"My guess is that someone on the left felt somewhat justified in releasing the opinion in response. Through the opinion, one would see what the Journal was saying Kavanaugh and Barrett were considering. That leak was a historically unprecedented violation of the deepest and most solemn trust among the justices and the court’s staff. It wounded the institution."
—
This is certainly possible. (I mean, anything’s possible.) And while I’m fairly confident in my opinion, Goldstein certainly knows the Court far better than I do. What is notable to me though is that we seem to be moving towards a broader consensus that there were a series of leaks. And thus, to the extent there was some breakdown in the function and norms of the Court, it went far beyond just the leak of the opinion draft to Politico.
Gosh, it’s almost like popular vote losing presidents putting right wing fascist ideologues on the court instead of qualified, tested, respected jurists has made the court just another corrupted political body that behaves like any other corrupted political body.
Gosh. Who ever could have seen this coming.
(via wilwheaton)
(Source: talkingpointsmemo.com, via wilwheaton)
"Regardless of who leaked the draft, in its wake, the political landscape in the country appears to be shifting. The right wing seems to see this as its moment to accomplish the imposition of religious restrictions they had previously only dreamed of achieving. Talk of ending gay marriage, recriminalizing homosexuality, undermining public schools, and so on, is animating the radical right. Media stories have noted that most democratic countries have, in fact, been expanding reproductive rights. Going the opposite direction is a sign of rising authoritarianism. The United States shares that distinction right now with Poland and Nicaragua."
— Heather Cox Richardson (via wilwheaton)
"The GOP has evolved into a reactionary cult seeking minority rule through the world’s most effective ecosystem of propaganda that feeds millions of Americans a steady diet of strategic victimization."
— Jason Sattler, The Editorial Board (via wilwheaton)
covington-shenanigans:
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By the way legislators aren’t making laws specifically targeting the LGBTQ community because of pansexuals or trans people without dysphoria or aces and aros. They’re doing it because they hate queer people, and want to make us existing openly illegal.
No amount of “but but but the new labels are making us look bad and people won’t take us seriously” will ever change the fact that you are putting yourself on the side of people that want us dead. So stand by your community, or put a damn sock in it.
This is your community. There is no circumstance that you should say “well, the oppressor is right on this one” but that’s what SO many of you are doing!
When politicians mock parts of our community that they know you won’t bother to defend, they’re using it as a foot in the door. They are using it as a way to make their next action seem less extreme, and they will continue until they have achieved what’s happening in Texas and Idaho. And you are allowing them to.
Other queer people are not your enemy. And once again if you still can’t see that, you’re on the side of the oppressors.
my babies, this is how they always do it. they go after the “freaks” first. they go after the strange ones, the fringe ones, the ones who aren’t palatable, who don’t have anyone to defend them, who can’t find anyone to defend them because they’re “freaks”. and once they get a foot in the door, they move on to the next group. this is what they do. because their goal, their actual goal, is to eliminate us.
I absolutely guarantee you these assholes do not know or care about the finer points of queer identity. you cannot be the right kind of queer for them; there is no such thing. respectability politics will not save you. it never has and it never will.
do you honestly think these anti-queer laws are going to stop once they’ve sufficiently beaten down the trans people? do you legitimately think the people who hate us are going to be satisfied with just that? no! they’re going to do what they always do and ride that victory into a fresh wave of persecution. and little by little they’ll try to eat away at our rights, push us back in the closet, back into the airless dark.
they don’t have to win, but it takes all of us pushing back. stop this ridiculous infighting and stand together.
(via steverogersnotebook)
