Health Care Wastelands And Abortion

 This Atlantic piece is a tough read about how Talibangelical abortion bans in Idaho are stripping the state of OB-GYNs, because they can't practice medicine there without violating either the law or their conscience. Two things.

First, places like Idaho are already on the "left behind" track that has created the conditions that allowed Trump to win in 2016. Actually, the sub-story of the Springfield anti-Haitian panic is the factory owner who said Haitians were the best, because they worked hard, went to church and didn't do drugs, unlike the White residents. The people voting for Trump are the ones who lost a friend or family member or neighbor to opioids or some other death of despair. They've seen the tragedy of being left behind, so when Trump talks about his American Carnage, that does resonate with them. (Or their evangelicals perpetually waiting for the End Times.) They themselves haven't been left behind - most Trumpists are well enough off - but they can see it from their front porch.

Second, I try not to engage politics with my very religious cousin in Texas. She's probably a fans of Libs of Tik Tok and the like. However, she was talking about post-birth abortions, and I couldn't let that slide. The comments were interesting, as I had a couple of people like my comments. More typical were people talking about late term abortions. I tried to focus on the fact that Trump was talking about literal infanticide and that doesn't happen (or is a crime). However, the vehemence on late term abortions was very palpable. They've been fed a steady diet of bullshit about this. Some of the facts are also in that Atlantic piece.

If you are having an abortion in the second half of your pregnancy, it is almost certainly because either A) the fetus will not live and/or B) the mother could die. Trump's vile lie about "post birth abortions" is actually about perinatal hospice, where parents sit with their newborn for the few hours it has to live while the staff give it palliative care so it doesn't suffer. 

Imagine the heartbreaking anguish of that entire situation. Imagine how preventing parents from being able to make their own decisions adds to that anguish. You've painted the nursery, you've picked out a name, your child is going to die shortly after birth. You can abort the fetus - which is indeed a grisly outcome - or you can bear the child - perhaps at great risk to the life and health of the mother. 

How does letting Samuel Alito or Donald Trump control that decision help things?

But ultimately, that might be the point. I can't help but wonder about the overlap between states with really shitty policy portfolios and Republican rule. We've always assumed that Republican rule leads to shitty policies like Idaho's or Mississippi's, and one party rule does tend to lead that way.

The question is whether shitty policies lead to Republican rule? If one party is slavishly devoted to the idea that government is terrible, evil, no-good Satanism, and then you wind up with shitty policies, it becomes a feedback loop.