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<title>02 July, 2022</title>
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<title>Daily-Dose</title><meta content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" name="viewport"/><link href="styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><link href="../styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><style>*{overflow-x:hidden;}</style><link href="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.css" rel="stylesheet"/><script src="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.js"></script></head>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="daily-dose">Daily-Dose</h1>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-vox">From Vox</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</a></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Is Biden Handling Putin Better Than He’s Handling Trump?</strong> - Facing down the threats that the two men pose to democracy has become the defining challenge of Biden’s Presidency. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-bidens-washington/is-biden-handling-putin-better-than-hes-handling-trump">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>A Potential Criminal Prosecution of Donald Trump Is Growing Closer</strong> - As evidence mounts, a rift has opened between the congressional committee investigating January 6th and the Department of Justice. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/a-potential-criminal-prosecution-of-donald-trump-is-growing-closer">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How the Supreme Court Could Approach Federal Laws Upholding—or Banning—Abortion</strong> - Without Roe, abortion is now a state-by-state issue. Is nationwide action by Congress the next frontier? - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/how-the-supreme-court-could-approach-federal-laws-upholding-or-banning-abortion">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Ukrainians Living in British Spare Rooms</strong> - A new program, Homes for Ukraine, allows average Brits to sponsor refugees fleeing the war, and host them in their houses. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-the-uk/the-ukrainians-living-in-british-spare-rooms">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Jia Tolentino and Stephania Taladrid on the End of Roe v. Wade</strong> - Two reporters compare notes on the rapid and chaotic impact of the Supreme Court’s decision. Plus, a crime story from a master of the form, Patrick Radden Keefe. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/podcast/the-new-yorker-radio-hour/jia-tolentino-and-stephania-taladrid-on-the-end-of-roe-v-wade">link</a></p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-vox">From Vox</h1>
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<li><strong>One Good Thing: A Danish drama lets its girlbosses fail</strong> -
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<img alt="Johanne Louise Schmidt as Signe Kragh and Sidse Babett Knudsen as Birgitte Nyborg take a smiling selfie together." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/0LkN5PFk59NE9CfSoIEJwxsSSXM=/202x0:1055x640/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/71040990/Screen_Shot_2022_06_29_at_10.28.45_AM.0.png"/>
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Johanne Louise Schmidt as Signe Kragh, left, and Sidse Babett Knudsen as Birgitte Nyborg in <em>Borgen</em> season 4. | Mike Kollöffel/Netflix via IMDB
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The latest season of Borgen is a political thriller for the Great Resignation.
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It’s no surprise that <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2020/9/11/21431527/borgen-netflix-denmark-birgitte-nyborg">the Danish series <em>Borgen</em></a> was a balm for many American viewers in the early days of the pandemic. Centering on the (fictional) first female prime minister of Denmark, the show depicts a functioning democracy with a robust social safety net, where government-funded health insurance and pensions are benefits voters take for granted. Sure, the show sometimes felt like fanfic, and it was often unclear exactly what heroine Birgitte Nyborg (Sidse Babett Knudsen), an avowed moderate, really stood for. But she came across as generally principled, caring, and humane, and it was comforting in 2020 to watch someone like that in charge of a country, even if she wasn’t real and the country wasn’t ours.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Zf5V3Q">
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<em>Borgen</em> (spoilers follow) was also very consciously a show about the challenges faced by women in power, documenting not just Nyborg’s rise but also that of Katrine Fønsmark (Birgitte Hjort Sørensen), an ambitious young TV reporter who covers Nyborg’s government and also dates her top media consultant. Both women were moms, and both at times faced an uphill battle as they tried to succeed in all-consuming careers while still showing up for their kids. In the show’s first three seasons — released in Denmark from 2010-2013 and on <a href="https://www.netflix.com/title/70302482">Netflix</a> worldwide in 2020 — they were making it work. They were leaning in.
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Then came <em>Borgen</em>’s <a href="https://www.netflix.com/title/81282868">long-awaited fourth season</a>, released on Netflix in June and subtitled “Power & Glory.” This pandemic-era iteration is darker and less comforting, and takes an entirely different view of female power: It’s one of the first shows I’ve seen to reckon with the decline and fall of <a href="https://www.vox.com/22466574/gaslight-gatekeep-girlboss-meaning">the archetype of the girlboss</a>.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Ber0W7">
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Season 4 finds Nyborg and Fønsmark in new roles: The former is now foreign minister under Denmark’s second-ever female prime minister, Signe Kragh (Johanne Louise Schmidt), while the latter has just become head of news at the struggling TV1. They’re as ambitious as ever, but that ambition has begun to warp them, clouding their judgment and destroying their empathy as they scramble to hold onto power.
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The foreign minister abandons her principles to back a climate-destroying oil-extraction agreement with Greenland. Struggling with her approval rating, she hires a slimy tabloid-news muckraker to retool her image, and he convinces her to abandon even more of the principles viewers of previous seasons expected her to hold dear. She’s mean to her son on national TV.
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Fønsmark, meanwhile, micromanages and then fires her star anchor, who also appears to be the only woman of color among the station’s on-air staff. She momentarily discourages an employee from taking maternity leave, causing internal conflict and public scandal (the level of horror with which this suggestion is met both inside and outside the company is, frankly, refreshing). She starts having panic attacks and yelling at her family.
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All this makes season 4 kind of hard to watch at times — the striving heroines of previous seasons have essentially become villains, and as the show progresses it’s increasingly difficult to see how they can ever turn it around.
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Then comes the season finale, and Nyborg and Fønsmark both do something that would have been unthinkable on pre-pandemic <em>Borgen</em>, and in pre-pandemic girlboss narrative culture more generally: They quit. Fønsmark leaves her job at the TV station, and Nyborg steps down as foreign minister, though not before negotiating an exit from the bad oil deal. Their announcements are met with shock, but for the viewer (or at least for me), it’s the only way the show can come to a satisfying end. The mindless pursuit of power has so thoroughly stripped these women of their wisdom and dignity that the only way to reclaim any shred of humanity — or to repair the wrongs they’ve caused — is to walk away.
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It’s a solution that feels perfectly timed to the moment. The 2000s and early 2010s — when <em>Borgen</em> debuted — were a time of starry-eyed optimism about women in power, at least among a slice of mostly white feminists. As <a href="https://www.vox.com/22466574/gaslight-gatekeep-girlboss-meaning">Vox’s Alex Abad-Santos writes</a>, women like Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg and former Nasty Gal CEO Sophia Amoruso “were finally wrangling power away from the men who had held it for so long, which was seen as a form of justice.” That perception started to crack as more and more female bosses were accused of pregnancy discrimination, bullying, racism, and other misconduct. And it arguably shattered irrevocably in the pandemic, as months of <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021/12/16/22837830/covid-pandemic-climate-change-great-resignation-2021">working during a public health crisis</a> led to widespread disillusionment about the value of the hustle.
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We’ve all seen the dark side of the girlboss — and of the boss in general, and of capitalism — in recent years, and we’re beginning to see popular culture reflect that disillusionment, whether it’s Apple’s <em>Severance</em> or Ling Ma’s <em>Severance</em>. It’s rarer to see an established show revisit its earlier premises with jaded eyes.
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<em>Borgen</em> has not entirely abandoned its old principles, nor are its characters realistic role models for ordinary viewers who might want to step away from the capitalist treadmill. After all, when Nyborg steps down from the Danish parliament, a prestigious post with the European Commission is apparently waiting for her. Fønsmark isn’t sure what she’ll do next, but she’s thinking of writing a book called <em>Power in Denmark</em>. These ex-bosses don’t have to worry about money or health insurance, and they get to keep doing cool stuff despite messing up catastrophically and hurting people along the way. Even this death-of-the-girlboss story takes the girlboss’s point of view.
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Still, I felt joy when Birgitte Nyborg announced her resignation on my TV screen. More precisely, I felt like a pretty good trick had been played on me. I started watching <em>Borgen</em> for the soothing fantasy that, somewhere in the world, there was a country where nice ladies were working hard to make everything okay. <em>Borgen</em> season 4 destroyed that fantasy and made me feel dumb for ever having it, then offered me something more interesting in its place. In a lot of ways, it gave me the ending that I — and Nyborg — deserved.
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<a href="https://www.netflix.com/title/81282868">Borgen</a><em> is streaming on Netflix. For more recommendations from the world of culture, check out the </em><a href="https://www.vox.com/one-good-thing"><em><strong>One Good Thing</strong></em></a><em> archives.</em>
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</p></li>
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<li><strong>10 ways to fix a broken Supreme Court</strong> -
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<img alt="Supreme Court Overturns Roe v. Wade Abortion-Rights Ruling" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/SF2iSqhRYKzOGZKJQej6xuY5K-c=/0x0:1820x1365/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/71040913/1241511670.0.jpg"/>
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Abortion rights demonstrators gather outside the US Supreme Court in Washington, DC, on June 24, 2022. | Yasin Ozturk/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
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Democrats don’t have the votes right now for major Supreme Court reform. But if they pick up seats, they could have many options.
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<em><strong>Editor’s note, July 2:</strong></em><em> The following is an updated version of an </em><a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/6/25/23181976/case-against-the-supreme-court-of-the-united-states"><em>article</em></a><em> that originally ran in Vox in October 2020. We are republishing it with revisions to reflect the Court’s most recent term. </em>
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The Supreme Court’s just-concluded term was a bacchanalia of reactionary indulgence. <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/6/24/23181720/supreme-court-dobbs-jackson-womens-health-samuel-alito-roe-wade-abortion-marriage-contraception"><em>Roe v. Wade</em> is dead</a>. Gun laws throughout the nation are <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/6/23/23180205/supreme-court-new-york-rifle-pistol-clarence-thomas-second-amendment-guns">now in peril</a>. The Court is <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/6/21/23176893/supreme-court-carson-makin-religion-schools-vouchers-chief-justice-roberts">pummeling the wall separating church and state</a> — and it isn’t afraid to <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/6/27/23184848/supreme-court-kennedy-bremerton-school-football-coach-prayer-neil-gorsuch">tell easily disprovable falsehoods</a> to achieve this goal. The Court’s GOP-appointed majority curtailed the EPA’s power to fight climate change, and gave themselves an <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/6/30/23189610/supreme-court-epa-west-virginia-clean-power-plan-major-questions-john-roberts">open-ended veto power</a> over any federal regulation.
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It’s likely that the worst is yet to come. Three “<a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/8/11/21356913/supreme-court-shadow-docket-jail-asylum-covid-immigrants-sonia-sotomayor-barnes-ahlman">shadow docket</a>” decisions this past term suggest that the Court is about to <a href="https://www.vox.com/23187117/supreme-court-louisiana-racial-gerrymander-ardoin-robinson-congressional-maps">slash safeguards against racial gerrymandering</a>. Another case looming in the next term, involving North Carolina’s gerrymandered congressional maps, is likely to give Republican state legislatures the <a href="https://www.vox.com/23161254/supreme-court-threat-democracy-january-6">power to defy their state constitution</a> when writing election laws. And that’s after the Court has spent the last decade <a href="https://www.vox.com/22575435/voting-rights-supreme-court-john-roberts-shelby-county-constitution-brnovich-elena-kagan">dismantling the Voting Rights Act</a> and <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/18pdf/18-422_9ol1.pdf">stripping the federal courts of any authority</a> to fight partisan gerrymanders.
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The Court’s Republican majority isn’t simply handing down bold conservative policy decrees, it is undermining democracy itself.
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Indeed, the GOP owes its control of the Court to an anti-democratic system that effectively gives extra votes to Republicans. Only <a href="https://www.vox.com/21514454/supreme-court-amy-coney-barrett-packing-voting-rights">three justices in American history</a> were appointed by a president who lost the popular vote, and confirmed by a block of senators who represent less than half of the country. All three were appointed by Donald Trump, and all three sit on the Court right now.
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Neither Congress nor President Joe Biden, however, are powerless against an anti-democratic Supreme Court. The elected branches have broad powers to rein in a rogue judiciary, or to limit the scope of at least some of the Court’s decisions. The greatest of these powers is court-packing — <a href="https://www.vox.com/22384461/supreme-court-court-expansion-packing-judiciary-act-13-seats-jones-nadler-markey-johnson">adding additional seats to the Supreme Court</a> to dilute the votes of Trump justices who lack democratic legitimacy.
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Realistically, Democrats lack the votes to push that or other meaningful Supreme Court reform through Congress right now. Such a proposal would require changing or abolishing the filibuster, as it’s nigh impossible to imagine 10 Republican senators voting to diminish the power of an institution controlled by Republicans. And at least two members of the Senate’s narrow Democratic majority <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/1/19/22881837/senate-filibuster-vote-voting-rights-joe-manchin-kyrsten-sinema">oppose filibuster reform</a>.
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But just because court reform isn’t currently politically viable doesn’t mean it’s not worth considering, especially if Democrats somehow manage to pick up larger majorities in a future Congress. There are several options to deal with an increasingly partisan Supreme Court. Here are 10 of them.
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">Court-packing
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Let’s get the biggest weapon in the arsenal of democracy out of the way first. If Congress has the votes, it could simply add more seats to the Supreme Court. President Biden would then name several new justices to fill those vacant seats, who could be confirmed by a Democratic Senate.
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Although the Constitution provides that there must be a Supreme Court, it <a href="https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/51/lets-think-about-court-packing-2/">does not say how many justices shall serve</a> on that Court. Over the course of American history, the Court has had as few as five seats and as many as 10. A bill pending in Congress right now would <a href="https://www.vox.com/22384461/supreme-court-court-expansion-packing-judiciary-act-13-seats-jones-nadler-markey-johnson">add four seats to the Court</a>, transforming the 6-3 Republican majority into a 7-6 Democratic majority.
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That said, there are several good reasons for Democrats to be cautious of packing the court, at least as an initial tactic to rein in the Court’s current majority.
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One is that getting a court-packing bill through Congress would probably require extraordinarily high levels of public anger at the Supreme Court. Shortly after President Franklin Roosevelt won his first reelection bid in an historic landslide, he proposed adding seats to the Supreme Court as a solution to reactionary justices who sabotaged many of his New Deal policies. But even at the apex of his political might, Roosevelt <a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2015/02/fdr-court-packing-plan-obama-and-roosevelts-supreme-court-standoffs.html">struggled to build support for his plan</a>.
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Indeed, some historians blame Roosevelt’s court-packing proposal for <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2019/03/12/dear-democrats-fdrs-court-packing-scheme-was-humiliating-defeat/">shattering his coalitions</a> and preventing him from pushing bold policies through Congress. Perhaps because of this history, Biden has been <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/10/15/21518745/biden-supreme-court-packing-town-hall">reluctant to embrace court-packing in the past</a>.
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The other problem with adding seats to the Court is that, absent a constitutional amendment fixing the number of justices on the bench, Republicans could potentially retaliate if they regain control of Congress and the White House.
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</p>
|
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|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AEQCXX">
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|
Just as a Democratic Congress can transform a nine-member Court with a Republican majority into a 13-member Court with a Democratic majority, a Republican Congress could add any number of seats to the Court if they have the votes to do so — and that new majority might be even more hostile to democracy than the current crop of justices.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h3 id="nwd7DD">
|
|||
|
Ways to change the makeup of the Supreme Court without giving a clear advantage to one party
|
|||
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jE6c20">
|
|||
|
Assuming that the next Congress does not have the votes to simply add new seats to the Supreme Court and let a Democratic president fill them, Congress still has several options that could change the makeup of the Court in ways that are less overtly partisan.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="K0um52">
|
|||
|
<ol start="2" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">A “balanced” Court
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0aKHSl">
|
|||
|
One of the leading alternatives to simply adding and filling new seats on the Court with Democratic judges is still a form of court-packing. But the aim is to create a politically balanced Court where neither party dominates.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9h8A2q">
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|
In a <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3288958">2019 paper</a>, law professors Dan Epps and Ganesh Sitaraman proposed a 15-justice Court made up of five Democrats, five Republicans, and five justices chosen by the other 10. The idea behind this proposal, which now-Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/10/30/20930662/pete-buttigieg-court-packing-anthony-kennedy-citizens-united">featured during his bid for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination</a>, is that the balance of power on the Supreme Court would be held by moderate judges acceptable to both political parties.
|
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</p>
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EosqMD">
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|
There are a number of concerns about this proposal. One is that it is <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/10/30/20930662/pete-buttigieg-court-packing-anthony-kennedy-citizens-united">likely to be declared unconstitutional</a>. The Constitution gives the president the power to appoint new justices; it does not give that power to a panel of 10 other justices.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
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|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3RCAji">
|
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|
A more fundamental problem is that any attempt at court-packing, even an attempt that installs a centrist Supreme Court, is likely to enrage Republicans and invite retaliation if Republicans regain control of the government. And there’s no guarantee that a centrist Court will overrule the Roberts Court’s previous decisions undercutting voting rights. Democrats could wind up <a href="https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/51/lets-think-about-court-packing-2/">triggering all the downsides of packing the Court</a> without gaining the benefits of a more democratic system.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JmWg0u">
|
|||
|
But if there was ever enough energy to make a 13-justice Court with a Democratic supermajority a real possibility, perhaps Republicans will be willing to negotiate a compromise — the kind of compromise that could be written into a constitutional amendment if both parties agree to it. And a balanced Court proposal similar to the one offered by Epps and Sitaraman could potentially be that compromise.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="yqwToa">
|
|||
|
<ol start="3" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">The “Supreme Court lottery”
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ee4obh">
|
|||
|
A separate proposal from Epps and Sitaraman would transform the Supreme Court from a permanent panel of nine justices to an ever-changing panel of judges. These judges would briefly rotate onto the Supreme Court before returning to their regular job on a federal appeals court.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="tLwVWc">
|
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|
The basic idea is that each of the approximately 170 active federal appeals court judges would be <a href="https://twitter.com/GaneshSitaraman/status/1311654239131885568">appointed as associate justices of the Supreme Court</a>. Then, every two weeks, nine of these judges would be randomly selected to serve on the nation’s highest Court. After two more weeks, a different panel of nine would be selected. (In this system, the current justices could also be eligible to rotate onto a temporary panel of nine, but they would no longer sit permanently on that panel.)
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lg8Klf">
|
|||
|
It may seem random, but this is more or less how federal appeals courts already operate. Most appeals court cases are heard by randomly selected panels of three judges, although a larger panel consisting of all the active judges on the court will occasionally hear exceptional cases.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gqBi2w">
|
|||
|
One problem with this proposed lottery system from a Democratic (and democratic) perspective is that the rotating Supreme Court panel would, at least in the short term, more often than not be controlled by Republicans who may share the current Court’s hostility toward voting rights. There are currently 172 active appeals court judges in the United States, and <a href="https://www.fjc.gov/history/judges/search/advanced-search">92 of them were appointed by a Republican president</a>, although Democratic appointees could control a majority of these judgeships by the end of Biden’s current term, if Democrats retain a Senate majority that will confirm Biden’s nominees.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1Qki75">
|
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|
Another risk is that a panel of anti-democratic radicals will be randomly chosen to hear a crucial voting rights case — or that such a panel will resolve a disputed election. Suppose, for example, that a “Supreme panel” that happened to be sitting when Donald Trump sought to overturn the 2020 election included judges like <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/6/24/21301826/michael-flynn-court-dismiss-charges-neomi-rao-karen-henderson-robert-wilkins">Neomi Rao</a>, <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/5/19/23130569/jarkesy-fifth-circuit-sec">Andy Oldham</a>, <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/5/12/23068017/supreme-court-first-amendment-twitter-facebook-youtube-instagram-netchoice-paxton-texas">Edith Jones</a>, <a href="https://www.vox.com/22820378/trump-biden-supreme-court-judiciary-sabotage">Kurt Engelhardt</a>, and Clarence Thomas — all of whom are known for taking extraordinary liberties with the law to advance conservative causes. That panel may very well have handed Trump the presidency.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xzNB0k">
|
|||
|
In the long term, however, a rotating Supreme Court could, in <a href="https://poseidon01.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=835027069103091090012093015103122010029012059080064045010093014077001089069088071073031034034120015014035094097015069081089006010046014046085091113027028122105122026054014075100008122116105067006122029067029012007014085105007124109030118102115020089&EXT=pdf">Epps and Sitaraman’s words</a>, “depoliticize the appointments process by making confirmations more numerous and less consequential.” And it would mean that individual justices “would no longer have the ability to shape constitutional law for a generation by strategically timing their retirement” so that their seat is filled by a president of their same party.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="J9PE38">
|
|||
|
<ol start="4" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">Term limits
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zAWQYL">
|
|||
|
Another way to prevent justices from “strategically timing their retirement” is <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/12/26/18155093/ruth-bader-ginsburg-supreme-court-term-limits">term limits</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ob4oB4">
|
|||
|
The leading term limits proposal, which has at times enjoyed support from prominent <a href="https://khanna.house.gov/media/in-the-news/house-democrats-introduce-bill-setting-18-year-term-limit-supreme-court-justices">Democrats</a> and <a href="https://archive.sltrib.com/article.php?id=52493936&itype=CMSID">Republicans</a>, would require each justice to <a href="https://beyer.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=4925">step down after 18 years</a>. Terms would be staggered so that a justice steps down every two years, meaning that two justices would be replaced during each presidential term, although whoever is president when this proposal is implemented might get to replace more justices depending on how Congress decided to manage the transition to the new system.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="P4RxS4">
|
|||
|
If such a proposal had been implemented on the first day of a Biden presidency, Biden might have immediately gotten to replace Justices Clarence Thomas and Stephen Breyer, both of whom have served more than 18 years. The next justice in line to leave the Court would be Chief Justice John Roberts.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="M5ZVDs">
|
|||
|
It is far from clear, however, that term limits may be imposed on a sitting justice. The Constitution provides that federal judges “<a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleiii">shall hold their offices during good behaviour</a>,” and the particular “office” held by each of the current justices is a seat on the Supreme Court for life. (Future justices could probably be term-limited, on the theory that they are being confirmed to a different “office” that only allows them to sit on the nation’s highest Court for 18 years before they are rotated onto a lower court.)
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0itaMv">
|
|||
|
Moreover, even if there is a constitutional way to impose term limits on sitting justices — Yale Law School’s Jack Balkin has a <a href="https://balkin.blogspot.com/2020/10/dont-pack-court-regularize-appointments.html">clever proposal to achieve this goal</a> — the question of whether sitting members of the Supreme Court can be subjected to term limits would be decided by, well, the Supreme Court. And it’s unlikely that a majority of sitting justices would willingly agree to term limits.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h3 id="CuY3DK">
|
|||
|
Ways to weaken the Supreme Court
|
|||
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sb3DFX">
|
|||
|
As an alternative to changing the personnel on the Supreme Court — or, perhaps, in addition to changing the personnel of the Court — Congress might also enact several reforms that seek to diminish the Supreme Court’s nearly unchecked power to hand down binding interpretations of the Constitution.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="vfrPsw">
|
|||
|
The president may also be able to diminish the Court’s authority by refusing to enforce particularly egregious Supreme Court decisions.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="QJAjmd">
|
|||
|
<ol start="5" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">Jurisdiction stripping
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="yuPj0o">
|
|||
|
The Constitution gives the Supreme Court power to hear most federal cases on appeal from a lower court, but it may only assert jurisdiction over cases “with such exceptions, and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.” Accordingly, Congress has at least some power to tell the Supreme Court that it is not allowed to hear certain cases.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Tf4JmC">
|
|||
|
It’s not clear how much power Congress has to limit the Court’s power to hear particular cases. Congress has <a href="https://www.vox.com/21336225/voting-rights-senate-electoral-college-gerrymandering-supreme-court">unlimited power to restrict the jurisdiction of lower federal courts</a>, a power that a Democratic Congress could use to prevent Trump-appointed trial judges from blocking new progressive laws as soon as those laws are enacted. But the Supreme Court’s decisions concerning Congress’s power to limit the high court’s jurisdiction are not a model of clarity.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rv9gGU">
|
|||
|
In <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/74/506"><em>Ex parte McCardle</em></a> (1868), the Supreme Court held that it did not have jurisdiction over a case, brought by a newspaper publisher who claimed that he was wrongly jailed for publishing attacks on Reconstruction, because Congress enacted a law stripping the Court of jurisdiction to hear this case.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WzSIwh">
|
|||
|
<em>McCardle</em>, however, is a very old case. And the opinion in that case does not explain the Court’s reasoning in much detail. In the years since <em>McCardle</em>, many scholars and at least some justices have argued that Congress’s power to limit the Court’s jurisdiction is not unlimited. Concurring in <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/95-8836.ZC1.html"><em>Felker v. Turpin</em></a> (1996), for example, Justice David Souter suggested that Congress may only be able to prevent the Court from hearing a particular case if there is some other way that the issue presented by that case could reach the justices.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ywRh9g">
|
|||
|
In any event, there are two closely related problems with this tactic — known as “jurisdiction stripping” — as a solution to a partisan Supreme Court. The first is that the question of whether Congress has the power to enact a particular jurisdiction-stripping law will be decided by the Court itself, so the justices may simply strike down an act of Congress that seeks to limit the Court’s jurisdiction.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="27nIzF">
|
|||
|
The other problem is that most federal statutes do not enforce themselves; they need to be applied to individual parties through court orders. Congress might be able to prevent the Supreme Court from striking down the Voting Rights Act, for example, by stripping the Court of jurisdiction to hear voting rights cases. But if voting rights plaintiffs cannot obtain a court order enforcing the Voting Rights Act, then that law ceases to function.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3KdDme">
|
|||
|
Similarly, jurisdiction stripping would not allow Congress to restore a constitutional right to an abortion. Indeed, if Congress passed a law stripping federal courts of the power to hear abortion cases, that would strip them of their authority to hear a case seeking to reinstate <em>Roe v. Wade</em>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UzjFGM">
|
|||
|
But jurisdiction stripping could prevent a rogue Court from creating new “rights” — think of early 20th-century decisions inventing a right to <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/261/525/">pay workers less than the minimum wage</a>, or a right to <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/208/161">employ a non-unionized workforce</a> — that implement conservative policy preferences from the bench.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="yMisG2">
|
|||
|
<ol start="6" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">Supermajority voting requirements
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oHDmP0">
|
|||
|
In a <a href="https://www.californialawreview.org/print/democratizing-the-supreme-court/">2021 law review article,</a> law professors Ryan Doerfler and Samuel Moyn propose that Congress could require a supermajority of justices to vote to strike down federal laws. This proposal could potentially be implemented in two different ways: Congress could either impose a universal rule requiring a 7-2 majority on the Supreme Court to strike down a federal law or identify particular laws, such as the Voting Rights Act, which can only be struck down by a supermajority.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YkxTYf">
|
|||
|
Such a law would need to be coupled with provisions stripping the lower courts of the power to strike down such laws, or else judges on the lower courts could potentially block laws that the Supreme Court would be unable to strike down with a bare majority vote.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="8GdkiH">
|
|||
|
A supermajority requirement, Doerfler and Moyn argue, “would functionally reallocate decision-making authority to the democratically legitimate branches of government in cases in which a countermajoritarian faction on the Court enjoys only a simple majority.” In effect, the Court’s conservatives would have to convince at least one Democratic appointee to strike down a federal law if Congress imposed a 7-2 supermajority requirement.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mHn5BD">
|
|||
|
This proposal, however, is vulnerable to one of the same problems facing jurisdiction stripping. What happens if a 5-4 Supreme Court strikes down the law imposing a 7-2 supermajority requirement? The result could be a constitutional crisis, as Congress and the Supreme Court would be fundamentally at odds regarding whether particular laws are constitutional, and there would be no clear way to resolve this dispute under the Constitution.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jNQT1G">
|
|||
|
Another problem is that the Supreme Court does not need to declare a federal law unconstitutional in order to sabotage it. If Congress requires a supermajority to strike down the Voting Rights Act, for example, the Court could still interpret the individual provisions of this law so narrowly that they would do very little to protect voting rights.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="odttvi">
|
|||
|
<ol start="7" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">Presidential (or congressional) resistance to the Supreme Court
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="n3wNfN">
|
|||
|
Abraham Lincoln began his presidency with a broadside against the Supreme Court. Reacting to the Supreme Court’s pro-slavery decision in <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/60/393"><em>Dred Scott v. Sandford</em></a> (1856), Lincoln attacked the very idea that the justices should have the final say on constitutional matters in his <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/lincoln1.asp">first inaugural address</a>:
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<blockquote>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FQkZE6">
|
|||
|
[I]f the policy of the Government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their Government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
</blockquote>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FyN1si">
|
|||
|
Though Lincoln conceded that <em>Dred Scott</em> was binding upon the particular parties to that litigation, he rejected the idea that the president or Congress is bound by the Court’s understanding of the Constitution. The Lincoln administration issued a passport to a Black man, <a href="https://politicalscience.missouri.edu/sites/default/files/people-files/dyer_dred_scott.pdf">defying <em>Dred Scott</em>’s holding</a> that Black people cannot be citizens. And Lincoln signed legislation banning slavery in the territories, defying <em>Dred Scott</em>’s conclusion that slaves remained slaves even after entering a free territory.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jmcCec">
|
|||
|
A similar drama nearly played out in the Franklin Roosevelt administration. During Roosevelt’s first term, many contracts contained “gold clauses” requiring debtors to pay back creditors in gold dollars valued at the time the contract was made. Because of rampant deflation due to the Great Depression, these contracts effectively increased the amount of debt owed under these contracts <a href="https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1026&context=flr">by as much as 69 percent</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bTDsyT">
|
|||
|
Among other things, these gold clauses drove up the returns railroads owed on their bonds so high that they could have bankrupted most of the railroad industry, potentially shutting down much of the nation’s shipping in the process. And the clauses threatened to ruin homeowners who suddenly owed the equivalent of $1.69 for every dollar they borrowed to buy their house.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="I3YivB">
|
|||
|
Congress declared these gold clauses null and void. But Roosevelt, fearing that the Supreme Court would reinstate the clauses, prepared a speech announcing that he would <a href="https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1026&context=flr">not obey such a decision</a>. “To stand idly by and to permit the decision of the Supreme Court to be carried through to its logical, inescapable conclusion,” Roosevelt would have said in a speech the Court never forced him to deliver, “would so imperil the economic and political security of this nation that the legislative and executive officers of the Government must look beyond the narrow letter of contractual obligations.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0oJwku">
|
|||
|
The theory that each branch of government may decide on its own how to interpret the Constitution, even in defiance of the Supreme Court, is known as “<a href="https://www.lawfareblog.com/departmentalism-judicial-supremacy-and-daca">departmentalism</a>.” Under this theory, a president potentially has significant (although not entirely unlimited) power to undermine the judiciary’s determination that a particular law is unconstitutional.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UbGFue">
|
|||
|
Suppose, for example, that the Court strikes down the Affordable Care Act. A Democratic president could order the US marshals not to enforce this decision. They could order the Treasury to continue to provide subsidies to states and individuals entitled to receive them under Obamacare. And the president could routinely pardon executive branch officials who continue to make these payments, neutralizing a <a href="https://www.gao.gov/legal/appropriations-law-decisions/resources">federal law</a> that plausibly could subject these officials to prosecution in a future administration.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="I16Zb5">
|
|||
|
Departmentalism would not allow the president to completely neutralize such a Court decision. Lower federal courts would remain bound by the Supreme Court’s decision, so the president would not be able to obtain a court order against states or private insurers who violate their obligations under Obamacare.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LsdBQz">
|
|||
|
Similarly, departmentalism probably could not be used to restore lost abortion rights, because state abortion bans are enforced by state law enforcement officers and not by anyone who answers to the president. But departmentalism would, at the very least, allow the president to mitigate the harm created by a decision that would otherwise strip health coverage from tens of millions of Americans.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="gasRsA">
|
|||
|
<ol start="8" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">State resistance to the Supreme Court
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="iwaElB">
|
|||
|
Just as the executive or legislative branch might resist a Supreme Court decision through departmentalism, states might invoke a theory known as “interposition” to defy a court order.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QaQ6AO">
|
|||
|
The history of interposition, which posits that a state may “interpose” its authority between the Supreme Court and its citizens, is not a happy one. In the wake of the Supreme Court’s desegregation decision in <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/347/483/"><em>Brown v. Board of Education</em></a><em> </em>(1954) Southern segregationists <a href="http://exhibits.lib.usf.edu/archive/files/aca0775d85b6a87259dec88a6565848a.pdf">relied on interposition</a> to justify defying <em>Brown</em>. Martin Luther King Jr. called out segregationist Alabama Gov. George Wallace, in King’s <a href="https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkihaveadream.htm">“I Have a Dream” speech</a>, for “having his lips dripping with the words of ‘interposition’ and ‘nullification.’”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LZLo7V">
|
|||
|
Yet there are constitutional systems where something similar to interposition exists without this same tainted history. Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms, for example, contains a provision known as the “<a href="https://thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/notwithstanding-clause">notwithstanding clause</a>,” which allows either the national parliament or a provincial legislature to declare that at least some laws shall operate “notwithstanding” a court decision declaring that the law violates Canada’s charter. These overrides, however, automatically expire after five years if they are not renewed.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="E0aQVc">
|
|||
|
In the US system, if a state defies a Supreme Court order, the executive branch may use force to enforce that order — think of President Dwight Eisenhower <a href="https://www.history.com/news/little-rock-nine-brown-v-board-eisenhower-101-airborne">ordering the Army to enforce a desegregation order</a> in Little Rock, Arkansas.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mR9OoG">
|
|||
|
But, as Alexander Hamilton wrote in the Federalist Papers, the judiciary “has no influence over either the sword or the purse” and “must <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed78.asp">ultimately depend upon the aid of the executive arm</a> even for the efficacy of its judgments.” If the Supreme Court hands down a decision that a state government deems abhorrent, the Court cannot enforce that order if the president decides it should not be enforced.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h3 id="2qwoxX">
|
|||
|
Ways to override Supreme Court decisions
|
|||
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dK0IKP">
|
|||
|
As Congress has grown more and more dysfunctional, the Supreme Court has gained a nearly unchecked power to determine the meaning of federal laws. Though Congress lacks the power to overrule a Supreme Court decision interpreting the Constitution, Congress may amend a federal statute if it disagrees with the Court’s reading of that statute.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lpYHYC">
|
|||
|
Yet Congress uses this power far less than it used to, according to a <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2130190">2012 study</a> by University of California Irvine law professor Rick Hasen. Hasen found that between 1975 and 1990, Congress enacted “an average of twelve overrides of Supreme Court cases in each two-year Congressional term.” Between 2001 and 2012, by contrast, the number of overrides dwindled to a mere 2.8 per two-year term. (Hasen defines the term “override” to include acts of Congress that “overturned, reversed, or modified a Supreme Court statutory interpretation holding.”)
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6gyL9S">
|
|||
|
But there’s no reason Congress — especially a filibuster-free Congress controlled by a single party — must continue to defer to the Supreme Court.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="DTif6i">
|
|||
|
<ol start="9" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">Omnibus legislation overruling past Supreme Court decisions
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Y5TCxz">
|
|||
|
One model that Congress could follow is the <a href="https://archive.thinkprogress.org/the-key-to-saving-us-from-gorsuch-and-kavanugh-lies-in-an-obscure-law-signed-by-george-h-w-bush-e591232bb7f0/">Civil Rights Act of 1991</a>, a bill signed by President George H.W. Bush back when it was still possible to achieve a bipartisan consensus against discrimination.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YnFlPN">
|
|||
|
In its 1988 term, the Supreme Court handed down five decisions that, in the words of one scholar, “<a href="https://via.library.depaul.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1981&context=law-review">substantially eroded Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964</a>,” which prohibits many forms of employment discrimination. Congress enacted the 1991 civil rights bill to overrule, or, in some cases, modify those five decisions.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="t0wQvC">
|
|||
|
Similarly, Congress could enact a Civil Rights Act of 2023 that overrides several Supreme Court decisions at once.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bWCltY">
|
|||
|
This bill could include, for example, provisions tossing out the Supreme Court’s <a href="https://www.vox.com/2020/2/12/21133486/doordash-workers-10-million-forced-arbitration-class-action-supreme-court-backfired">entire forced arbitration jurisprudence</a>, which allows companies to force their workers and customers into a privatized justice system that favors corporate parties. It could overrule decisions weakening the Voting Rights Act. It could also override less famous decisions such as <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/11-556_11o2.pdf"><em>Vance v. Ball State University</em></a> (2013), which made it much harder for workers who are sexually harassed by their boss to sue their employer; or <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=13841743782025775964&hl=en&as_sdt=6&as_vis=1&oi=scholarr"><em>Gross v. FBL Financial Services</em></a> (2009), which weakened protections against age discrimination.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mWgS8i">
|
|||
|
Such an omnibus bill would serve two purposes. It would get rid of Court decisions that weakened laws intended to protect our democracy and halt practices such as discrimination, and it would send a clear message to the justices that there’s a new sheriff in town who is keeping a close eye on them.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h4 id="5VRq3b">
|
|||
|
<ol start="10" type="1">
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">Expedite legislation seeking to overrule Supreme Court decisions
|
|||
|
</li></ol></h4>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="t5JPgM">
|
|||
|
The Congressional Review Act (CRA) lays out an expedited process that Congress can use to swiftly overrule regulatory decisions by the executive branch. A bill overruling a federal regulation through the CRA still must pass both houses of Congress and be signed by the president, but the CRA’s streamlined process makes it relatively easy for lawmakers who oppose a particular regulation to override it quickly.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OkRCJM">
|
|||
|
In an essay published in <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/11/congressional-review-act-court/601924/">the Atlantic</a>, Sitaraman suggests enacting similar legislation allowing Congress to swiftly overrule Supreme Court decisions:
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<blockquote>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wiq5q8">
|
|||
|
If the Court issued a decision interpreting a statute or regulation, Congress would have 30 days to vote on whether to open a reconsideration process. If Congress voted yes, the speaker of the House, the Senate majority leader, and the minority leaders would appoint a special committee in each chamber (with proportional party membership) to design a legislative fix for the full body to vote on within the next 30 calendar days. The bill would then go to the other house, where it would be voted on within 10 days through a privileged, fast-track process, which would avoid common legislative snags like the filibuster and committee hearings. The president would then sign the law or veto it, as with any ordinary piece of legislation.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
</blockquote>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JeNOyN">
|
|||
|
Such legislation could create a normalized process whereby Congress routinely reviews the Supreme Court’s decisions and corrects decisions that read federal laws in damaging or implausible ways. It would also act as a complement to an omnibus bill in the vein of the Civil Rights Act of 1991. The omnibus would take care of past decisions that misread federal law, while the review act would prevent new decisions from having much effect.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h3 id="xO1n1W">
|
|||
|
Democrats will not have much time to decide how to deal with the Supreme Court
|
|||
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zkBIpU">
|
|||
|
Setting aside the more detailed proposals described above, Congress has a great deal of power to restrict a Supreme Court that seems determined to undermine democracy.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FgAJaX">
|
|||
|
In its 2020 budget request, for example, the Supreme Court <a href="https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R45965.pdf">requested $106.8 million</a> in funding from Congress. Congress could have, if it wanted, drastically reduced these funds (though the Constitution <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleiii">does not permit Congress</a> to reduce a sitting justice’s salary and benefits).
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="smnV1V">
|
|||
|
Similarly, Congress could also impose onerous new duties on the justices. For most of the nation’s history until 1911, Supreme Court justices had to spend at least some of their time “<a href="https://www.fjc.gov/history/timeline/circuit-riding">riding circuit</a>” — traveling to various parts of the country to hear ordinary federal cases. Congress could revive this practice. Or it could expand the Court’s (<a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/2020/07/final-stat-pack-for-october-term-2019/">currently very limited</a>) mandatory jurisdiction, forcing it to hear thousands of routine cases involving uncontroversial legal issues.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="CsQ2ka">
|
|||
|
The point isn’t that Congress necessarily should strip the Court of its staff, order the justices to spend half their year flying around to random federal courthouses, or drown them in an ocean of routine appeals. Rather, it’s that Congress has tremendous power to fight back against an anti-democratic Supreme Court.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="67YIXN">
|
|||
|
Realistically, however, if Congress wants to prevent the Supreme Court from entrenching its power to veto federal laws and manipulate voting rights, it’s likely to only have a short window in which to do so. Indeed, that window could already be closing.<strong> </strong>If there is one lesson from the past two decades, it is that full Democratic control of the elected branches does not happen very often — and even when it does happen, a Democratic majority can be held hostage by its most conservative members.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3tHOmD">
|
|||
|
Supreme Court justices, by contrast, serve for life. They can afford to bide their time, waiting until their party controls at least one house of Congress or the White House to hand down decisions that could entrench that party in power for a very long time.
|
|||
|
</p></li>
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
<li><strong>The many reasons the “just vote” rhetoric from Democrats falls flat</strong> -
|
|||
|
<figure>
|
|||
|
<img alt="President Joe Biden, wearing a dark suit and red tie, holds up a hand, gesturing as he speaks in front of a blue backdrop with the White House seal." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/AsP3Ux89HkF25WWYzY_67O4WWSY=/482x0:3298x2112/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/71040869/1241649344.0.jpg"/>
|
|||
|
<figcaption>
|
|||
|
President Joe Biden speaks during a virtual meeting with governors to discuss efforts to protect access to reproductive health care, on July 1 in Washington, DC. | Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images
|
|||
|
</figcaption>
|
|||
|
</figure>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
“It is unacceptable that there was not a concrete plan the minute this decision came down.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="HhUSto">
|
|||
|
<a href="https://www.vox.com/23182181/abortion-roe-wade-dobbs-casey-democrats-supreme-court">Over and over</a>, Democrats’ main refrain <a href="https://www.vox.com/23055298/supreme-court-roe-abortion-rights">in response to the end of <em>Roe</em> <em>v. Wade</em></a> has <a href="https://www.vox.com/23184192/democrats-abortion-roe-dobbs-strategy-vote-midterms-crisis">been to tell people to vote in the midterms</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bbvXUa">
|
|||
|
“This fall, <em>Roe</em> is on the ballot. Personal freedoms are on the ballot,” <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2022/06/24/biden-its-a-sad-day-for-the-court-and-for-the-country-00042291">said President Joe Biden in a recent speech</a>. “A woman’s right to choose — reproductive freedom — is on the ballot in November,” <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/after-roe-decision-pelosi-says-abortion-rights-will-be-on-the-ballot-in-november-164659927.html">House Speaker Nancy Pelosi similarly emphasized</a>. “You have the power to elect leaders who will defend and protect your rights,” <a href="https://abc17news.com/news/2022/06/27/kamala-harris-to-sit-down-with-cnn-for-first-interview-after-roe-reversal/">echoed Vice President Kamala Harris</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6le8GT">
|
|||
|
They’re speaking to an important political reality: <a href="https://www.vox.com/21562362/house-democrats-2020-election-aoc-spanberger">Democrats do need to both keep their majority in the House</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/2/28/22946299/womens-health-protection-act-senate-vote-abortion-rights">get a bigger one in the Senate</a> in order to pass any legislation <a href="https://www.vox.com/20930358/codify-roe-wade-womens-health-protection-act-supreme-court-nancy-pelosi-democrats">that could codify abortion rights long term</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="yKWkBq">
|
|||
|
Abortion rights activists, though, have been underwhelmed with that response: They want to see more short-term policy solutions, more specifics about long-term plans, and they really want top Democrats’ rhetoric to match the urgency they feel. “It is extremely patronizing to tell people that the answer is to vote, when many of us have been voting for years,” says Tamya Cox-Toure, co-chair of Oklahoma Call for Reproductive Justice, a coalition of abortion rights advocacy groups. “It’s a vote <em>and.</em>”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="a9XPwe">
|
|||
|
The White House, meanwhile, has stressed that it’s operating under serious legal constraints and weighing concerns that taking some of the more aggressive actions activists are demanding <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-unlikely-meet-bold-democrat-demands-after-abortion-ruling-sources-2022-06-29/">could create political backlash</a> on what is currently a winning issue for Democrats. Biden has signaled that his administration will protect the right to travel across state lines for abortion and defend access to medication abortion — without going into the particulars. He’s noted, too, that he <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/biden-support-eliminating-filibuster-codify-roe-right-to-privacy/">supports eliminating the filibuster</a> in order to codify the protections of <em>Roe </em>into law, though that avenue is currently stymied by members of his own party. Additionally, he’s indicated that there could be more <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2022/06/30/remarks-by-president-biden-in-press-conference-madrid-spain/">executive actions to come</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="VMoEcW">
|
|||
|
The legal and legislative challenges facing the White House — and national Democrats overall — are real and in some cases, insurmountable. Some of the things activists want, Biden simply might not be able to achieve, and may have less political support than leaving legislation up to Congress. At the same time, many of the demands activists are making are within the administration’s capacity and could have immediate impacts on people’s access to reliable information, and their ability to obtain abortions in the near term. Ultimately, too, if Democrats want their voters to stay mobilized this fall, they need to demonstrate that they’re able to act when they are in power.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h3 id="XCg1Lr">
|
|||
|
The Biden administration is weighing political and legal constraints
|
|||
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rQz3eI">
|
|||
|
The Biden administration has sounded caution thus far about what it can do.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Qd1Ws0">
|
|||
|
“The administration is looking at everything we can do to protect women’s rights,” a White House official told Vox. “But it’s important to remember that an executive order cannot restore a constitutional right that the Supreme Court has taken away.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zooU3N">
|
|||
|
Passing any legislation with stronger abortion rights protections is up to Congress, where Democrats don’t currently have the numbers they need to advance any bill. Thus far, Senate Democrats have taken two failed votes on the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would enshrine the right to an abortion into law, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/09/24/1038931908/house-democrats-abortion-rights-bill">after House Democrats previously passed it</a>. Because of the filibuster, most bills in the Senate need 60 votes in order to pass — a threshold that the 50-person Democratic caucus currently falls short of.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="eEdKpg">
|
|||
|
Biden, along with many other Democrats, has called for the elimination of the filibuster in order to pass abortion rights legislation, but the party doesn’t have the numbers for that, either. All 50 Senate Democrats would have to be on board in order to make that happen, and thus far, Sens. Joe Manchin (WV) and Kyrsten Sinema (AZ) have been staunchly opposed to taking this route.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ECRQta">
|
|||
|
Antjuan Seawright, a Democratic strategist and Biden supporter, thinks national Democrats and the administration are doing the most they can under the limitations they face. “I think the president has focused on what he knows he could do without being legally challenged, which could cause even more disruption. I think that he’s urged Congress to do what it can,” Seawright told Vox.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gW37Kh">
|
|||
|
But there are things activists see as within Biden’s power — and interest — to do.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h3 id="dWVEAu">
|
|||
|
Activists want a plan
|
|||
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="h3wIM7">
|
|||
|
Activists want Democrats to provide specifics about what’s next, and to bring more energy to defending abortion rights, both things they could do now.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="C84Vck">
|
|||
|
Their demands have included ambitious ones that are likely to prompt legal pushback — like attempting to establish clinics on federal lands — as well as more straightforward tasks like building out the administration’s website to show how people in different states are affected by this decision.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2GDxRl">
|
|||
|
One of activists’ core frustrations is that there hasn’t been an explicit roadmap for what the White House, and Democrats broadly, intend to do next, beyond calling on people to vote.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="SM4zsJ">
|
|||
|
“It is unacceptable that there was not a concrete plan the minute this decision came down,” says Morgan Hopkins, the interim executive director of All Above All, an abortion rights advocacy group.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="eV0CRA">
|
|||
|
The White House, like the broader public, had known for weeks that this decision was coming <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2022/05/02/supreme-court-abortion-draft-opinion-00029473">since Politico published a scoop outlining the contours of it in early May</a>. Yet, on the Friday the Court’s <em>Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization</em> decision was announced, the administration offered few specifics, <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2022/06/24/remarks-by-president-biden-on-the-supreme-court-decision-to-overturn-roe-v-wade/">noting broadly</a> that it would defend people’s ability to travel and that it would advocate for access of medication abortion to the “fullest extent possible.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IQoDdK">
|
|||
|
Experts have long emphasized that the Justice Department could challenge state laws that try to curb access to medication abortion and that <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/04/15/federal-judge-says-patrick-administration-cannot-block-sale-painkiller-zohydro-massachusetts/DlLIz9qETePxqC29Ob27CN/story.html">there’s precedent</a> to take such actions. They note that there are likely to be legal challenges but solid grounds to make this case: because the FDA has made medication abortion more accessible, that policy theoretically supersedes state laws attempting to ban abortion altogether.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fEK4kz">
|
|||
|
Neither the White House nor the DOJ has committed to this approach. And this past week, <a href="https://19thnews.org/2022/06/will-biden-administration-plan-protect-abortion-access-pills/">Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra</a> declined to provide more context about how exactly the agency would offer protections of medication abortion. Being clearer about their willingness to challenge state laws on abortion pills would be helpful, Georgetown University health law professor Lawrence Gostin told Vox. Becerra had said that they are taking the time to figure out responses that align with “what a state tries to do.” <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/30/opinion/abortion-pills-biden.html">Several states’ restrictions on abortion pills</a> have been in place since last year, giving lawmakers more time to determine a response.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xpYLFH">
|
|||
|
The White House didn’t provide much context for how it would go about shielding people’s ability to travel and obtain abortions in different states, either. “If any state or local official, high or low, tries to interfere with a woman’s exercising her basic right to travel, I will do everything in my power to fight that deeply un-American attack,” Biden has previously said. Activists want to hear about what this defense would entail as well as how the administration could help people address the costs and logistics of having to travel for abortions.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0jVxNo">
|
|||
|
Beyond these two areas, advocates have also called on Biden to consider a range of executive actions including the idea of <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/28/politics/white-house-federal-lands-abortion/index.html">leasing federal lands to abortion clinics</a>, and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/06/30/democrats-call-biden-declare-abortion-national-health-emergency/">declaring a public health emergency</a> that could help unlock staffing and funding for states dealing with an influx of people seeking abortions. The administration has pushed back on the idea of leasing federal lands, citing concerns that providers and patients could still be prosecuted by different states. It has yet to consider a public health emergency, which activists note could help provide funding for different resources that wouldn’t clash with the Hyde Amendment, a measure that bars the use of federal funds for many abortions.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="m6rFJZ">
|
|||
|
“We’ve seen in the last three years that tremendous resources can be marshaled to address a public health emergency,” says Kimberly Inez McGuire, the executive director of URGE, a reproductive justice organization aimed at mobilizing young people. “This requires a response of that scale.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qHNtjQ">
|
|||
|
Biden has also given one major speech on the issue before leaving for a major foreign policy trip in Europe. Activists hope to see him and others speaking out on the issue more, and using rhetoric that acknowledges the need for abortion care in an array of instances.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0Ql8Ee">
|
|||
|
In particular, they’re interested in seeing him continuing to dispel any stigma surrounding abortions by treating the procedure as health care, rather than something that people can only use in particular cases. In his initial remarks, for example, Biden cited specific instances of when abortions would now be restricted in many states, such as in the case of threats to a woman’s health or in the case of rape.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="HbsEqf">
|
|||
|
“How hard is it for the president to go out there and say, ‘my fellow Americans, every single one of us has loved someone who’s had an abortion, and it’s health care’?” asks Renee Bracey Sherman, the executive director of abortion rights advocacy group, We Testify. Both Inez McGuire and Bracey Sherman noted, too, that it would be meaningful for the administration to hold public events and meetings with people who have had abortions.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4ojei8">
|
|||
|
Finally, activists are calling on Democrats to provide more centralized resources. Currently, <a href="https://reproductiverights.gov/">reproductiverights.gov</a> is already beginning to address some of those questions — but it could be much more robust.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qchPZ7">
|
|||
|
“What they have is a good start,” said one reproductive justice advocate, who noted that “additional information on where to go, information on what an abortion is, what a medication abortion is,” would be helpful.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="DorMfF">
|
|||
|
Any efforts that Biden can take will, as the White House has repeatedly explained, fall short of fully bringing back the abortion rights protections guaranteed by <em>Roe</em>. Activists, broadly, are aware of this dynamic, but they’d like to see Biden try actions that could lead to incremental gains and send a powerful message about where he stands.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<h3 id="ObRuqE">
|
|||
|
The political calculus
|
|||
|
</h3>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lnpUoe">
|
|||
|
Besides the issues the administration is running up against legally, officials have also indicated there’s another reason the White House has been more reserved in its response: politics. “Biden and officials are concerned that more radical moves would be politically polarizing ahead of November’s midterm elections, undermine public trust in institutions like the Supreme Court or lack strong legal footing, sources inside and outside the White House say,” according to a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-unlikely-meet-bold-democrat-demands-after-abortion-ruling-sources-2022-06-29/">Reuters report</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="MAZjcZ">
|
|||
|
Democratic pollster Joey Teitelbaum, however, says the politics of the issue are firmly in Democrats’ favor at the moment, and actually suggests that they should be as aggressive as possible. “The good news for [Biden] is protecting <em>Roe</em> and abortion rights is not only the right thing to do, it’s popular with voters from across the spectrum,” Teitelbaum tells Vox. “It would benefit him electorally to take action, and it would benefit women everywhere to have control over their own health care decisions.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Hc593c">
|
|||
|
Support for a national law to protect abortion rights, for example, is strong. <a href="https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000181-a5e0-df92-a1e7-e5fd9b340000">According to a Morning Consult/Politico poll</a> conducted after the Supreme Court decision was announced, 52 percent of people supported Congress passing one. It’s unclear whether the White House believes that some of the executive actions that have been floated could potentially be more polarizing. Other proposals, like an executive action to preserve access to medication abortion and the declaration of a national public health emergency, had 54 percent and 44 percent support, respectively, in the same Morning Consult poll.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0lv9Ur">
|
|||
|
“A defense of <em>Roe</em> is not divisive within the Democratic Party and it commands a clear majority in the country. So perhaps the reference is to something more extreme to that,” says Bill Galston, a governance studies fellow at Brookings Institution. “Obviously, a serious administration doesn’t want to put itself in the position of looking ridiculous with symbolic acts that are impractical or would do very little to address the problem.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rMluvO">
|
|||
|
Overall, the bulk of Democrats’ messaging in the wake of the <em>Dobbs</em> decision has been focused pretty extensively on the threat that Republicans pose, rather than the affirmative case of what Democrats are doing.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GHcJ6U">
|
|||
|
“Republicans aren’t stopping at overturning <em>Roe</em>,” <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkV9M4cbz04">notes a recent ad campaign</a> from the Democratic National Committee. “They want to go further and ban abortion. Believe them.” “[Biden] is ‘telling people the truth and putting the focus where it needs to be, holding Republicans’ feet to the fire for the harm they’re causing,’” a White House official <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-unlikely-meet-bold-democrat-demands-after-abortion-ruling-sources-2022-06-29/">told Reuters</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="eQwhoU">
|
|||
|
The implication of all this messaging is that voting for Democrats this fall will serve as a check on any GOP efforts to pass even more expansive abortion restrictions, something Galston sees as an important point to make before the party can make an argument for solutions of its own. Aides for both the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the DNC note that Democrats have a track record in the House of passing legislation that would codify abortion rights, and that the case for electing more Democrats is the fact that they would advance such bills if they had the numbers required in the Senate.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="TqlYgj">
|
|||
|
Speaker Nancy Pelosi has also said the House could consider <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/27/roe-v-wade-pelosi-unveils-abortion-rights-proposals-after-supreme-court-decision.html">other legislation</a> that focuses on protecting people’s data on reproductive health apps and reiterates people’s ability to travel for services.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Go6FX9">
|
|||
|
Some of the skepticism from protesters has stemmed from Democrats’ failure to codify <em>Roe</em> in past administrations, like in the Obama administration, when they had a 60-vote majority in the Senate as well as a majority in the House. In 2009, for example, Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress as well as the presidency, and did not pass legislation to codify <em>Roe. </em>
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="carFhJ">
|
|||
|
“Democrats have used this for 50 years to fundraise. They had opportunities to codify <em>Roe</em>,” Carolyn Yunker, a pro-abortion rights protester, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/06/28/1107963863/frustration-at-biden-and-other-democrats-grows-among-abortion-rights-supporters">told NPR this past weekend</a>.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6KuLaH">
|
|||
|
Then as now, however, there was dissent among the Democratic caucus about abortion rights: Even though the party had a filibuster-proof Senate majority, not all of those lawmakers were necessarily supportive of such legislation, <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2022/05/11/why-roe-v-wade-never-codified/9650536002/?gnt-cfr=1">USA Today reports</a>. And because of the Supreme Court precedent, few lawmakers actually thought that <em>Roe</em> was at risk and would need legislation to enshrine it.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="f7esDp">
|
|||
|
Democrats’ past track record and their recent approach to the issue has only fueled activist pushback. Bracey Sherman is among those who wondered why the DNC’s reproductive rights website focused on phone banking for candidates and fundraising, rather than offering guidance to people about how they can access abortions and advocate for these rights in their states. A DNC aide noted that the group had coordinated more than 25 events and rallies in states across the country since the Supreme Court decision had been announced, including protests in Ohio and Michigan.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="h8ixX7">
|
|||
|
“None of this will actually help people get abortions right now. It’s exhausting,” Bracey Sherman said, of the DNC website.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="knImAL">
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="SnszrQ">
|
|||
|
</p></li>
|
|||
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</h1>
|
|||
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Ashwa Magadheera, Pride’s Angel, Multistarrer, Philosophy, Splendido, and Aldgate excel</strong> -</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>CSK mulls owning team in Women’s IPL</strong> - Also supports increase in teams for men’s league</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Jasprit Bumrah breaks Lara's world record, smashes Broad for 29 runs in an over</strong> - The world record stayed with Brian Lara for 18 years; he scored 28 runs off Robin Peterson in 2003-04.</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Chennaiyin FC signs Ghanaian Karikari</strong> -</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Handball academy to be set up in Hyderabad</strong> - International association to assist in infrastructure building and training programmes</p></li>
|
|||
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</h1>
|
|||
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>JNTU University, Vizianagaram, to introduce new courses</strong> - New self-finance courses may be introduced</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>JD(S) protest against remarks on Deve Gowda</strong> -</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Delhi Police officer admits he informed media incorrectly about Mohammed Zubair's bail plea</strong> - Mr. Zubair’s lawyer called it ‘scandalous’ and said the court was yet to pronounce its order.</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Niti Aayog releases compendium of Ayush practices to manage COVID-19</strong> - NITI Aayog vice-chairman Suman Bery said it is critical to communicate the learnings from the testing times during the COVID-19 outbreak about how Ayush practices implemented at national- and State-level benefitted people.</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Water discharged from four crest gates of Harangi dam</strong> - Madikeri MLA offers ‘bagina’ as inflow into reservoir goes up following heavy rains in catchment area</p></li>
|
|||
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</h1>
|
|||
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Two more captured Britons charged by pro-Russian rebels, say reports</strong> - Andrew Hill and aid worker Dylan Healy are understood to be under investigation as mercenaries.</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Ukraine demands the seizure of Russian-flagged grain ship off Turkey</strong> - Ship tracking reveals the route of a grain shipment from Russian-controlled Ukraine.</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Ukraine war: Russian missile strikes kill 21 in Odesa region - emergency service</strong> - The overnight strikes hit a residential building and a recreation centre in a village, officials say.</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Vera Pauw: Republic of Ireland boss reveals rape and assault in Dutch football</strong> - Republic of Ireland manager Vera Pauw says she was raped and sexually assaulted by three different men in Dutch football.</p></li>
|
|||
|
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Watch: The moment a whale is cut free from ropes in Norwegian Sea</strong> - The Norwegian Coastguard came to the rescue after the whale got tangled.</p></li>
|
|||
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</h1>
|
|||
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How to go from eating mosquitos in Siberia to leading a NASA mission</strong> - An autobiography covers a career in science that even its author admits is “curvy.” - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1861534">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How many calories will the Tour de France winner burn?</strong> - The best cyclists are capable of producing 1,000 watts of power in short bursts. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1863980">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Billing fraud apps can disable Android Wi-Fi and intercept text messages</strong> - Android scamware uses many tricks to sign you up for pricey services. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1864065">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The best game-exploiting speedruns of Summer Games Done Quick 2022</strong> - Fans blast through everything from <em>King’s Quest V</em> to <em>Halo Infinite</em>. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1863948">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Google loses two execs: one for Messaging and Workspace, another for Payments</strong> - Two executives in charge of Google’s most turbulent products are leaving this week. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1863803">link</a></p></li>
|
|||
|
</ul>
|
|||
|
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</h1>
|
|||
|
<ul>
|
|||
|
<li><strong>My first time buying condoms as a teenager, I went to the pharmacy.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
|||
|
<div class="md">
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
The hot cashier at the counter could see that I was new at it and gave me the pack asking if I knew how to use one. I said, “No, it’s my first time.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
She took one out, put it on her thumb, and told me to make sure it was on tight.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
I still looked confused.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
She looked around the store to see if it was empty and it was.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
“Just a minute.” she said and locked the door.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
She led me to the back room, took off her shirt and bra.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
“You like these?”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
I could only nod my head.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
She said to put the condom on.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
As I was putting it on, she dropped her skirt, removed her panties and laid down.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
“Come on.” she said. “We don’t have much time.”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
So I climbed on her.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
It was so amazing that I couldn’t hold back and KAPOW! I was done in two minutes!
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
She looked at me concerned and asked, “Did you put the condom on?”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
I said, “I sure did!”
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
|||
|
…and held up my thumb to show her.
|
|||
|
</p>
|
|||
|
</div>
|
|||
|
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Remarkable-Youth-504"> /u/Remarkable-Youth-504 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vpe4jv/my_first_time_buying_condoms_as_a_teenager_i_went/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vpe4jv/my_first_time_buying_condoms_as_a_teenager_i_went/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>I dumped my last girlfriend because she was a communist.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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I should’ve known sooner. There were red flags everywhere.
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Greatone198"> /u/Greatone198 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vpo4o6/i_dumped_my_last_girlfriend_because_she_was_a/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vpo4o6/i_dumped_my_last_girlfriend_because_she_was_a/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>My wife often compares me to Ryan Gosling.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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She’ll say “You’re nothing like Ryan Gosling.”
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</p>
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</div>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/No-Relation2437"> /u/No-Relation2437 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vpffut/my_wife_often_compares_me_to_ryan_gosling/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vpffut/my_wife_often_compares_me_to_ryan_gosling/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>Jack Russle and Great Dane at the vets…</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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A Jack Russell and a Great Dane are in the waiting room at a vets…
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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JR: “Why are you here ?”
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</p>
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GD: “Fuck off.”
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JR: “No, come on, let’s be friendly, we’re both dogs, we don’t want to be here, we should support each other,”
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</p>
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GD: “<sigh>”
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</p>
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JR: “I’ll tell you why I’m here and then to can tell me why you’re here…”
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</p>
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GD: “Oh, ok…”
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</p>
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JR: “Right! Well, I walked into the kitchen and I saw my mistresses cat, who’s really tasty, bent over her water bowl and I don’t what came over me but rushed her from behind and started to give her a right good seeing to. Anyway, my mistress caught me and so she brought me here to have my bollocks cut off.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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GD: “Really, how interesting…” (said the disinterested Great Dane)
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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JR: “Come on then, it’s your turn, tell me why you’re here…”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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GD: “Oh if you insist… well… I lolloped into the hallway and saw my mistress bent over picking up the mail at the front-door… she was wearing just a short transparent skimpy neglige and no knickers and, well, I don’t know what came over me, but I ran up behind here, forced her onto the floor, and started giving her a right good seeing to ‘doggy-style’ if you know what I mean. So she brought me here.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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JR: “Oh no, so you’re here for the same as me, getting your bollocks chopped off.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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GD: “No, I’m getting my nails clipped.”
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</p>
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</div>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/BrissBurger"> /u/BrissBurger </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vpa5vo/jack_russle_and_great_dane_at_the_vets/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vpa5vo/jack_russle_and_great_dane_at_the_vets/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><strong>i love how the Earth rotates on its axis</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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it really makes my day.
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</p>
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</div>
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<!-- SC_ON -->
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/riverwebb420"> /u/riverwebb420 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vplotc/i_love_how_the_earth_rotates_on_its_axis/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/vplotc/i_love_how_the_earth_rotates_on_its_axis/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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</ul>
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