to appear inconsistent so the consensus has coalesced around 2 arguments:
1. Roe is popular. This is a fine statement as far as it goes but as Matt and others have pointed out the holding in Roe goes a lot further than is actually popular. And the whole point of Roe is that it upholds a right that would be violated by legislation from the elected branches if it didn't exist, so it sort of elides the primary reason why liberals like it.
2. It is bad to have backsliding of rights/creates uncertainty to lose rights... this is a good argument if you are trying to prevent the rights from going away. But I think once Roe is overturned and like 20 states have "heartbeat" laws or whatever it ceases to really work.
This is a long way of saying that the arguments in favor of Roe, which basically amount to going back to an old school liberal view of judicial review and the supreme court, aren't very well suited for a world in which abortion is contested in the political realm as opposed to at the court. A lot of people say Republicans are like the "dog who caught the car" in terms of not knowing what to do now that Roe will be overturned. But in some ways Democrats are also not well prepared for this situation either, but this better change quick...
I feel compelled to point out that your views on Canadian Medicare are not entirely accurate. In fact rather a large percentage of the population of Canada actually has Bernie Care levels of health care. This includes virtually every Federal, Provincial and Municipal worker in Canada and their families. That's about a third of Canadians btw. And yes they get all those additional benefits and more. This is,of course, manifestly unfair and is the reason I have spent a fair amount of my own time embarrassing Canadian politicians across the political spectrum whenever the opportunity arises.
Sometimes this is easy. For example when the BC teachers unions are negotiating for additional health care benefits, in particular regular massage therapy for themselves and their families, it is but the work of a few moments to write a letter to the editor pointing out that many of the children in their classes don't qualify. Or qualify for the drug plans, eye care, dental care or any of the numerous other health care benefits they have negotiated for themselves.
It is definitely a Slow Boring process to make progress on these issues. But it can be done. So now Ontario, where I reside, now has a drug plan for children included in the basic care all residents receive. It is not comprehensive to be sure but it covers a lot of basic drugs. Next up on my personal campaign is dental. I do not see why any child should suffer because their parents are not part of the in crowd.
I can't get over how simple and reasonable the Irish law is. And it is literally in line with what the NRSC is claiming is the Republican position (see here, slide 15: https://www.nrsc.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Abortion_Updated.pdf). And it protects the vast majority of current abortions. And it would be popular. And ethical. Omg. Just do it already.
Copy/paste this Irish politician's op-ed: https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/katherine-zappone-twelve-week-period-is-right-way-to-respect-women-1.3436679
The Democrats really need to start acting like they believe their own "Democracy is in peril!" rhetoric, instead of simply using it as cover to smuggle in uncompromisingly dogmatic policy views. It's not simply disingenuous and hypocritical, it legitimately fuels the threat to our institutions. Screeching about SCOTUS while letting The Groups have the only say on actual abortion policy is a perfect example.
There is also a chance that purple state republicans take the Ireland approach on abortion. This would be seen as a win for the right and consistent with the types of policies they have been passing for the last 20 years. By not moderating, Democrats could surrender the middle to Republicans.
Both parties suffer from a purity test on abortion. Abortion is an important ethical issue, however it has little connection to the vast majority of politics.
I've long since accepted the Democratic Party, under its current leadership, is incapable of making the deft and nimble moves to adjust. I like Biden, and I still think he's been a better president than he gets credit for, but I can't see him adapting to a post-Roe world by moderating on abortion. Although it would be nice if he rediscovered his opposition to the Hyde Amendment.
I think that federalism / regionalism is going to make it hard to achieve a national compromise on abortion.
Pro-choice folks want abortion to be legal at any time and in any circumstance in New York and California, and they aren't willing to give that up in exchange for guaranteeing a minimum amount of legal abortion in Florida and Texas.
Meanwhile, pro-life activists want to ban abortion under all circumstances in red states and don't want to give that up so that they can moderately curtail abortion in blue ones. I think that this is especially hard for serious pro-lifers given that the vast majority of abortions happen in the "compromise window" (<= 12 weeks), so accepting that window wouldn't reduce abortions by much.