On the Stupid Arizona and Georgia Bigotry Laws

[MineralMan]

Here's how I see this:

Right now, there is a desperation on the part of the bigoted, hateful right wing. They can see what's coming soon, and their bigotry and hatred is threatened. In Arizona and Georgia, as examples, right wingers and fundamentalist religious bigots still can just manage to push laws through their state legislatures in an attempt to codify their bigotry and hatred.

It's a desperation move. Faced with a changing demographic, Supreme Court and other Federal court decisions, and the inevitability that things like marriage equality, bigots are soon not going to be able to ban things they don't like, so they're making a last-ditch effort to enact laws they think might forestall the changes they're seeing. They know their time is short, so they're pushing as hard as they can.

And worse, those state legislators are scared to death that their comfy jobs are at risk. So, they push these bigoted, stupid bills through the legislature, using threats of primary opposition and other threats to get other legislators to vote with them. They need to take something to their constituents that says, "Look here! We're guarding our state from change. See what we did! You should get out and vote for us, because FEAR."

It won't play much longer. Expect Arizona's Governor to veto the most recent bill. It's economically a bad thing, and her financial supporters and others are making it clear to her that it won't wash. We're one Supreme Court decision from every state being required to recognize marriages performed in those states that have implemented marriage equality. We're a few Federal Court decisions away from laws like these new ones from being tossed in the garbage for the inequality they codify. We're very close to a new demographic majority that won't accept any of this nonsense. The old guard is, well, old and dying off.

It's a last gasp. It's panic. It's futile. It's over for the right wing religious fundamentalists. They just don't know it yet. But it's over.

And we can accelerate that process. In every state and every jurisdiction, there is a majority or near majority of people who are eligible to vote but who do not vote. Many are not even registered to vote. Election activism, including identifying and registering the unregistered and GOTV efforts to get every voter in this new demographic to the polls can accelerate the change. It's something we can do, and it's something we should do. I think it's something we must do. We can make the changes happen, but we have to make the effort. Every non-voter who feels the bigotry and hatred and every non-registered voter who would vote against these right-wing bigots needs to do just that.

We can help!

GOTV 2014 and Beyond!

[The Magistrate]

1. Hear Hear, Sir!

[MineralMan]

2. I thank the kind gentleman on the left! nt

[HappyMe]

3. It is panic and a last gasp effort.

I don't think we should underestimate the power of the rw though. There are a lot of boneheads out there that just may sign on with their lunacy.

What angers me is that it takes the threat of economic measures to get her to do the right thing. Even if she vetoes this, she's not an advocate for lgbt rights.

[MineralMan]

4. I don't think we should underestimate anything.

I think we should get out there and do what needs to be done.

As for Governor Brewer, she's a horrible, nasty person. But she listens to those who contribute to her campaigns, and they're telling her not to sign this stupid bill. It's just another sign that things are changing. She'd love to sign it, but she can see the writing on the wall. She needs to be replaced.

[jeff47]

7. "Last gasps" in politics can take a very long time to end.

For example, the Dixiecrats had large effects on the parties for a generation after it was apparent they would be going away.

The current Republican hegemony is in the process of collapsing, but that doesn't mean it will finish collapsing any time soon. It could take many years. It definitely will take many years if we do not do better at GOTV in non-presidential years.

[HappyMe]

8. Very true.

It won't happen overnight. I wonder just how bizarre a party they will have when it all shakes out.

I would like to see the Dems move a bit to the left.

[jeff47]

11. Where the Dems go depends on how the Republicans collapse.

If the Republicans wander further off into the right until they reach oblivion, there's going to be a lot of pressure to drag the Democratic party to where the Republican party was in the 1960s/1970s. Dems would be "only picking up the left end" of the former Republicans, up until they drag the party so far to the right that the left side of the party breaks off to form a "new" left party. (or turn a minor left-of-center party into a major party).

An alternative scenario is that the Republicans fracture into religious and economic conservatives, and the economic conservatives are the ones who retain the party. In that case, the "new" Republicans hold that same 1960s/1970s position, and the Democratic party moves left. This would be nicer, in that it should take less time to settle down than forming a "new" left party.

Either could happen, but there really isn't a scenario where the existing Republican party survives.

[frazzled]

5. But some forms of discrimination will sadly persist

I think it's true that economic interests and the general will of the nation will not permit a state like Arizona to institute Jim Crow-type laws that permit discrimination against the LGBT community, on the supposed grounds of religious belief. I, like millions of others, would most certainly boycott that state if it were to go through—vigorously. And I would put pressure on others to do so.

Yet Arizona does have a law on its books that permits health care providers and pharmacists to refuse women access to reproductive health services and/or birth control if they feel it goes against their "conscience." Where was the call to boycott that state for such a law? Nowhere, to my knowledge. Frankly, many states have initiated such anti-women laws, and the federal government has even been forced by successful right-wing challenges to support such "conscience clauses." Right now we await Supreme Court decisions on the ability of employers to refuse insurance policies to their workers that include women's reproductive care, based on their religious beliefs.

I wish we could muster as much righteous outrage for these laws, which keep creeping in without much protest or consequence. Because really, once such "conscience clause" exception laws become standard for women, a legal precedent is set that might have deleterious consequences for other groups.

[MineralMan]

6. And that is why we must work to elect people who

will not enact such laws and who will repeal the existing ones. My example was just one example. I'm not ignoring other examples, but my OP was already long enough. The answer for all such bigotry is still the same:

GOTV 2014 and Beyond!

[B2G]

9. I thought RFRA was a federal law

?

[wocaonimabi]

10. Yes many people do not vote for a varity of reason but mainly they do not vote

becasue it does not matter to them who is in office they get screwed either way.

When the party gives people a reason to vote followed up by ACTION, people will vote.

Threating people with well Teabagger XXXX will get elected, yeah so what. They voted for the Democrat and still got F-ed over, at least the TeaBagger provides comedy relief.