Comments

1
I'll be going downtown to support her after I get off work tonight. Looks like I'll have a lot of company too.
2
No mic stand? Yammering on and on for 13 hours is one (not easy) thing, but holding a mic the whole time increases the physical difficulty.
3
Wow! Some of the letters she's reading are really powerful. You go, Wendy!
4
I've always liked the name Wendy. Holly too. Those are the only two female-ends-with-y names that I can think of that I like, though.
5
Just as I get more cynical, a hero emerges.
6
She's a heroine! Start #GoWendy on twitter!
7
She should read each word in one second interval. If it's me I'll piss and shit on the floor (if it doesn't violate their regulation) to show my disgust for this travesty of a bill.
8
@7 - The last thing she needs is to give the opposition any petty reason to have her removed from the floor.
9
Wow, this is unbelievable drama. What a heroine. Let's go viral on Twitter #GoWendy!
10
The rule says she can't use the bathroom but doesn't say she can't piss on the spot
11
@10 There are rules of Senate decorum which the Lt. Governor (who's presiding and who's a major force behind this bill) would almost certainly rule she violated.

Besides, do you really want to hand more ammunition to the opposition?
12
How many more Gosnells and Karpens will it take to demonstrate that the line distinguishing between the legitimate exercise of a woman's right to choose and the murder of a child is indistinct and meaningless? At what point does a fetus mysteriously transform into a constitutionally or morally meaningful person or life? Is it at birth? Partial birth? At birth, but only if the mother intended for the baby to be born alive? When the child can raise its hands in protest? When do the unborn attain value? Only when planned? Only when wanted? Only when wanted by the natural mother? Only when healthy? Only when timely? Only when convenient?

I assume that rather than answer these questions, the advocates of the right to choose will continue to talk about victims of rape, pregnant women fighting cancer, the social and economic consequences of unplanned pregnancies, personal autonomy, etc. All of these are tough issues - none of them answer the critical questions.

Let the red herrings, straw men, and ad hominems begin...
13
@12 Why don't you answer your own damn questions first.

Everyone has a different idea of when "life" begins. Maybe you think that life begins when a sperm enters an egg. Maybe you think that condom use is immoral.

You should tell us your beliefs first so we know what kind of person you are.

As far as the law goes it should be up to an individual woman to decide when she should or should not get an abortion. Not you. Not me. Not your goddamn stupid mythological sky god.

The only red herrings are those used by the anti choice crowd.
14
#12 - "At what point does a fetus mysteriously transform into a constitutionally or morally meaningful person or life? Is it at birth?"
The current law says 24 weeks.
You're the one who is putting out red herrings. How about situations like when the mother's life or health is threatened, when the fetus has fatal illness, when the fetus's certain to be miscarried etc etc.. These are real life tough choices anti-choice fucktards like you chose to ignore and want to ban abortions regardless of any circumstances.
15
These letters are incredible. I'm completely, utterly awed. Wendy is my hero.
17
14

current law.

well, that settles it.

as long as you make it legal it must be moral, right?

the Nazis thought so.

everything they did was legal under German law, they argued at Nuremberg.

A millions babies a year. six million Jews.

relax. it's all legal.....
18
@17

You are an asshole. Anyone who compares abortion to genocide or the Holocaust is an asshole who does not have a grasp on reality.

Go back to your cave where you came from.
19
@17 Godwins law - you are irrelevant to this discussion

@12 The division is the same between a child and an adult. Between one able to drink and one too young to do so.

The line is drawn by society and society says that an individual must be allowed mastery over their own body. Until then, the dividing cells within that body have no more individual rights than any other growth.

I can understand that this is disconcerting. It's a kinda messed up idea that we have to even draw this line, but, more importantly, the issue at hand is not one of pro-abortion or anti-abortion. I think that issue must be decided and argued on a personal basis, not a governmental stage.

The underlying issue is that Texas isn't trying to dissuade a woman from choosing to have an abortion, they're trying to dictate what rights a woman has over aspects of her own body.

Look, I'm with you in that I don't like abortions. I would love a world in which no one needs to have one. But I think that trying to outlaw them is like trying to plug an assembly line at the wrong end. Instead, why not try to work towards a world where they aren't necessary?
20
@12: I think it's fair to say that a fetus becomes legally a person when it attains viability. That is, if it were to be removed (via vaginal birth or a caesarian section) from the uterus, it would survive given medical care and have the capacity to develop normally.
Any issues with that definition?
21
Pro-lifers truly interested in "saving babies" would do well to read this article. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/lovejoyfemi…
22
Go like her on Facebook and send her well wishes:

https://www.facebook.com/wendydavistexas…
23
My own argument would be that abortion should be legal until 3 days after birth. That way a mother who can't get a medical abortion can still kill it post-birth. The Inuit did that for years. Not a lot of medical facilities up there.

Most people hate that idea, and I realize that. It's just what I believe.

The real issue though, shouldn't even be abortion and whether a fetus is a person or not. The real issue should be preventing abortion from even being needed in the first place, halting unwanted pregnancies. Education, openness, health care... these are the things we should really be talking about.
24
@12 - not that others haven't said it, but basically - and speaking of the straw men, ad hominems, etc. - it begins at viability. Your long list of questions has, in fact, been addressed. I doubt you really care honestly though.

Gosnell was a pretty easy prosecution because the standards do exist - and he pretty clearly violated them. Late term - post viability - abortions are precluded, pretty much out and out. If the life of the mother is at risk, they can perform a c-section for a viable birth. For non-viable fetuses - that is, fetuses who cannot live on their own - say spina-bifida or anechaphaly - then an abortion is permitted. However, these are not viable fetuses - not viable independent human beings.
25
@19

I had a beer last night and told my 18
year old nephew he couldn't.

Are you seriously comparing that decision to the murder of an unborn child?

26
@25

It's not a child, dipshit.
27
I'm kind of addicted to watching her now. She has so much grace and tact conversing with the senators who disagree with her, and the conversation is so civil and respectful. She's awesome. I'm letting it run in the background while I work.
28
I wonder why the Republicans are asking her questions. It doesn't seem to fluster and it gives her a chance to give her voice a break.

Not a winning strategy if you ask me.
29
@26

If I were an advocate of mass infanticide I suppose I'd have to salve my conscience with transparent lies a (non-murdered) child could see through as well...
30
@25 Not at all. I think my wording may have been insufficient. What I was saying was that the difference between a cluster of cells and a protected entity in the eyes of the law exists only as dictated by society. As there is no sudden physiological reason that someone at 21 is old enough to drink or someone at 18 is old enough to vote, there is, to my knowledge, no physiological reason that a zygote is 'ready' to be a person. The only reason that the line is where it is is because we've decided that's where it is.

Though, I have to say, the use of the phrasing "Murder of an unborn child" leads me to believe that you aren't interested in other opinions.
31
I'm throwing campaign contributions at my screen and nothing is happening!
32
I mean I agree with not shutting down clinics but 20 weeks...you mean 5 months. That's a really long time to decide that you don't want a baby anymore.
34
@29

The fact that you compare abortion to infanticide shows just how immoral and disgusting you are. You are no better than someone who compares abortion to what occurred at Auschwitz.

You are a grotesque human being; you should be ashamed of yourself.
35
Every try to schedule an appointment to get your teeth cleaned? Sometimes it takes weeks to schedule an abortion.
36
BTW, repeatedly well stated passionate jus!
37
@12: At any point that the fetus is still inside my body, I have the choice of whether or not I want it to still be there. That is the line. It is nobody else's choice but my own, as the person who is carrying said fetus.
38
@25: What he was saying is that all such legal age distinctions (24 weeks is viability, 18 years is majority, 21 years is drinky drinky) are to some degree arbitrary.
@29: http://pigroll.com/img/abortion_not_a_di…
39
#12 makes the classic mistake of making the issue all about the fetus, rather than the rights of the woman carrying it and what we see as the role for big government in our lives. For the Religious Right, the woman's rights do not matter, and they are willing to give big government more power to over-regulate our private lives and personal decisions in an attempt to force the rest of Americans to live under their religious beliefs. Sometimes I think they worship fetuses and not god.
40
@20 " I think it's fair to say that a fetus becomes legally a person when it attains viability. [...] Any issues with that definition?"

As medicine progresses, the age of viability arguably decreases, if we simply describe this an interventionist capability to remove the unwanted presence from the woman's body and have it live. There is a cost component that needs to be considered, such that a woman doesn't quickly become a baby incubator because the legal paths available due to progress are not economically oppressive. Arguably the state could bridge this gap, although I can't imagine most of the anti-choice brigade actually being willing to pay into a system that removed the death from abortion, even though that will probably be medically possible soon enough.
41
So, Texas suddenly cares about the dignity of human life? How'd that work out for Lenora Frago?
42
The anti-choice movement not only compares abortion to infanticide, they are quite fond of comparing it to slavery. I'm sure that's one of the reasons why the Republicans get so much of the black vote.
43
@40: When it is possible to remove a severely premature fetus from a woman's uterus and allow it to develop to maturity ex utero, I'd be fine with restricting abortion in favor of that, so long as insurance is required to cover that option.
44
@43 I think we agree, although I am currently explicitly demanding more theoretical legal provisions for non-abortion in terms of abdicating responsibility for the removed fetus before I agreed it was okay to lose abortion rights to the science-fictional procedure.
46
I strongly suspect that Texas filibuster requirements violate OSHA and the ADA. Can we get a ruling on that?
47
I think abortion should be legal until they are 18 years old...where is my right?
48
@39

Nobody is trying to make your indiscriminate drunken sex with strangers illegal. No-one is trying to take away contraception from adults.

What common sense minded people ARE saying is that murder is not ever, ever a civil right.
49
@32, when I got pregnant, I didn't miss a period until I was three months in. I hadn't had unprotected sex, so I didn't have an idea that I was pregnant until then. It took me about three weeks to come to the decision to get an abortion, which I don't think is a crazy amount of time, and then it was about two weeks before I actually got into the clinic to have one; at that point, I was 19 weeks. It could easily have taken longer for me to schedule it, especially if more clinics were shut down. 20 weeks really isn't that long.
51
Shit, it's 8:55 p.m. here - I don't hear Sen. Davis speaking - is the session over? Did she collapse or lose her voice?!? WHAT'S HAPPENING?!?

Agh! I KNEW I should have stayed tuned in!
52
Okay, so she "allegedly" got her 3rd strike, but the ruling is being challenged. Anyone know if this could potentially turn into a "run out the clock" scenario, like, if the appeal drags out until the official close of the session?
53
@51

If you want to keep up to the minute by minute go to twitter and check out #StandWithWendy

or her facebook page

https://www.facebook.com/wendydavistexas

Basically the Senate has a rule where members can object to her filibuster if she isn't following the rules. If there are three objections that are ok'd by the chair then her filibuster is forcibly ended and they vote on the bill. The GOP is trying to shut her down.

The 3 objections have been over her talking about Planned Parenthood, which the Republicans said was not germaine to this bill and the fact that one of her Democratic colleagues tried to help her put on a back brace.

A bunch of bullshit of course!

54
The Democrats are trying to run down the clock with procedural rules and points of inquiry.

And the gallery has erupted several times. There are reports that the state police is locking the building and not letting people into the gallery anymore.
55
I can't wait to vote for Hilary Clinton in 2016!

Fuck these GOP bastards!
56
@51 Basically, the Chair threw out the rule book and recognized members of his party improperly. Total hardball, and used to railroad this thing to a vote. Ridiculous.

Has been interesting watching.
57
Ok so now what's the deal? Anyone understand what all the milling around is about?
58
Bumping a 12-hour old SLOG post isn't coverage. Let's have some Stranger feedback ASAP.
59
There's a huge amount of confusion: TX Senate Dems are saying the vote didn't begin until after midnight; Reps are saying vote was completed before midnight. Nobody seems to know exactly what's going on. I watched the coverage, but there was never an official vote count announced by the Secretary, and the session wasn't officially adjourned by the President, although that may be moot since supposedly the session is automatically over at midnight.

HUGE amount of Twitter traffic, I've got a lot of friends posting on FB, scanning CNN & even the Texas Tribune page for updates & information.
60
The vote should be invalid in any case, there was a motion on the floor to have the question put to writing and read to the body by the recording secretary (or whatever) which did not happen. Nothing should have taken place until that happened. Of course, I'm no parliamentarian, but it seems pretty basic.
61
Here's a local liveblog:

http://www.texastribune.org/2013/06/24/d…

Basically there are Republicans who said the vote started before midnight and thus the bill is passed, while there are Democrats who said that the vote concluded after midnight.

100,000s of thousands saw what happened on the live feed.

There is no way that this vote should count.

If the Republicans try to say it does then there should be lawsuits immediately.
62
According to one Dem Senator the chamber's time-stamp clearly shows the vote did not start until after 12:00 a.m.

http://www.texastribune.org/2013/06/24/d…
63
Aaaaand, the live feed has been shut down, with no announcement or resolution. How am I going to get to sleep?
64
Annnnd - there goes the live feed...
65
12:02 a.m. — that's the time state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, says the Senate timestamp shows a vote taken on Senate Bill 5. If that's true, the vote may not withstand legal scrutiny.

"It's pretty conclusive that it didn't pass," said Whitmire. The Senate still has not officially adjourned sine die, although the special session legally ends at midnight. When Senators resume floor proceedings, Whitmire said Democrats will call a point of order on the motion to vote on a bill after the midnight deadline.

http://www.texastribune.org/2013/06/24/d…

If true the vote doesn't count. End of story.
66
I really wish there was definitive news on this tonight -- it's honestly going to keep me awake. That was by far the most compelling parliamentary drama I've seen since the movie Lincoln (and this was far more exciting). I think the causes of freedom and justice for women in this country has found a new champion in Sen. Wendy Davis. I really hope it wasn't for nought.
67
What a debacle. The Texas GOP looked even more shifty - and shitty - than I thought possible. Wonder if they realize how big of an audience was watching as they pulled their dirty tricks. Democracy indeed. Fuck the Texas GOP.
68
Aaand some fascist knucklehead threw firebombs at Sen. Davis's office. http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/03/21/ma…
69
More live video right now outside the Capitol:

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/christophe…
70
Regardless of the outcome, the GOP can rest assured that they have just fired up the pro-choice movement. And Wendy Davis is bound to receive a shitload of donations. Thanks, conservatives!!!
71
This may be the only comments thread in slog history that is NOT cynical enough. That bill, unfortunately, will pass. I hope to be proven wrong shortly.
72
http://www.legis.state.tx.us/BillLookup/… and http://www.capitol.state.tx.us/BillLooku… previously showed the vote as happening on the 26th, have since been changed to 25th. That seems a little fraudulent.
73
@68: I don't even know why people are passing that story around...it's a year old. My bad for not catching that.
74
@73, they'll probably do it again now. Cynic though I try to be, I'm still amazed at what bastards Republicans are. If only Molly Ivins were still with us, just imagine what she'd say.
75
49

wow.

you never had unprotected sex but got pregnant?

and had two periods while you were pregnant??

they should do a Lifetime special about you....
76
18

You are right, the comparison is inappropriate and we apologize.

Because the yearly slaughter of a million totally innocent totally helpless babies by their own mothers and a physician who is sworn to 'do no harm' dwarfs any other genocidal crime in the history of humanity.

Lincoln (a Republican) mused that "every drop of blood drawn with the lash [of slavery], shall be paid by another drawn with the sword"

We wonder what price this society will pay for the blood of tens of millions of totally innocent totally helpless babies slaughtered in the name of selfish "choice".

Some choices are evil.

All choices bring consequences.

The Arc of the Moral Universe will turn out to be not as Long as some might hope, because It ALWAYS Bends Toward Justice.

77
Republicans are horrible people. This is the State that Tom DeLay came from after all. They have a lot of brave democrats tho.

@76 - Choices like keeping loaded guns in a home with babies and kids? You're right Gollum, some choices are evil. Who will stop the slaughter?
78
Seattleblues (comment 48): "What common sense minded people ARE saying is that murder is not ever, ever a civil right."

But I bet you believe Zimmerman was right to shoot Martin. And I bet you believe gun restrictions are wrong. Hypocrite.

Keep your laws off women's bodies. We don't share your "morals".
79
77

let's do it together. Pudge!

You get abortion of convenience outlawed (of course we will keep rape and life/health-of-the-mother exceptions) and save a million babies a year and we will get gun lock laws passed and save a couple of hundred kids a year.

keep us posted on your progress.....
80
79 - Oh Gollum, I'm surprised at you. If aborting cells is evil, why are you allowing exceptions? Why are clumps of cells derived from rape different from the other clumps of cells? Why isn't the "murder" those cells evil too?
81
@78

I don't know what happened to Trayvon Martin. Fortunately there's a jury to decide that. On the facts rather than media hysteria.

Owning a gun and murder aren't the same thing. Murdering an unborn child is however always murder. Don't want to carry a child. Thank God, given your abhorrent beliefs. You DO have a choice. Practice birth control. Your femininity (such as it is) does not give a 'right' to infanticide
82
Zygotes aren't children. You can't change that simple, scientific fact, as undebateable as gravity, by calling zygotes "children."
83
@81:

If you're going to argue that a clump of undifferentiated cells is exactly equal to a fully gestated infant, then here's an easy solution: allow any female who doesn't want the clump of undifferentiated cells to have them surgically removed and re-implanted into a female who DOES want them. Can't find a female who wants to gestate those cells for seven or eight months? Put them in cryo-storage until somebody steps forward. It's a win-win for everyone: women who don't want to be pregnant don't have to be, women who want to give birth can, and the cells can remain in-storage almost indefinitely until a suitable host is found.

Now surely, you would have absolutely no problem with such an arrangement, yes?
84
Dear right wing anti-abortionists: the instant you start giving a crap about the welfare of children after they're born, we might start believing that your concern for the precious little fetuses is motivated by true humanitarianism, and not by a misogynistic desire to "punish" women by forcing them to carry unwanted pregnancies to term.

We'll still disagree with you, of course, but we might respect you a bit more.
85
@79: Not true. Only about 800k abortions happen in the US every year, and over 90% of them are before 13 weeks' gestation, well before the nervous system forms a single synapse.
@83: Thank you, Mr. Know-It-All, but I'm going to stick with what the science suggests rather than aligning to your angry ranting.
86
What amazing me about people who have Seattleblues stated opinion is that they believe millions of murders are being committed in America and all they do about it whine on the internet. Seriously, if a baby was on fire across the street from him, it seems he'd just shake his head sadly and blame liberals for it.

Please wait...

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