I'm still grieving.  Don't get me wrong.  But I've never been one to mourn so long that others could take advantage of me. 

Just because there's tears doesn't mean I won't put up one helluva fight.

The clock is already ticking, has been for some time.  We know the assault is coming.  Keep crying if you must, but don't turn your back as you do it.  The battle is already planned, initial salvos have already been fired.

There are several items that the second Bush administration will tackle early and head-on.  The first will undoubtedly be Roe v. Wade.

At this point I expect there are some of you that I may lose.  We will not see eye-to-eye on this.  For me, this is non-negotiable: I support a woman's right to control her body, her destiny.  I believe that woman must have the same rights as all other citizens and control of her body is just part of those rights.

At the same time, I don't believe abortion should be frequent.  Instead, birth control and reproductive education should be as available as any erectile dysfunction drug -- and more so, since no man dies of ED but women die at a rate of one every 3000 pregnancies.

That's right:  for every 3000 of us who become pregnant, one of us will die during the course of the pregnancy or childbirth.  Women have the right to protect themselves from mortal harm as much as men do -- and choosing not to be pregnant is part of that right.

What kind of society would deny rights to women to protect themselves?  to determine the course of their own destiny?  What kind of society would insist that women are subordinate?

Fundamentalist societies.  Christian or Muslim. 

That is the frame that we will need to implement going forward.

As I commented at Eschaton today:

"...Roe will be under attack, don't kid yourselves for one moment. While they may not approach a federal ban on abortion, once Roe is weakened, every state will be able to implement a local attack on it. The assault will happen in the same manner as the gay rights issue, with no support under civil rights acts at federal level and beaten down at state level.

The question of framing and symbolism will be difficult, since we'll be up against the Christian right's "Thou Shalt Not Kill" meme.

This is about women's rights. It's about the slippery slope. Once you take away a woman's right to make her own reproductive choices, once you subordinate a woman's rights to that of a non-citizen that cannot even support itself outside of the womb, what else will be taken away?

At what point will women be forced to wear burkas? Look at the most common sects of the religious right; many actively condemn women wearing pants or cutting their hair or using makeup. How far is the walk to a veil, a burka?

Birth control education has already been restricted; at what point will women be discouraged from learning anything about their bodies, prevented access to the sciences, prevented access to basic health care? That's what happened to the women of Afghanistan...

At what point are women even permitted to vote if they are voting to "kill babies"? They don't let women vote in Saudi Arabia, after all...

It's time to frame this as a women's rights issue. It's time to frame the Christian fundamentalists of this country as no different than those of the Muslim world. The symbolism is right there for us to use.

9/ll was a terrorist assault by a fundmentalist sect against the free world, against free women.

So  too were Eric Robert Rudolph's bombings.

Framed as a women's right's issue, we already know there will considerable support based on the numbers, support that goes across party lines. This time, unlike the ERA in the 70's, men must get behind this as well."

Or do you support anti-woman terrorists, too?

8:50:50 AM    comment []