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Thu, 22/06/2023 - 08:00
Following up on the post below here’s a pro-choice tactic that should tie the other side up in knots: Revs. Jan Barnes and Krista Taves have logged hundreds of hours standing outside abortion clinics across Missouri and Illinois, going back to the mid-1980s. But unlike other clergy members around the country, they never pleaded with patients to turn back. The sight of the two women in clerical collars holding up messages of love and support for people terminating a pregnancy “so infuriated the anti-abortion protesters that they would heap abuse on us and it drew the abuse away from the women,” recalled Taves, a minister at Eliot Unitarian Chapel in Kirkwood, Missouri, as she sat on a couch at Barnes’ stately church in this quiet suburb of St. Louis. “I thought: ‘Whoa, these people really are not messing around.’ But then I thought, ‘Well, I’m not messing around either.’” So when Missouri’s abortion ban took effect after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year, Barnes and Taves decided to fight back.
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Thu, 22/06/2023 - 06:30
Will the new anti-abortion tactics work? They want a total national ban, don’t kid yourself. But they’ve always been willing to do it incrementally. Now that they have succeeded in overturning Roe and “returning it to the states” they’re moving simultaneously to push full bans where they can get it and a so-called “moderate” ban for all the states where it is currently legal. It’s diabolical: A key anti-abortion group is pushing to get Republicans singing from the same songbook a year after the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade damaged the party’s national political prospects. Citing a new round of national polling the group commissioned, Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America argues in a new memo, obtained by Semafor, that many Americans are comfortable limiting access to abortions even if they consider themselves broadly “pro-choice.” It’s part of an effort to convince Republicans to go on offense with an issue that many believe played a role in the party’s disappointing midterms performance, and get them to at least back a national ban on abortions after 15 weeks.
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Thu, 22/06/2023 - 05:00
If a Republican get into the White House we’re going to find out Semafor (subsc. only)reports on Trump’s latest “policy” announcement: Donald Trump unveiled another sweeping piece of his plans to slash federal spending and defund the “deep state” on Tuesday, effectively claiming vast, unchecked powers to shape the government.  In a new video, first shared with Semafor, the former president vowed to scrap pieces of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, the once obscure federal law he was accused of violating when he froze funding Congress had earmarked for Ukraine. That move helped lead to his first impeachment. The statute forces the executive branch to spend money Congress approves. But it also puts in place rules governing how the president can delay — or “impound” — federal funding for specific programs, or permanently rescind cash from them with permission from lawmakers. Congress passed it after President Richard Nixon attempted to scrap tens of billions in federal spending on his own, in what was widely seen as an abuse of his powers.
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Thu, 22/06/2023 - 04:56
There were celebrations and high expectations when Prime Minister Albanese and his talented front bench formed the government in May 2022. The language and style of the national agenda appealed to Australians wanting realistic policies and a two-way conversation about what is in the best interests of our community. There were inspiring speeches and commitments Continue reading »
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Thu, 22/06/2023 - 04:55
Last Thursday (14 June), the Government tabled its Public Service Act Amendment Bill 2023 in the House of Representatives. The Bill is almost exactly the same as the exposure draft which was released by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet on 22 May with consultation ending on 31 May. Because there have been no Continue reading »
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Thu, 22/06/2023 - 04:54
Blockade Australia’s return this week, in larger numbers and across three locations, represents a victory over ‘Strategic incapacitation’, a policing technique that aims to smash the organising ability of a group of people, such that the group can no longer function. “Like the hydra, we are back threefold. You cannot decapitate the climate movement,” they Continue reading »
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Thu, 22/06/2023 - 04:51
Despite the great interest in and importance of US Secretary of State Blinken’s visit to China, there have been far more interesting things happening here for China watchers. They illustrate the continuing shift in geopolitical gravity towards China as the centre of the multipolar world. To coin a sporting phrase, “it’s all happening here”. Here Continue reading »