Abortion Über Alles

Apparently abortion is the only issue that anyone in the DC suburbs cares about if the TV campaign ads by Democrats are any indication. When my kneejerk lefty, very wealthy congressman David Trone was running for re-election, and again during his failed run for the Democratic nomination for Senate (he managed to lose to a corrupt, woke, tax-evading political hack from PG County), if you were not watching closely, you would have thought his constant barrage of TV ads were for a chain of abortion clinics.

Uber-squish Larry Hogan, the GOP Senate nominee and former governor is lambasted because he put aside his stated personal objections to abortion to avidly support legalized (though not publicly funded) abortions. This is clearly way too right-wing for Maryland. (Personal note: Hogan's uncle was a staunchly pro-life OB-GYN who delivered our first two kids).

It is odd that abortion is even an issue in Maryland where the legislature has legalized late-term abortions up to roughly the second week of pre-school. Given the present trend, no one will be able to run for Governor of Maryland or federal office here without having personally performed an abortion on an undocumented trans minor of color.

In Virginia’s 7^th, Democratic candidate Eugene Vindman (identical twin brother of the odious weasel who helped engineer the Ukraine impeachment of Trump) is also big on killing babies as a priority issue in his ads. (That is Eric Cantor's old district.)

From all these ads I learned that the GOP plans to enact a sweeping federal ban on abortions if they get control of Congress and the White House (just before they eliminate taxes on the rich). Ironically, in the highly unlikely event that Congress were to enact such a ban, the same Supreme Court that found that it has no authority to make abortion law would likely inform Congress that it also lacks the constitutional authority to do so. You can only squeeze so much through the commerce clause or through ties to highway funding.

Over the last two decades, the counties surrounding DC have grown at a rapid pace, continue to have household incomes well-above the national average and have gone from 45-55 Democrat-to-Republican to 60-40 with a rising Democrat edge.

Abortion is technically a luxury issue since there is absolutely no chance of any federal or local restriction. Leftists invariably accuse MAGA voters of ignoring actual issues in favor of symbolism and slogans. But abortion as identity politics for white-collar white women in Maryland and Virginia is far more detached from actual, concrete legislative issues than anything happening in the issue complex on the right.

The attack on Hogan for clinging to some vestigial notion of a moral dimension to abortion is telling. It is not enough to legalize abortion. Any semblance of adverse moral judgment must be eliminated. The sexual revolution was a gift to narcissistic promiscuous males -- her body so her problem. For women the revolution greatly complicated personal struggles regarding self-esteem, social standing, relationships and reputation, directly resulting in billions spent on political advertising solely to affirm the notion that abortion must be a morally positive, or at the very least a morally neutral, undertaking. I wonder if and when we will get past that. It is kinda sad, and an enormous distortion of normal, practical politics.

[I discussed the issue of suppression of sexually-related guilt a few years ago in this post The Age of Herodias ]