Does the filibuster really only protect the corporations & the NRA?

[billbuckhead]

I'm convinced the filibuster really only protects corporations & the NRA. The Democrats were already making concessions on a woman's right to choose and screwed the middle class royally over on the bankruptcy scam. They're just saving the filibuster as safeguard against progressive victories in the future.

[Kolesar]

1. Piss Owens had some horrible environmental decisions

She was one of those who "invented" rights for corporations that heretofore had not existed. Being a judge, she had the power to do such.

[dsc]

2. Name one concession on abortion

and I don't mean Casey who likely would have won his primary. I mean a substantive concession on abortion as in a law which passed with majority or substantial minority Democratic support.

[billbuckhead]

3. For Democrats, abortion revisited

For Democrats, abortion revisited
The party that lost on Nov. 2 wrestles with how to add nuance on a key cultural divide in America.
By Linda Feldmann | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

WASHINGTON - For Democrats who favor abortion rights - that is, most of the party - this week may carry the sensation of standing on the edge of a cliff: President Bush has just been sworn in for four more years, and it's possible he will get to nominate enough new Supreme Court justices to overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark ruling that legalized abortion nationwide 32 years ago Saturday.

But embedded in this week of inauguration and stock-taking lies a central irony: At a time when abortion-rights forces are feeling an acute sense of peril, they are also being asked to reframe the way abortion is discussed - including being more receptive to Democrats who oppose abortion.

"I have long believed that we ought to make a home for pro-life Democrats," Howard Dean, a leading candidate to become the next Democratic Party chairman, said on "Meet the Press" last month. While calling himself "strongly pro-choice," he urged respect for antiabortion Democrats whose policy positions, such as support for children's programs, are "often lacking on the Republican side.

<http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0121/p03s01-uspo.html>

[Kolesar]

4. I don't see an abortion concession in those three paragraphs ... eom

[billbuckhead]

5. Ken Lay has a big smile on his face. Cheney is breathing a sigh of relief

Kenny Boy is laughing it up right now, he's getting his Enron judges. Halliburton can go back to screwing us without fear of judicial action.

[Kolesar]

6. still nothing about abortion ... eom

[billbuckhead]

8. Dean himself says there is no right to an abortion in the constitution

Sun, 13 Jul 2003

There has been a lot of excitement in the American Internet community about Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean because he knows how to use a blog, raise money on-line and maybe not necessarily heap more disgrace upon America. So I decided to check out Howard Dean's website and his stand on the issues.

The high level summary is that he is a tax and spend liberal whose solution to most problems is to throw money at it. He doesn't have any new ideas, few concrete plans and no apparent clue for how we will fund the money he wants to lob around other than getting rid of Bush's tax cuts. While I may identify with large parts of Dean's social agenda fundamentally Dean believes government is the solution, not the problem.


Abortion - He claims a right to privacy in the constitution (I should love for it to be there but I can't manage to find it) and uses that as the basis to support his pro-choice platform. Would that he said that the Supreme court was wrong, that there is no right to an abortion in the constitution and that this is a states issue.

-----------snip---------------------

<http://goland.org/reviews/howarddean2004.htm>

And this is on the NOW homepage today

"We have very disturbing news to report—some Democratic leaders are actively recruiting anti-abortion candidates and forcing out pro-choice Democrats!

Feminists and progressives must speak out to stop the Democratic Party from becoming "Republican-lite" on women's issues and undermining its own women candidates.

Barbara Hafer is a strong advocate for reproductive rights and was the frontrunner to take on extremist Republican incumbent Rick Santorum in the 2006 Pennsylvania Senate. She has just been forced out of the race by Democratic leaders and consultants in favor of an anti-abortion candidate they recruited.

Who did top Democrats pick to run against Santorum, one of the leading anti-abortion, anti-women's rights and anti-gay senators?

Top Democrats recruited Robert P. Casey Jr., a staunch abortion opponent in the mold of his father, the late Pennsylvania Governor Bob Casey Sr. You may recognize his name from the 1992 Supreme Court case of Casey v. Planned Parenthood, in which the senior Casey defended Pennsylvania's Abortion Control Act, which was so extreme that the Supreme Court struck it down.

And who made sure that Hafer would not run? She was pushed out by Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, who previously supported Hafer, then made the call forcing her out of the race; Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, who serves as the top Senate recruiter for the Democrats (as head of the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee); and political consultants who are already lining up with the Casey campaign."

<http://www.nowpacs.org/alerts/democrats-letter-03-05.html>

[dsc]

10. Very selective history here

Hafer dropped out and to my knowledge she wasn't threatened with violence or tortured. Also Hafer was a Republican, who endorsed Santorum twice, until 2003. Just how much can she really care about pro choice?

And on edit, I had already conceeded Casey. You still haven't shown any concession on abortion at all.

[billbuckhead]

7. How about this states rights language? The new line in the sand?

MR. RUSSERT: Well, the--but several heads of the American Medical Association endorsed banning third-term abortions because they said life of the mother is one thing but the health is a much different issue. It can be defined in so many different ways, it was a major loophole.

DR. DEAN: You know what I'd prefer to see, frankly? I'd prefer to see medical practice boards around the country, state by state--because people do believe different things about this in different states."

<http://msnbc.msn.com/id/7924139/> Yesterday on Meet the Press

[dsc]

9. that was about third term abortions

WHERE THAT ALREADY CAN BE DONE BY LAW. STOP BEING DISHONEST.

[billbuckhead]

11. Does Dean believe there is a right to an abortion in the Constitution?

Are you saying I'm dishonest becauase I link to the NOW website?