[ED: I changed the title so folks wouldn’t think this was just a repeat of yesterday’s news]
Well, there’s sort of good news and not-so-good news to report from the state of South Dakota regarding the abortion ban.
First, the bad news because it’s really awful and people need to know about this. This is my first diary, so I hope it up to form.
“Tribal council outlaws abortion President suspended for alleged donations”
I’m sure many of you remember Cecelia Fire Thunder, President of the Oglala Sioux tribe (Pine Ridge). She made news shortly after the ban passed by stating she wanted to build a women’s health clinic on the reservation: “Tribal President Proposes Clinic”. She received thousands of dollars in donations for this clinic – albeit unsolicited.
Just today, the tribal council banned all abortions on the reservation and has suspended Fire Thunder for 20 days, after which they will vote on impeachment:
Fire Thunder, in Iowa for an annual test of the cochlear implants that restored her hearing four years ago, said the people who brought the complaint were the same people who have been opposing her presidency since she was elected in November 2004.
“It got crazy,” Fire Thunder said. “On Friday they were passing around a flyer that said ‘Wilma Mankiller – Cecelia Babykiller.’ “
Mankiller was the first female principal chief of the Cherokee Nation; Fire Thunder is the first female president of the Oglala Sioux.
I am certainly no expert in tribal politics, but having an all male council vote to suspend and possibly impeach the first women president doesn’t sit right with me. I think this says it all, though:
But “she is a hard gal to look after,” Peters said. “I just believe that she has fallen out of touch with the people she was elected to represent.”
Now, the better news: More than twice the signatures needed to get the issue on the ballot were turned in despite attempts from supporters of the ban to stop it. Rumors were floated about the deadline for turning in signatures in an effort to confuse people and make then turn the petitions in early (thus, ban supporters hoped to force people to turn in the petitions without enough signatures). It didn’t work.
From the Argus Leader: Abortion petitions in: two issues rejected
PIERRE – Opponents of the 2006 Legislature’s ban on abortion in South Dakota delivered to the secretary of state Tuesday about 38,000 signatures on a petition to give voters a chance to veto the proposed law.
If Secretary of State Chris Nelson determines that at least 16,728 of the names are registered voters in the state, voters will decide Nov. 7 whether the Legislature was right or wrong in passing a law that makes it a felony in almost all cases for a doctor to perform an abortion.
The abortion ban is scheduled to take effect July 1, as most laws do in South Dakota. If Nelson certifies the issue to the ballot, the ban will be held in check until after the November election. If voters approve the ban, it takes effect the day after the official canvass, although a court challenge almost certainly would be filed against it in federal court.
I’m glad the issue will be brought to a vote. The ban will be voted down. While many South Dakotans do not support abortion completely, most believe this ban is far too restrictive and that Rounds went too far in signing it. He’s up for a tough fight in November, too, if Billion wins the Dem nomination.
Taking tactics from the Republican playbook.
Please visit
Focus South Dakota to help defeat the abortion ban.
Or, in plain English, “Our token female has stepped out of line and demonstrated signs of independent thought! Quick, kill her before she makes us look like the dribbling reactionary morons we really are!”
Yeah, that line really stood out. That message is pretty clear, eh?
I think it summed up the right-wing attitude towards women that’s working behind this ban very nicely. I’ve been reading Pandagon a lot lately, and they’re really good at pointing out this attitude when it pops up.
Looking back, I think that was what was behind the Pie Wars.
Looking back, I think that was what was behind the Pie Wars.
Absolutely it is what was behind Pie Wars. It was never the ad, it was the FP polemics against women, hiding behind a take down of NARAL. etcetera.
When I saw the ad (which I never would have noticed but for the campaign waged for months against women) I emailed Kos: “message received”. And I inquired after “the wife” and “the kid”.
A little objectifying in return.
The site, IMO, also wished to be rid of strong women’s voices and to replace them with the 23 year old frat boys and their 28 – 37 year old male gurus/party whips
Calling out so called Special Interests was an old time scam of the DLC. And honestly I don’t think much of NARAL national. Nor of Keenan, who has not long term history of supporting reproductive rights, she is a basic Red State Dem who lost and election in 00 and was on the loose. NARAL SD is something else. But god forbid Kos and his whack jobs know anything.
About it… in a nut shell.
Ghastly people… and so centrist they virtually suck Republican cock. To be blunt.
Oh, MCat, you do go right to the heart of the issue!
I think in general politics is such a male-dominated environment that the threshold of discomfort on anything that smacks of women’s issues is usually much lower than that for other issues. Once that threshold is reached, women must be disciplined, isolated, reduced in importance, sent off in a new (and less intrusive) direction, etc. Or simply made to “vanish.”
Why should we expect things to be different in most democratic party groups?
bingo.
Why should we expect things to be different in most democratic party groups?
Oh I dunno, maybe because the tiny tots at Kos state all day long they are different? </being snide>
Frankly a lot of the rhetoric reminds me of nothing so much as the INC, Iraqi National Congress. Just seeking a shift in power, but no change.
No different than Elaine Kamarck, Begala and Carville in their stand up routine (via C-Span I caught them a few weeks ago at Harvard, Kennedy School for Gov.) declaring “take back the party” and in the next breath assuring the audience that “nobody wants the party to be more liberal” [check, got that one] that they were “founding members of the DLC” and all were “Catholic”.
Oh and they sqeezed in that “Partial Birth Abortion” is something we all know is “bad”. [Check, got that one. shove out a Republican lie.]
Younger consultants / operatives / activists may pay up at the NDN, about the only difference.
LOL. And the trope (pushed shamefuly at Dkos, even now) is that the DLC is trending to obsolescence… and with a piece in the Wapo Kos pretends to be adverse Hillpac. Considering the money that will spent, everywhere, for that run, I so doubt that whopper.
Same old same old: bitch and capitulate.
A very important subject for your first diary. It’s always about power and dominion, never respect for life.
You’d think that men who had been victimized would be less enamored of the system.
All of the tribes tend to have their own common belief systems. Even though I lived in Gillette WY for awhile I don’t know much about the people who live on Pine Ridge. An Indian Reservation is it’s own nation and governed by those who are on its council. I would say it is going to be hard to predict what sort of outcome this may bring, and in the long term Fire Thunder and her clinic for her women could rebound from all of this quite easily even if they do manage to impeach her this time. If you think garden variety American politics gets odd and hairy……tribal politics can be even more so but in my opinion their people tend to eventually WIN the greater good more often than the rest of us because their tribal leaders have to actually live among and speak to the people they represent!