You know, five years ago I wouldn't be quite so worried about O'Connor stepping down. "She's hardly a leftist," I would have thought, "I mean, even if they put forward someone more conservative, how bad could it be?"
Suffice it to say, I've changed my view of these things. I'm just glad Gonzales already has a job. I figure they'll put forward some woman with the most retrograde vision of reproductive rights possible (as well as privacy, free speech, freedom of assembly...). Then when there are objections they'll accuse the "liberals" of partisanship and sexism. Really the whole thought of it makes me want to both cry and vomit.
Many years ago, when I was 21, I stayed for a few days at this rooming house in Utrecht (NL). It was one of the most comfortable, cozy places I stayed for almost no money during that trip. The first night I was there, the woman who owned the house--a cute, bustling, motherly woman who loved to help me with my Dutch and made boiled eggs with little knit ski caps on them--warned me that the next day a couple was coming from Spain. Her house, she explained, sheltered folks who came to Holland ostensibly on vacation but really to obtain abortions. At the time, I thought about how grateful I was that the US was past that level of prohibition. That my elder sisters had fought for my rights and those dark days were behind us.
Today I just think about how grateful I am that my reproductive years are drawing to a close. This is going to be completely and totally fucked.
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