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495 lines
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<title>08 July, 2023</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>The Alternative Facts of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.</strong> - The Democratic Presidential candidate talks about his right-wing admirers, his distrust of scientists and the media, and his belief that the C.I.A. was involved in J.F.K.’s death. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/the-alternative-facts-of-robert-f-kennedy-jr">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Conspiracies of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.</strong> - The anti-vaccine activist and litigator with a famous name and a long history of addiction has decided to run for President. David Remnick probes what his candidacy is all about. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/podcast/the-new-yorker-radio-hour/the-conspiracies-of-robert-f-kennedy-jr">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>To Save the Planet, Should We Really Be Moving Slower?</strong> - The degrowth movement makes a comeback. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/to-save-the-planet-should-we-really-be-moving-slower">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>What Does California’s Homeless Population Actually Look Like?</strong> - Politicians and commentators spend a disproportionate amount of time talking about a small subset of the homeless population. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/what-does-californias-homeless-population-actually-look-like">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Next Targets in the Fight Against Affirmative Action</strong> - It won’t be admissions offices at selective schools but institutions and programs that use race as a plus factor in making decisions about who gets contracts, jobs, scholarships, and awards. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/the-next-targets-in-the-fight-against-affirmative-action">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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<ul>
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<li><strong>How an LGBTQ clinic in Uganda keeps going amid rising homophobic violence</strong> -
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<figure>
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<img alt="A protester standing outside the Ugandan embassy in Washington, DC, holds two signs opposing Uganda’s recent anti-LGBTQ law." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/wd31Yp2Y6Vn1FfN_9zxL2-QwTkY=/304x0:5145x3631/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/72435210/1485152661.0.jpg"/>
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<figcaption>
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Activists protest outside the Ugandan embassy over Uganda’s parliamentary Anti-Homosexuality Bill on April 25, 2023, in Washington, DC. | Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
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</figcaption>
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</figure>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Outlawing homosexuality has forced health care underground.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7nPHJd">
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<a href="https://www.vox.com/lgbtq"></a><a href="https://www.vox.com/health-care"></a>
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EH7cq8">
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="eCRTgB">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fKg9ef">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="720D0i">
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In the six weeks since Uganda’s president signed the country’s <a href="https://www.vox.com/23750826/uganda-anti-gay-homosexuality-hiv-foreign-aid-trust-health-care">Anti-Homosexuality Act</a> (AHA) into law, the LGBTQ community and its supporters in Kampala, Uganda’s capital and largest city, have faced escalating harassment and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/29/africa/uganda-life-for-lgbt-community-intl-cmd/index.html">security</a> <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/5050/uganda-anti-homosexuality-act-gay-law-impact-month/">threats</a>. The regulation has led to more than 300 human rights violations against people suspected of being gay in Uganda, according to <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/29/africa/uganda-life-for-lgbt-community-intl-cmd/index.html">reporting</a> from CNN.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gRK2Jp">
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Experts are deeply concerned about the <a href="https://www.vox.com/23750826/uganda-anti-gay-homosexuality-hiv-foreign-aid-trust-health-care">law’s impact on Uganda’s progress on health</a> — in particular, its impact on HIV transmission. Although gay men and their sexual networks comprise less than a third of new HIV cases in the country, containing the infection’s spread among men, women, and children depends on steady access to HIV treatment and prevention.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Dl3aVV">
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A court challenge to the AHA is in progress, but so far, there is no indication that Uganda’s leaders intend to walk back the law. In the meantime, the AHA poses material threats to people who provide health care to LGBTQ people, raising the risk of treatment interruptions for many Ugandans with HIV.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9In7Xo">
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In Kampala, amid intensifying hostility toward LGBTQ people and those who provide their health care, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-aliganyira-a4a87a190/?originalSubdomain=ug">Brian Aliganyira</a> is executive director of the <a href="https://twitter.com/ArkWellnessHub">Ark Wellness Hub</a>, an LGBTQ health clinic. We talked to him in mid-June about the clinic’s work, the risks he and his staff face, and what action he thinks people outside Uganda should take in response to the AHA.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xMytOY">
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When we checked in with Aliganyira in early July, his clinic had just received a visit from employees of the national bureau that monitors nongovernmental organization work within Uganda. He was told the bureau had information on the group’s involvement in immoral acts and the recruitment of minors for homosexual behavior.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6befn6">
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The Ugandan press is littered with stories that demonize LGBTQ people, Aliganyira said. And while “everyone believes these kinds of stories,” they’re worlds away from reality: “The number of people pushed out of their homes has skyrocketed,” he said, “and we are struggling to find people food and places to stay — it’s been a mess for our community.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="VR7M7q">
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“These are stories I really want to tell, but the local press doesn’t want to hear them,” Aliganyira said.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="HQCFVj">
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He wasn’t sure if he would be okay — but “we aren’t going to close the clinic,” he said.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wtTMXX">
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<em>This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.</em>
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</p>
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<hr class="p-entry-hr" id="hYdpU4"/>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="iqJTgg">
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<strong>Tell me about the clinic. What kind of work do you do?</strong>
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OrC0hk">
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We started providing services in January 2020. Our target population is LGBTQ people but also includes other subpopulations that might benefit from our services, like drug users and male sex workers. We provide prevention, treatment, and care for HIV and sexually transmitted infections, <a href="https://www.vox.com/mental-health">mental health</a> services, and we do vaccinations for hepatitis B and other diseases. We also engage in health education even for those who are far away, so we provide telemedicine services and education through phone calls.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="TN92va">
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Long before this law passed, our community faced a lot of stigma and discrimination, and a lack of competent counseling services and information. Our idea was to gather people from within [the LGBTQ] community who are skilled or professionals in different disciplines, and to have them provide services in one place.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="n65miT">
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HIV infections among our community is very high — prevalence is about 13.5 percent [among <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8254907/#:~:text=In%20Uganda's%20capital%20city%2C%20Kampala,years%20or%20older%20%5B13%5D.">men who have sex with men</a> in Kampala]. So we are open seven days a week until late evening, and we’ve been able to provide services to around 4,200 LGBTQ persons.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1vWlxu">
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Just providing health education is a challenge. It’s very hard to provide information that includes sexual health for men who have sex with men or for LGBTQ persons, because now that is also termed as promotion of homosexuality. And now authorities are viewing just providing lubricants as promotion of homosexuality, so our supplies of those have gone down.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="i5izJn">
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<strong>What are the threats currently facing LGBTQ people seeking health care, and the people who provide that care?</strong>
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7zHNDm">
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For us as health workers and service providers, we are at risk for being penalized under this law. But if we give up and don’t provide services to our community, we’d be assured they would not get them anywhere.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="DhA6Vx">
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In early June, a transgender woman who had been beaten was taken to the hospital to access emergency services. While the doctors were tending to her wounds, they saw that she had male genitals and called the media. This person was in critical condition, and instead of giving them care, they just called the media and took pictures and exposed the person.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="yhl1j7">
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That’s supposed to be a place where life is protected — and not only is this person not taken care of, but also embarrassed and ashamed.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rg74Yd">
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So it’s quite a painful situation to be in right now. And we know it’s going to get worse because communities have been radicalized. No one looks at an LGBTQ person as a human being. Everyone looks at you as an enemy of their country, their morals, their culture. It will take a lot of work for us to undo what has been done.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="eSC4lA">
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We’ve not had any attack on the clinic physically. But in the past few months, we’ve lost about four health workers who resigned because of the danger of this work.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0jxBhX">
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There’s a false narrative that clinics like ours promote homosexuality and human trafficking. So occasionally, people — spies — show up dressed as students and pretending to be seeking sexual partners abroad. They use it as a trap to see if you fit the narrative. So we train our staff on what to do when people come in and try to trick them into doing something wrong.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3KnHzo">
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<strong>How have security threats to LGBTQ people changed how your patients get care? </strong>
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="kdkdEu">
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Recently, the police arrested <a href="https://www.voaafrica.com/a/uganda-arrests-men-for-practicing-homosexuality-/7010184.html">six guys who were in Jinja</a> [a city in eastern Uganda] and said they were caught having group sex. But according to <a href="https://oblogdee.blog/2023/04/17/six-peer-educators-arrested-in-ugandan-gay-hunts-denied-bail/">some reports</a>, when they were peer educators working for health care organizations. To avoid this kind of situation, we avoid having a number of people in one place at the same time.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Ri1Bpo">
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So although we welcome walk-ins, we have shifted to doing a lot of our care outside the clinic. Like for people who are on HIV medication and need blood samples collected for testing, we now send someone to them to collect the samples. So we tell clients, unless you really have to walk up, please order whatever you want or maybe let’s do a phone call or video call. The most important thing is protection for everyone.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0Uy7PY">
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We have been able to maintain care for most of our clients through telemedicine, but not all. About 600 clients who don’t have phones or internet or who cannot read have fallen out of contact.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7n5cwO">
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<strong>How have these threats changed the way your clinic operates?</strong>
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xHBWzB">
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We have always provided telemedicine services, but this period has made us focus more on telemedicine, which has made things more expensive for us. We’ve switched from providing most of our services at the clinic to having almost 3,000 people seek services online. It takes a toll on our communication and internet budget, and we also had to hire another staff person to support the receptionist in handling all the calls and messages and deliveries. And although we have a nurse and a medical officer at the clinic, we need someone to be able to collect samples in the community.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YvjsXX">
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It’s been three months since those guys in Jinja were arrested, and they are still in prison. Every time they go to court, they are denied bail. I think about it every single day. Like, if one day something goes wrong, I will end up in prison — and for how long? The whole office staff is scared. Even the lawyers we work with are scared — the law also criminalizes them for supporting us.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mx21VX">
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It makes me so frustrated that our work is shifting from providing services to just basically always trying to stay safe, like in a war zone — instead of providing health services, the biggest share of our budget now is going into security. I feel so bad when my work is reduced to just survival.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qGebV7">
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We can do so much with improving health care for our communities, but also the general communities and society in general. But instead, we are in survival mode. Right now, donors are mostly giving money for security. If we didn’t have this punitive law, all this money would go to improving people’s lives and health.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1y9Ujf">
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<strong>I’ve heard some Ugandan activists suggest foreigners should be kind of quiet about their disagreement with this law to avoid playing into the idea that Uganda is caving to Western pressure if it adopts a more open stance toward homosexuality. What do you think?</strong>
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GMtqZj">
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I do understand the argument. But that narrative silences the Western community, and it’s going to leave local communities here without a voice. These laws take away our voices, and in the moments when we can’t talk, we need someone else to speak for us until we can also speak for ourselves. The law disempowers us so much, and we cannot also disempower ourselves by saying people should not speak out.
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</p></li>
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<li><strong>So is Turkey finally going to let Sweden into NATO?</strong> -
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<figure>
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<img alt="President Erdoğan makes a press statement after a cabinet meeting on June 6, 2023 in Ankara, Turkey." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/gWJNwg3okNxML9ylzvNefxxU6mQ=/332x0:5884x4164/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/72435177/1496557143.0.jpg"/>
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<figcaption>
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It’s still not clear what might convince Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to drop his opposition and allow Sweden into the alliance. | Yavuz Ozden/dia images via Getty Images
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</figcaption>
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</figure>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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The Turkey-Sweden-NATO drama, briefly explained.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="o2YTGu">
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Turkish President <a href="https://www.vox.com/world-politics/2023/5/28/23735070/turkey-elections-erdogan-akp-nato-united-states">Recep Tayyip Erdoğan</a> is pretty much the most popular guy in town these days — if that town is <a href="https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/216570.htm">Vilnius, Lithuania</a>, and if you’re popular because everyone has to be nice to you so you’ll let a <a href="https://www.vox.com/world/23581876/turkey-sweden-finland-nato-membership">really good friend</a> join your military alliance.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="M4veLO">
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<a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/5/13/23069341/finland-sweden-nato-membership-russia-ukraine-war">Sweden</a>, by the way, is that really good friend. And ahead of the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance (NATO)’s big summit next week, the Turkish leader has so far <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/06/world/middleeast/nato-summit-sweden-turkey.html">refused to drop his objections to Sweden joining NATO</a>, potentially sidelining Stockholm’s membership indefinitely and spoiling NATO’s sought-after moment of unity and cohesion in Vilnius.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4D9ZpS">
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All NATO members must approve new ones, so Erdoğan’s opposition is effectively a veto. The Turkish president is not alone; <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/swedish-pm-says-hungarys-orban-still-promises-not-delay-nato-accession-2023-06-30/">Hungary’s Viktor Orbán is also holding out</a>, but <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/swedish-pm-says-hungarys-orban-still-promises-not-delay-nato-accession-2023-06-30/">Hungary has signaled it won’t be the final roadblock</a>. Erdoğan has continued to insist that Sweden <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/sweden-must-do-more-if-it-wants-to-join-nato-turkey-says-f00b73b3">has not done enough</a> to crack down on people in Sweden with ties to Kurdish militants and other groups that <a href="https://www.vox.com/turkey">Turkey</a> has deemed terrorists.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0k2h5J">
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Sweden has tried to appease Turkey, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/sweden-turkey-nato-terror-laws-pkk-ed6dc182a351de8f338269e184d49d96">including passing a new anti-terrorism law that went into effect June 1</a>. But Erdoğan’s definition of terrorists is pretty expansive, and often includes dissidents and others critical of his regime. And even if Turkey has a case, Sweden has to follow due process and rule of law and can’t just, say, extradite a bunch of people on a whim. <a href="https://apnews.com/article/sweden-quran-burnings-islam-nato-russia-ukraine-bbcf9ebcae1b2897df77929919a4f765">A recent Quran-burning outside a Stockholm mosque has added to tensions</a>, as Turkey interprets these as Sweden’s permissive attitude toward anti-Islamic protests rather than freedom of speech.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ILTROG">
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Sweden, <a href="https://twitter.com/SecBlinken/status/1676773943800377345?s=20">alongside NATO allies</a>, has been doing some furious diplomacy to try to persuade Turkey to approve Sweden’s bid. Swedish and Turkish officials talked Thursday, with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg saying they made <a href="https://apnews.com/article/nato-membership-turkey-sweden-hungary-9bdf70de90ac0fb6e0ba1c8cc72f9f10">“good progress”</a> but issues remained unresolved. Stoltenberg <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/06/world/middleeast/nato-summit-sweden-turkey.html">will mee</a>t Monday with Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson and Erdoğan, a day before the Vilnius summit kicks off.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GrE6OZ">
|
||
Until then, the impasse prevails. Which means the thing everyone really wanted to happen — that Sweden would join NATO, becoming its 32nd member — might <em>not </em>happen this week in Lithuania. This will deny NATO its unity narrative in Vilnius, something the alliance very much wants to project.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Mn8DEv">
|
||
But it is more than just the storyline: Sweden is cooperating and planning closely with NATO, but it remains outside the alliance, and its mutual defense protections. If Erdoğan won’t budge here, after everyone shuttling to meet with Turkish officials, after Swedish concessions, and during the military alliance equivalent of the Super Bowl, it’s not clear when he would — <a href="https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2020/03/27/its-official-north-macedonia-becomes-natos-30th-member/">which could leave Sweden stuck outside the alliance</a> at time when NATO is trying to redefine and reinvigorate itself amid <a href="https://www.vox.com/russia">Russia</a>’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="fDTLvU">
|
||
Erdoğan’s gonna Erdoğan. But that has real implications for NATO.
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ByoGJD">
|
||
It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Last summer, in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/5/13/23069341/finland-sweden-nato-membership-russia-ukraine-war">Finland and Sweden dropped their long-held stance of nonalignment</a> and announced their intention to join NATO. The two European Union countries had a long history of cooperating closely with the alliance, and both are strong, stable democracies — typically the ideal formula for a smooth membership.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="MEKMtD">
|
||
Erdoğan saw it differently. The Turkish leader opposed their bids because of what he saw as the countries’ support for Kurdish groups that he regards as terrorist organizations, and because of the countries’ arms embargoes on Turkey. At last year’s NATO summit in Madrid, Turkey, Finland, and Sweden <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/5/13/23069341/finland-sweden-nato-membership-russia-ukraine-war">all agreed to a memorandum of understanding</a> that seemed to resolve these issues.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JS06nZ">
|
||
But it didn’t last. Though the Turkish leader ultimately allowed Finland to join (<a href="https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_213448.htm#:~:text=Finland%20became%20NATO's%20newest%20member,at%20NATO%20Headquarters%20in%20Brussels.">which it did in April</a>), he <a href="https://www.vox.com/world/23581876/turkey-sweden-finland-nato-membership">continued to block Sweden’s entry</a>, saying that it still had not been tough enough on terrorists.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ba9Fz0">
|
||
The hope was that Erdoğan, <a href="https://www.vox.com/world-politics/2023/5/28/23735070/turkey-elections-erdogan-akp-nato-united-states">fresh off a big reelection win this May</a>, would no longer be seeking easy political wins, and so might ease off his Sweden stance by the time this summit rolled around. But just because Erdoğan won another term didn’t mean he would become a different president. <a href="https://www.vox.com/world-politics/2023/5/28/23735070/turkey-elections-erdogan-akp-nato-united-states">As experts said</a>, he would see the election as a way to reset relations with the West — but on his terms. Which meant few Turkish observers thought he’d rush to ratify Sweden’s NATO membership after the election, at least not without getting something in return.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GauDgm">
|
||
That something might be F-16 fighter jets. The <a href="https://www.vox.com/joe-biden">Biden administration</a> has been very clear that it will be happy to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/biden-says-he-erdogan-talked-about-f16s-sweden-2023-05-29/">let Turkey buy upgraded equipment</a>, and hasn’t even been <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/biden-says-he-erdogan-talked-about-f16s-sweden-2023-05-29/">all that discreet about using it as leverage in this effort</a> to get Sweden into NATO. “I congratulated Erdogan. He still wants to work on something on the F-16s. I told him we wanted a deal with Sweden, so let’s get that done,” Biden <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/biden-says-he-erdogan-talked-about-f16s-sweden-2023-05-29/">said</a> after Erdogan’s election win in May.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ftiF15">
|
||
But it isn’t quite that simple. Congress ultimately has a say over weapons transfers, and it has continued to object to an F-16 deal over the Sweden-NATO standoff, but also other concerns, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/senior-us-lawmaker-wants-change-turkey-before-f-16-sale-approval-2023-05-31/">such as Turkey’s anti-democratic slide and Syria</a>. Turkey has bristled at the idea of a possible quid pro quo, basically saying that, as a NATO ally, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-07-05/turkey-snubs-us-pressure-on-f-16s-as-biden-meets-swedish-premier">it needs those F-16s for its security, and the security of the alliance</a>, which is separate from the Sweden issue.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ptpm6J">
|
||
Taken together, it’s not completely clear what is going to convince Erdoğan. Sweden has made concessions, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/sweden-turkey-nato-terror-laws-pkk-ed6dc182a351de8f338269e184d49d96">including strengthening its antiterrorism laws</a> and by agreeing to extradite some individuals, including an at least one person convicted of a drug crime in Turkey in 2013. (The person claims <a href="https://apnews.com/article/sweden-turkey-kurds-hdp-pkk-extradition-a3c20e6712657bd465711bd0144404e0">the real reason for his extradition</a> is his PKK ties.) But Sweden is also trying to walk a delicate line, as both its government and its citizens <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-01-03/swedes-reject-legal-concessions-for-turkey-s-nato-assent-in-dagens-nyheter-poll#xj4y7vzkg">have insisted they will not compromise on rule of law to appease Turkey</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IefNzi">
|
||
Erdoğan, who has eroded those institutions and principles in Turkey, may not necessarily see Sweden’s perspective, and he and his officials keep insisting they want to see more <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/sweden-must-do-more-if-it-wants-to-join-nato-turkey-says-f00b73b3">action against terrorists</a>. “The essence of the alliance is the institution of mutual trust and solidarity. Without it, it’s meaningless to talk about other subjects,” Erdogan said in a speech on Friday, <a href="https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2023/07/turkeys-erdogan-ups-pressure-us-sweden-ahead-nato-summit">according to Al-Monitor</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sR4HRo">
|
||
Of course, lots of NATO allies would probably say the same to Turkey: Where’s the trust and solidarity, especially when we need it most? Officials and experts seem more measured in their optimism ahead of Vilnius, hoping Turkey changes its mind but recognizing it might not. Even if Erdoğan drops his objections — and Orbán follows suit — their respective parliaments still have to ratify membership, so Stockholm will still have to wait a bit longer to formally ascend into the alliance.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hgZNNg">
|
||
Few NATO members want to deal with Turkey’s obstruction right now. Officials in NATO governments see Sweden’s membership as a priority, but the pact has a lot of other pressing stuff on their agenda as they meet in Vilnius. <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-07-07/nato-agrees-on-new-pledge-to-spend-at-least-2-of-gdp-on-defense#xj4y7vzkg">Countries will make commitments to defense spending</a>, something the alliance has long sought, but has struggled to achieve.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1bSqEp">
|
||
There is the also the fraught issue of security guarantees for Ukraine, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-wants-nato-invite-vilnius-summit-urges-courage-zelenskiy-aide-2023-06-29/">as Kyiv seeks more tangible assurances on future NATO membership</a>. Alliance members are split on how concrete they want to be with Ukraine, showing support for its eventual membership, but without overpromising with Kyiv engaged in a war with an unclear outcome. A lot of these debates will happen behind the scenes, and while a little will spill out into the public, it won’t be as public as this Turkey-Sweden-NATO drama.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Z1BGAf">
|
||
Which is why there is an urgency in resolving this Sweden standoff. The longer the feud drags on, the greater the reputational damage it does to an alliance that seeks to reinvest in its defense and also evaluate its purpose and and mission, in Europe <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/japanese-pm-heads-nato-warn-east-asia-risks-2023-07-07/">and beyond</a>. It is a little boost for Putin, whose aggression in Ukraine spurred this Nordic NATO expansion but who stands to gain from Turkey’s obstructionism. Putin always seeks to exploit alliance divisions for his political gain — and <a href="https://www.vox.com/2023/6/26/23774184/putin-wagner-group-mutiny-prigozhin">he could probably use that right about now</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mvH50J">
|
||
Sweden’s membership would be a security boon to the alliance; all the Nordic countries would be in the mix, and that will reshape planning and security in the Nordic, Arctic, and Baltic regions. And the worst time for any wannabe NATO member is when it has declared its intention to join but isn’t yet a member. Sweden can cooperate all it wants, but it isn’t covered by the mutual defense protections. While the threat is probably not super urgent, it’s still an uncomfortable position for Stockholm to be in, especially since the initial plan was for Finland and Sweden to do this together.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rBcE55">
|
||
NATO really, really does not want this to drag out any longer, for fear this turns into <a href="https://www.rferl.org/a/north-macedonia-officially-joins-nato/30513509.html">a North Macedonia situation</a>. But right now, it’s just not clear what exactly will get Erdoğan to let Sweden sit at the cool kids’ military-alliance table.
|
||
</p></li>
|
||
<li><strong>The importance of staying angry at the Supreme Court</strong> -
|
||
<figure>
|
||
<img alt="" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/2uofbo5cXYYzc6NpUr297F47J24=/330x0:4986x3492/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/72435160/1356616295.0.jpg"/>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
Activists hold photos of US Supreme Court justices as they block an intersection during a demonstration in front of the Supreme Court in December 2021, in Washington, DC. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
The way to beat a partisan Supreme Court is to hold a grudge against it for a really long time.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6oaN1o">
|
||
Chief Justice John Roberts ended his <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/22-506_nmip.pdf">final opinion of the Supreme Court’s just-completed term</a> by scolding his liberal colleagues. “It has become a disturbing feature of some recent opinions to criticize the decisions with which they disagree as going beyond the proper role of the judiciary,” Roberts wrote in response to a dissenting opinion by Justice Elena Kagan — which laid out in detail how Roberts and his fellow Republican appointees had just <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/30/23779903/supreme-court-student-loan-biden-nebraska-john-roberts">gone far beyond the proper role of the judiciary</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="p8yDqF">
|
||
Nor was Roberts the only justice this year who intimated that the justices’ rulings are beyond criticism. In an <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/justice-samuel-alito-this-made-us-targets-of-assassination-dobbs-leak-abortion-court-74624ef9?st=coy6yyy6bi923ji">interview published by the Wall Street Journal</a> in April, Justice Samuel Alito complained that the justices “are being hammered daily” by critics, <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/874542">falsely claiming</a> that this level of disparagement is “new during my lifetime.” He also claimed that lawyers, the very people who are most educated about the courts and most capable of explaining their shortcomings, have a special obligation to defend his Court against criticism.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fJCXrD">
|
||
One year after the Court’s GOP-appointed majority <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/6/24/23181720/supreme-court-dobbs-jackson-womens-health-samuel-alito-roe-wade-abortion-marriage-contraception">overruled <em>Roe v. Wade</em></a>, the same justices behind that decision remain emboldened, apparently eager to settle old scores, and openly disdainful of those who dare to question the wisdom of their rulings. At least two of them have accepted lavish gifts from billionaires, and are <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/propublica-misleads-its-readers-alito-gifts-disclosure-alaska-singer-23b51eda">contemptuous</a> of anyone who tells them it is wrong for powerful public servants to do so.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wIs7eD">
|
||
It’s disturbing that two of the nine justices, who collectively have the final word on how to read the First Amendment, would even suggest that they should not be criticized. But it is not particularly surprising. Federal judges, who are not elected, must draw their legitimacy from the public perception that they are obedient to a legal text. Criticisms like the Kagan dissent Roberts responded so sharply to can refute that perception, and feed the <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/4732/supreme-court.aspx">rapidly growing disapproval</a> of the Court.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<figure class="e-image">
|
||
<img alt="A graph of Gallup polling data from 2002 to present, asking respondents “Do you approve or disapprove of the way the Supreme Court is handling its job?” Though it varies over time, disapproval has grown from 29 percent in 2002 to a recent spike into the 50s." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/WgTXPXDHgg6nPv-OkaMR8yzdwAQ=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/24771078/temp.png"/> <cite><a class="ql-link" href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/4732/supreme-court.aspx" target="_blank">Gallup</a></cite>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AlYOaz">
|
||
Similarly, disparagement of the justices and their decisions is one of the most powerful weapons ordinary Americans can wield against the nation’s nine justices. Indeed, if there is one lesson to be drawn from this Court’s recently completed term, it is to never underestimate the power of holding a grudge against the Supreme Court.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="uRx17m">
|
||
The Court’s GOP-appointed majority is settling old grudges
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3hkCTI">
|
||
Until very recently — as in, less than 10 days ago <strong>—</strong> the right of universities to pay limited attention to race when admitting students was grounded in well-settled law. The Court first ruled that <a href="https://www.vox.com/2023/6/14/23761092/supreme-court-affirmative-action-college-admissions-race">affirmative action</a> is legal, albeit subject to significant constraints, in <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/438/265"><em>Regents of the University of California v. Bakke</em></a> (1978).
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bkWwQ6">
|
||
The Court, moreover, reaffirmed <em>Bakke</em> in its 2003 decision in <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/02-241.ZO.html"><em>Grutter v. Bollinger</em></a>. It <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/11-345">did so again in 2013</a>. And <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/579/14-981/">again in 2016</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hh2izy">
|
||
And yet, despite the fact that the Court had time and time again rejected efforts by racial conservatives like Edward Blum — the <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/23405267/affirmative-action-supreme-court-ruling-race-harvard-unc-chapel-hill">white activist behind many lawsuits challenging affirmative action</a> — Blum and similarly minded advocates continued to hold a grudge. They were joined in holding onto that grudge by many of the justices themselves, and by <a href="https://fedsoc.org/topics/affirmative-action">powerful groups like the Federalist Society</a>, which played an outsize role in <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/12/9/20962980/trump-supreme-court-federal-judges">selecting former President Donald Trump’s judicial nominees</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="itobXC">
|
||
The briefs in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/20-1199_l6gn.pdf"><em>Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College</em></a>, the case that the Court’s GOP-appointed majority used to <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/23405267/affirmative-action-supreme-court-ruling-race-harvard-unc-chapel-hill">end affirmative action</a> at nearly all universities last month, raised few, if any, new legal arguments that weren’t heard before by the Court in <em>Bakke</em>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="p6bMwz">
|
||
Nor has there been some triumphant victory over racism in the United States that eradicates the case for affirmative action. Though incomes and college graduation rates have <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2016/06/27/1-demographic-trends-and-economic-well-being/">risen for all racial groups</a> within the United States since <em>Bakke</em>, the median Black household still <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2020/02/07/6-facts-about-economic-inequality-in-the-u-s/#:~:text=The%20black%2Dwhite%20income%20gap,as%20measured%20in%202018%20dollars).">earns at least $33,000 less in annual income than</a> the median white household.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1gi1Ph">
|
||
No, the Supreme Court did not strike down affirmative action because of any change in the law. It struck it down because racial conservatives organized. They recruited powerful institutions like the Republican Party and the Federalist Society to their cause. And then they <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/12/9/20962980/trump-supreme-court-federal-judges">made a deal with the devil</a>, as Trump-skeptical legal conservatives agreed to back his bid for the presidency in return for a small army of Federalist Society judges.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="25YnHm">
|
||
Men like Ed Blum held a grudge. And they held onto it for decades. Until they won.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YT6Npv">
|
||
This is, of course, the <a href="https://www.vox.com/23180634/supreme-court-rule-of-law-abortion-voting-rights-guns-epa">same story that played out in the last Supreme Court term</a>, when the Court eliminated the constitutional right to <a href="https://www.vox.com/abortion">abortion</a>, and when it drastically expanded the rights of gun owners. Again, there were no important new insights in any of the briefs filed in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/19-1392_6j37.pdf"><em>Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization</em></a> (2022) or in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-843_7j80.pdf"><em>New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen</em></a> (2022).
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dwanUN">
|
||
Those cases were decided the way they were because abortion foes and gun rights advocates organized, took over the Republican Party, and held onto their grudges. They have nothing whatsoever to do with “the law.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="QHvq2Q">
|
||
Lawyers’ grudges are the most powerful grudges of all
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="skY5Ah">
|
||
There are, of course, mass movements against abortion, against affirmative action, and in support of expansive gun rights. Before racial conservatives convinced the Supreme Court to implement their college admissions policy preference from the bench, for instance, they successfully <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/california-ended-affirmative-action-90s-retains-diverse-student-body-rcna91846">convinced voters to abolish affirmative action in many states</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="APRWjg">
|
||
The same cannot be said about the Supreme Court’s “major questions doctrine,” a <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/30/23779903/supreme-court-student-loan-biden-nebraska-john-roberts">legal rule</a> largely invented by Republican appointees to the Supreme Court, which played a major role in the <em>Biden v. Nebraska</em> decision striking down the <a href="https://www.vox.com/joe-biden">Biden administration</a>’s <a href="https://www.vox.com/student-loan-debt">student loan</a> forgiveness program.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<figure class="e-image">
|
||
<img alt="Protesters crowd a large area in front of the white-columned Supreme Court building, holding large crosses, flags, and signs with anti-abortion slogans." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/Sqr6mC5eArtHoERHH4tFTzZgMeM=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/24771431/1458045808.jpg"/> <cite>Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images</cite>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
These attendees of the 50th annual March for Life rally did not come to Washington to demand that the judiciary narrowly interpret statutes which delegate power to federal agencies.
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="81dWl9">
|
||
That case asked whether a federal law known as the <a href="https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-117/pdf/STATUTE-117-Pg904.pdf#page=1">Heroes Act</a> permits the US Department of Education to reduce many student borrowers’ loans — some by as much as $20,000. The <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/30/23779903/supreme-court-student-loan-biden-nebraska-john-roberts">correct answer to this question is “yes,”</a> as the Heroes Act gives the secretary of education sweeping authority to “waive or modify any statutory or regulatory provision applicable to the student financial assistance programs … as the Secretary deems necessary in connection with a war or other military operation or national emergency.” And there’s no question that the Covid-19 pandemic, which inspired both the Trump and the Biden administrations to modify many student loan obligations, was such a “national emergency.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EhYvib">
|
||
The major questions doctrine, however, enables the Court to strike down programs, like Biden’s proposed loan relief under the Heroes Act, if a majority of the justices deem those programs too ambitious. As the Court has described this doctrine, it requires “<a href="https://www.vox.com/congress">Congress</a> to speak clearly if it wishes to assign to an agency decisions of <a href="https://www.vox.com/2022/6/30/23189610/supreme-court-epa-west-virginia-clean-power-plan-major-questions-john-roberts">vast ‘economic and political significance.’</a>”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JvQz9L">
|
||
But this doctrine comes from nowhere at all. It is mentioned in no statute, and it certainly isn’t mentioned anywhere in the Constitution. As Justice Kagan has written, the major questions doctrine is nothing more than a “<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-1530_n758.pdf">get-out-of-text-free card</a>,” frequently used to strike down programs that are authorized by the explicit text of a federal law, but that a majority of the justices don’t like.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="j03hPz">
|
||
Yet, while the major questions doctrine cannot be found in the text of any law, it is easy to tell the doctrine’s origin story. And that story is one about very powerful lawyers who decided to hold onto a grudge.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jrlKpo">
|
||
As recently as the Ronald Reagan and George HW Bush administrations, when Republicans controlled the executive branch — and with it the power to wield any authority delegated to federal agencies by Congress — many of America’s preeminent legal conservatives were staunch defenders of the idea that courts should defer to those agencies. In 1989, <a href="https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3075&context=dlj">no less of a Federalist Society eminence than Justice Antonin Scalia</a> delivered an important lecture arguing in favor of such judicial deference.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="sFR2M8">
|
||
After President Barack Obama took office, however, and right-wing lawyers started to get a taste of what it looks like when Democrats wield executive power, all of this changed. By Obama’s second term, the Federalist Society’s annual meetings became a showcase of <a href="https://archive.thinkprogress.org/the-little-noticed-conservative-plan-to-permanently-lock-democrats-out-of-policymaking-9f776ad16635/">proposals to limit the power of executive agencies</a>. According to a <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=Q8muDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA42&lpg=PA42&dq=%E2%80%9Cproved+decisive+in+clinching%E2%80%9D&source=bl&ots=5evLEKYOzT&sig=ACfU3U3MQ1gQ5LcrjGKhLRycOiTNzMpVew&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi10fLxzu_lAhWItVkKHQ-QBHwQ6AEwAHoECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q=%E2%80%9Cproved%20decisive%20in%20clinching%E2%80%9D&f=false">2018 book</a> by legal journalist David Kaplan, the reason the Trump White House chose Neil Gorsuch as their first Supreme Court nominee is because Gorsuch was an <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/12/9/20962980/trump-supreme-court-federal-judges">outspoken proponent of expanding the power of federal judges</a> to strike down actions by federal agencies.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0jntUL">
|
||
The <em>Nebraska</em> decision, in other words, is no less of a product of political organizing than the Court’s decisions in <em>Dobbs</em> or <em>Harvard</em>. It’s just that this organizing took place among lawyers, and specifically within the Federalist Society.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2Z2L1o">
|
||
And, as it turns out, this kind of organizing is even more potent than the mass movement that formed in opposition to <em>Roe</em>. It took nearly 50 years for abortion opponents to secure the votes they needed to win in <em>Dobbs.</em> And it took nearly as long for people like Ed Blum to destroy <em>Bakke. </em>By contrast,<em> </em>the strong version of the major questions doctrine that the Court applied in <em>Nebraska</em> went from a pipe dream shared by many right-wing lawyers to a legal doctrine embraced by the Supreme Court in less than a decade.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="ngrXdi">
|
||
Several key justices let go of two grudges this term
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ang39T">
|
||
After the last two Supreme Court terms, it’s easy to see how a liberal could be tempted by despair. At least two of the justices are <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/clarence-thomas-scotus-undisclosed-luxury-travel-gifts-crow">absurdly</a> <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/samuel-alito-luxury-fishing-trip-paul-singer-scotus-supreme-court">corrupt</a>, accepting lavish gifts from Republican billionaires. And most of the justices appear to be going down a checklist of long-held conservative grudges, ticking off more boxes with each passing year.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="yVwdRO">
|
||
And, on top of all of that, the Court’s Republican-appointed majority has shown extraordinary willingness to bend the Court’s own rules to benefit one of the most powerful constituencies within the GOP — the religious right — while <a href="https://www.vox.com/23180634/supreme-court-rule-of-law-abortion-voting-rights-guns-epa">simultaneously bending them in the other direction to hurt liberal causes</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ceCOJL">
|
||
Consider, for example, the Court’s June decision in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-476_c185.pdf"><em>303 Creative v. Elenis</em></a>, in favor of a Christian conservative website designer who wishes to discriminate against same-sex couples who might want to hire her to design their wedding website in the future. Notably, this web designer has never designed a wedding website before; she has never been approached by a same-sex couple who wished to hire her to make such a website; and Colorado’s lawyers expressed <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2022/12/3/23472175/supreme-court-303-creative-elenis-first-amendment-lgbtq-religion-website">doubts that the state’s anti-discrimination law applies to her</a> at all, even if she did refuse service to such a couple.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="r2PUcG">
|
||
Nevertheless, the Court ruled in favor of this woman’s challenge to Colorado’s civil rights law, despite its holding in <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=6489811204109737205&hl=en&as_sdt=6&as_vis=1&oi=scholarr"><em>Texas v. United States</em></a><em> </em>(1998) that “a claim is not ripe for adjudication if it rests upon ‘contingent future events that may not occur as anticipated, or indeed may not occur at all.’”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="endBii">
|
||
And yet, despite this Court’s <a href="https://calvinandhobbes.fandom.com/wiki/Calvinball#:~:text=Calvinball%20is%20a%20game%20invented,again%20in%20any%20future%20games.">penchant for Calvinball</a>, there was one important area this term where the Court played things by the book. In a pair of <a href="https://www.vox.com/voting-rights">voting rights</a> decisions, the Court rejected efforts to effectively <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/8/23753932/supreme-court-john-roberts-milligan-allen-voting-rights-act-alabama-racial-gerrymandering">rewrite the Voting Rights Act</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/27/23775378/supreme-court-moore-harper-john-roberts-independent-state-legislature-north-carolina-bush-gore">the Constitution itself</a> in ways that would have benefited the Republican Party. And these two decisions may, in the long run, prove to be the most consequential of this just-concluded term.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6g6eh7">
|
||
In <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-1271_3f14.pdf"><em>Moore v. Harper</em></a>, the Court rejected a <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/27/23775378/supreme-court-moore-harper-john-roberts-independent-state-legislature-north-carolina-bush-gore">deranged legal theory</a> that sought to nullify every state constitutional provision that protects voting rights or that restricts gerrymandering. Under the strongest version of this argument, known as the “independent state legislature doctrine” (ISLD), state governors would also lose their power to veto laws impacting federal elections, and state supreme courts would lose their power to strike such laws down.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="aB04O9">
|
||
Ordinarily, such a ridiculous legal argument could be dismissed as a curiosity, but a majority of the current justices endorsed versions of the ISLD in the past. Roberts <a href="https://casetext.com/case/arizona-state-legislature-v-arizona-independent-redistricting-commn">did so in a 2015 dissenting opinion</a> (though he later walked back his support for the ISLD), and <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2022/12/4/23481063/supreme-court-moore-harper-independent-state-legislature-doctrine-elections">four other GOP-appointed justices did so in the lead-up to the 2020 election</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WV4BDG">
|
||
But then, a year after taking up <em>Moore, </em>the Court released a decision that was as <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/27/23775378/supreme-court-moore-harper-john-roberts-independent-state-legislature-north-carolina-bush-gore">full-throated a denunciation of the ISLD</a> as anyone reasonably could have expected from this Court. It left open the possibility that the Court could decide the winner of a very close election, but the Court already did that in <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/531/98/"><em>Bush v. Gore</em></a><em> </em>(2000). Rather than lighting many of the rules governing federal elections on fire, the Supreme Court maintained the status quo.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ttNELz">
|
||
Similarly, in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-1086_1co6.pdf"><em>Allen v. Milligan</em></a>, the Court decided to leave in place safeguards against racial gerrymandering that have been in place since <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/478/30/"><em>Thornburg v. Gingles</em></a> (1986). That may seem like a minor decision, but <em>Milligan</em> also involved the “results test” under the Voting Rights Act — a test that Chief Justice Roberts has <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/8/23753932/supreme-court-john-roberts-milligan-allen-voting-rights-act-alabama-racial-gerrymandering">wanted to kill since he was a young lawyer working in the Reagan Justice Department</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="m2xRlx">
|
||
In the very same term that the Court seemed to be running down a checklist of Republican Party priorities, in other words, several key justices gave up longstanding grudges against voting rights and democracy. And that means that Democrats have a real chance of fighting back against this highly partisan Court at the polls.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="PSeiOx">
|
||
The case for optimism in the face of a partisan Supreme Court
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="g2YSze">
|
||
There are some signs that, despite its overreach in cases like <em>Nebraska</em>, this Supreme Court understands that there are certain lines it must not cross. Beyond the two pro-democracy decisions this term, the justices were <a href="https://twitter.com/steve_vladeck/status/1674392446938017793">aggressive in reversing the Fifth Circuit</a>, a far-right court <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2022/12/27/23496264/supreme-court-fifth-circuit-trump-court-immigration-housing-sexual-harrassment">dominated by Trump appointees and other MAGA stalwarts</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EkrrdK">
|
||
Among other things, the Court blocked the Fifth Circuit’s attempt to effectively <a href="https://www.vox.com/politics/2023/4/21/23686788/supreme-court-abortion-pill-ruling-mifepristone-fda-alliance-hippocratic-medicine">ban the drug mifepristone</a>, which is used in more than half of all abortions in the United States. And it also shot down an argument, frequently raised by nativist judges on the Fifth Circuit and elsewhere, that the Biden administration does not enjoy the <a href="https://www.vox.com/scotus/2023/6/23/23771310/supreme-court-united-states-texas-ice-immigration-drew-tipton-brett-kavanaugh">same discretion over immigration policy enjoyed by past presidents</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="XCRIXY">
|
||
So, while this Supreme Court frequently exercises arbitrary authority over US policy, it drew the line against decisions that could destroy democracy in the United States altogether. And the justices also showed that they are unwilling to sign onto the MAGA movement’s more novel legal arguments. This Court holds old grudges, but it does not necessarily sign on to every new grudge held by the rightmost fringe of the judiciary.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NhTa8Z">
|
||
If, and this is a big “if,” the justices hold this line — sometimes wading into policy debates where they don’t belong, but leaving democracy in place — then Democrats have real reason to hope that they can eventually regain control of the Court. And, if they hold the right grudges, they can eliminate much of the current Court’s legacy.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nGduHK">
|
||
For one thing, the Court’s polling numbers are in the toilet. Gallup’s poll <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/4732/supreme-court.aspx">shows disapproval of the Supreme Court at record highs</a>. A May poll by Marquette University reached a similar conclusion, determining that <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/24/politics/supreme-court-approval-rating-poll-ethics-marquette/index.html">59 percent of US adults disapprove of the Court</a>. A Quinnipiac poll released in June — after news broke that Justices Clarence Thomas and Alito accepted expensive trips from Republican billionaires, but before the Court released its biggest decisions of the term — found that <a href="https://poll.qu.edu/poll-release?releaseid=3874">59 percent of registered US voters disapprove of the Court</a>, and only 30 percent approve.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gQpyzu">
|
||
And as the Court has lost public support, Democrats — both at the highest levels and at the ballot box — have stepped up their efforts to push the judiciary in a different direction.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fONIaw">
|
||
President Joe Biden made confirming federal judges who can dilute the Republican Party’s influence on the bench one of his highest priorities. As of this writing, the Senate has <a href="https://www.fjc.gov/history/judges/search/advanced-search">confirmed 133 of Biden’s judges</a>, 11 more judges than Trump had appointed at this point in his presidency, according to the Federal Judicial Center. And the Trump White House was itself <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/12/9/20962980/trump-supreme-court-federal-judges">unusually aggressive in placing judges on the bench</a>. (All of this said, Biden has only appointed one justice, while Trump appointed three. Presidents, of course, have little control over when a lifetime-appointed justice leaves the Supreme Court.)
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="asORoB">
|
||
Moreover, while past Democratic presidents often nominated prosecutors, corporate law partners, and other lawyers who spent their careers working on behalf of the already powerful, Biden has selected an <a href="https://www.vox.com/22587059/joe-biden-courts-judicial-nominations-donald-trump-supreme-court-barack-obama">unusually large number of public defenders, civil rights lawyers</a>, and others who’ve spent their careers advancing liberal or democratic values. In just one week in June, the Senate <a href="https://rollcall.com/2023/06/14/senate-confirms-voting-rights-lawyer-as-new-york-federal-judge/">confirmed Dale Ho</a> — arguably the nation’s preeminent voting rights litigator — to a powerful district court in Manhattan, and then confirmed Julie Rikelman, a <a href="https://www.vox.com/2023/6/20/23760777/julie-rikelman-confirmed-first-circuit-abortion-dobbs-supreme-court">similarly prominent abortion rights lawyer</a>, to the First Circuit.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="meK5cW">
|
||
Meanwhile, in the wake of the Supreme Court’s rightward turn, Democrats in several states are demanding judges who align more closely with progressive values. In Wisconsin, for example, voters sent Janet Protasiewicz to the state supreme court by a 10-point margin, after she campaigned on <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/05/us/politics/wisconsin-supreme-court-abortion-protasiewicz.html">protecting abortion rights after <em>Dobbs</em></a>, and against Republican efforts to rig elections. Democratic state senators tanked Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul’s nomination of Hector LaSalle, a <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2023/1/4/23537232/new-york-kathy-hochul-hector-lasalle-court-of-appeals">conservative-for-New-York judge on a state appeals court</a>, to be the state’s top judge.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nKCwI9">
|
||
Similarly, major players within left-leaning politics are organizing around reshaping the Supreme Court. Last month, for example, a coalition known as <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/meetthepressblog/dem-aligned-groups-launch-campaign-keep-supreme-court-front-mind-2024-rcna88662">United for Democracy</a> — which <a href="https://unitedfordemocracy.us/partners/">includes Democratic power players</a> such as Planned Parenthood and MoveOn, plus major <a href="https://www.vox.com/unions">unions</a> such as SEIU and the National Education Association — dropped a $1 million ad buy criticizing the Supreme Court. Its first ad <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XakD1edeQiM">lays gun violence, air pollution, and reduced access to abortion</a> at the feet of the justices.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7u9mRL">
|
||
This kind of campaign infrastructure is important for Democrats, not just because it can help during election years, but because it can help the party and its voters hold onto grudges. Again, the reason why <em>Roe</em> and <em>Bakke</em> are no longer law today is because activists in the Republican Party spent decades building similar infrastructure and making similar pushes to place judges with a grudge on the bench.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9ZOvz0">
|
||
And so it should not surprise anyone that Roberts and Alito want you to believe they are above the kind of harsh criticism Republicans directed against the Supreme Court for years. They know, as much as anyone, that their legacy can be dismantled by a well-maintained grudge.
|
||
</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>National weightlifting coach Vijay Sharma optimistic about Jeremy’s comeback after his ‘bad phase’</strong> - Jeremy, the Commonwealth Games champion who overcame a hand injury during the Birmingham Games last year, was diagnosed with a back issue in June</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>Ready for the huge challenge, says the young Vritti</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>Manika goes down fighting</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>Pakistan PM forms high-level committee to decide on national team’s participation in ODI World Cup</strong> - Both the International Cricket Council and host BCCI have already announced the World Cup schedule and expect Pakistan to travel to India for the 50-over showpiece beginning October 5</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>Ex-Netherlands goalkeeper Van der Sar in intensive care after a bleed around his brain, Ajax says</strong> - Dutch media reported the 52-year-old Van der Sar was on vacation in Croatia when he became ill.</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>A radio wireless system becomes force multiplier for disaster management team in Thrissur</strong> - The system, which uses radio frequency, can function even when all other communication links fail</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>Bandi Sanjay hogs the limelight with fiery jibes at KCR in front of PM Modi</strong> - Telangana BJP leaders Bandi Sanjay and Kishan Reddy targetted CM K. Chandrashekhar Rao for boycotting PM Modi’s visit to the State</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>Sarpa app helps bring down snakebite deaths in Kerala</strong> - Data collected through Sarpa app launched by Forest department in August 2020 have been invaluable in identifying parts with highest incidence, the distribution of various species, and the time each species becomes most active. The average annual snakebite death in Kerala was 110 before the app. In 2022, only around 40 cases were reported</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>“Decide whether its me or Naidu,” CM tells farmers</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>Collective leadership ‘only way’ forward going into Assembly polls, says Sachin Pilot</strong> - In an exclusive interview just days after the crucial Rajasthan polls strategy meeting of the party, Mr. Pilot said Mr. Kharge advised him to “forgive and forget” and move forward.</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>President Zelensky visits Snake Island as war enters 500th day</strong> - The island became a symbol of Ukraine’s resistance after troops there defied a Russian order to surrender.</p></li>
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<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: Eight killed in Russian strike in Lyman, say authorities</strong> - Another five people were wounded in the Russian shelling in the Donetsk town, authorities say.</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Cluster bombs: Biden defends decision to send Ukraine controversial weapons</strong> - But the UK says it is a signatory of a convention that “discourages” the use of the weapon.</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>What are cluster bombs and why is US sending them to Ukraine?</strong> - Cluster bombs are banned by more than 100 countries - so the move will likely draw intense criticism.</p></li>
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<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>France riots: Can Paris prevent tensions igniting again?</strong> - The riots in the country’s suburban estates have subsided, for now, but deep divisions remain.</p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>How Threads’ privacy policy compares to Twitter’s (and its rivals’)</strong> - Here’s what is collected by Threads, as well as by Twitter, Bluesky, Mastodon, Spill, and Hive Social. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1952168">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>In-space manufacturing startup aces pharma experiment in orbit</strong> - One more big test remains for Varda’s first-of-its-kind “space factory.” - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1952343">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Rare case of green hairy tongue is pure nightmare fuel</strong> - The man fully recovered after extra tongue brushing. But you might not. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1952298">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Our big unanswered questions about the switch to Tesla-style EV plugs</strong> - Will non-Teslas fit at Superchargers, and what about 3rd party networks? - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1952271">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Musk sues law firm because he’s mad that Twitter paid $90 million bill</strong> - Musk tries to claw back $90M from firm that forced him to complete Twitter deal. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1952281">link</a></p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</h1>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>After my accident, I woke up in hospital with a sexy nurse standing over me..</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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She said “You may not feel anything from the waist down.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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“Fair enough,” I replied and felt her breasts.
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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/HelpingHandsUs"> /u/HelpingHandsUs </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14tnzbs/after_my_accident_i_woke_up_in_hospital_with_a/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14tnzbs/after_my_accident_i_woke_up_in_hospital_with_a/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>A farmer named Clyde had a car accident. In court, the trucking company’s lawyer was questioning Clyde. “Didn’t you say, at the moment of the accident, ‘I’m fine.’” asked the lawyer?</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
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<div class="md">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Clyde responded, “Well, I’ll tell you what happened. I had just loaded my favorite mule, Bessie, into the…” “I did not ask you for any details”, the lawyer interrupted. “Just answer the question. Did you not say, at the scene of the accident, ‘I’m fine?’” Clyde said, “Well, I had just got Bessie into the trailer and I was driving down the road.” The lawyer interrupted again and said “Judge, I’m trying to establish the fact that, at the scene of the accident, this man told the highway patrolman on the scene that he was just fine. Now several weeks after the accident he is trying to sue my client. I believe he is a fraud. Please tell him to simply answer the question.” By this time the judge was fairly interested in Clyde’s answer and said to the lawyer “I’d like to hear what he has to say about his favorite mule, Bessie.” Clyde thanked the judge and proceeded. “Well as I was saying, I had just loaded Bessie, my favorite mule, into the trailer and was driving down the highway when this huge semi-truck and trailer ran the stop sign and smacked my truck right in the side. I was thrown into one ditch and Bessie was thrown into the other. I was hurting real bad and didn’t want to move. However, I could hear old Bessie moaning and groaning. I knew she was in terrible shape just by her groans. When the highway patrolman came on the scene he could hear Bessie moaning and groaning so he went over to her. After he looked at her and saw her near fatal condition, he took out his gun and shot her between the eyes. Then the patrolman came across the road, gun still in hand, looked at me and said, ‘how are you feeling?’ Now what the fuck would you say?”
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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/myvotedoesntmatter"> /u/myvotedoesntmatter </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14tfej8/a_farmer_named_clyde_had_a_car_accident_in_court/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14tfej8/a_farmer_named_clyde_had_a_car_accident_in_court/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>BREAKING NEWS: A man was admitted to the hospital today with 25 plastic toy horses inserted in his rectum.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
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<div class="md">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Doctors have described his condition as stable.
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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/thisisQualia"> /u/thisisQualia </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14tpp65/breaking_news_a_man_was_admitted_to_the_hospital/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14tpp65/breaking_news_a_man_was_admitted_to_the_hospital/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>My daughter just told me this and it made me laugh more than it should have…</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
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<div class="md">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Teacher: What was that noise?
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Student: Sorry, my jacket fell on the floor.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Teacher: Why was it so loud?
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Student: Because I was wearing it when it fell.
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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/cthulu_akbar"> /u/cthulu_akbar </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14tn55l/my_daughter_just_told_me_this_and_it_made_me/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14tn55l/my_daughter_just_told_me_this_and_it_made_me/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>When Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone…</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF --></p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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He saw he had 10 missed calls from Chuck Norris.
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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/MudakMudakov"> /u/MudakMudakov </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14timjb/when_alexander_graham_bell_invented_the_telephone/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/14timjb/when_alexander_graham_bell_invented_the_telephone/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
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</ul>
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