Samuel Alito

As sentient beings living in what purportedly is a free society, the right to self-determination is one of our most closely held values. South Dakota is doing all it can to take away self-determination away from women, as far as reproductive rights go.

In 2005, the South Dakota legislature passed five laws restricting abortion, after a bill to ban abortion outright had failed by one vote in 2004. And new laws are virtually assured for the coming year. A 17-member abortion task force, made up largely of staunch abortion opponents, issued recommendations to the legislature earlier this month that included some of the most restrictive requirements for abortion in the country.

The report states that science defines life as beginning at conception and recommends a law that gives fetuses the same protection that children get after birth, thus banning abortion. Until such a ban, the task force recommends requiring that a woman watch an ultrasound of her fetus, that doctors warn women about the psychological and physical dangers of abortion, and that women receive psychological counseling before the abortion, among other measures.Here they go with the "science is what I say it is" approach. Does life really begin at conception? Where is this scientific evidence? Does implantation have nothing to do with it? What about gestation? You know, the nine months of what is required of the woman's body after the man's five-second contribution to the effort?

As national leaders on both sides of the abortion debate focus on the upcoming Supreme Court nomination hearings of Samuel A. Alito Jr., they are watching states such as South Dakota pass more and more restrictions that might be upheld by a newly constituted, more conservative Supreme Court.

"Samuel Alito wrote the blueprint 20 years ago on how to dismantle and eventually overturn Roe," said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, referring to a memo Alito wrote in 1985 in which he mentioned passing restrictions on abortion as a way to mitigate the effects of Roe v. Wade. "If he is confirmed, Alito could cast the decisive vote that allows additional attacks on women's reproductive freedom from the states to stand."Of course, that's exactly why the man who's "pro-life" views extend to warrentless strip-searches of 10-year-old girls is just wonderful in the eyes of the religious zealots.

But Mary Spaulding Balch, director of the state legislation department of the National Right to Life campaign, said South Dakota is one of many states that have had success in passing laws the organization has been espousing for more than 30 years.

"Working within the fact that the Supreme Court said that it's legal to kill unborn children," she said, "it makes sense that you do your best to save whatever lives you can."Unborn children -- a nice, nonsensical phrase, because of course children are not children until they are born. But hey, potential children are almost children, right? Let's move the point of birth up to the point of conception. That way, women can be relegated to cow status, whose primary purpose is replenishment of the herd.

Moo.

The AP reports there's yet another memo in which Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito openly states his goal of stripping women's reproductive rights.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito wrote in a June 1985 memo that the ruling that legalized abortion should be overturned, a position certain to spur tough questioning at January's confirmation hearings.

In a recommendation to the solicitor general on filing a friend-of-court brief, Alito said the government "should make clear that we disagree with Roe v. Wade and would welcome the opportunity to brief the issue of whether, and if so to what extent, that decision should be overruled."

The June 3, 1985 document was one of 45 released by the National Archives on Friday. A total of 744 pages were made public.

The memo contained the same Alito statements as one dated May 30, 1985, which the National Archives released in November - but with a forward note from Reagan administration Solicitor General Charles Fried acknowledging the volatility of the issue and saying that it had to be kept quiet.

And what does he say?

"While abortion involves essentially the same medical choice as other surgery, it involves in addition a moral choice, because the woman contemplating a first trimester abortion is given absolute and unreviewable authority over the future of the fetus," Alito wrote. "Should not then the woman be given relevant and objective information bearing on this choice? Roe took from the state lawmakers the authority to make this choice and gave it to the pregnant woman. Does it not follow that the woman contemplating abortion have at her disposal at least some of the same sort of information that we would want lawmakers to consider?"

Consistent with his previous writings, Alito said these arguments would be preferable to a "frontal assault on Roe v. Wade."

"It has most of the advantage of a brief devoted to the overruling of Roe v. Wade; it makes our position clear, does not even tacitly concede Roe's legitimacy, and signals that we regard the question as live and open," Alito wrote.

In his memo, Alito said the government, in its argument, might be able to nudge the court and "to provide greater recognition of the states' interest in protecting the unborn throughout pregnancy, or to dispel in part the mystical faith in the attending physician that supports Roe and the subsequent cases."

In other words, he's advocating for politicians to decide what is relevant information to be given to a pregnant woman, and it reveals a goal to establish requirements for what doctors can and cannot say.

Do we want politicians making medical decisions?

Do we want the State to have control over people's bodies?

Alito is at least consistent in this regard, considering his views on the strip-search case where he opined that police, without a warrant, have an inherent right to strip search 10-year-old girls in their own homes.

Alito seems to be the full-blooded anti-libertarian, who believes that the State should control everything. That approach didn't work out too well with Communism. But what should we expect from a man nominated by a president who regards American citizens all as suspects?

What a Scrooge the president was yesterday when he declared he'd continue spying on us:

"This is a different era, a different war," the president said at a year-end news conference in the East Room. "People are changing phone numbers and phone calls, and they're moving quick. And we've got to be able to detect and prevent. I keep saying that, but this . . . requires quick action."
And in case you were wondering what's behind the Alito nomination:

In the wide-ranging news conference, Bush demanded that the Senate confirm Samuel A. Alito Jr. to the Supreme Court by Jan. 20, even as Democrats vowed to question the nominee on his view of the NSA program.Nothing like packing the judiciary with judges who have strong affection for authoritarian government power over the people.

While generally relaxed and sometimes joking, Bush grew testy when asked if he is presiding over the expansion of "unchecked power" by the executive branch. "To say 'unchecked power' basically is ascribing some kind of dictatorial position to the president, which I strongly reject," he responded sharply, waving his finger.Thus is offered the imperial decree. You don't need stand-up comics to make fund of this.

"I just described limits on this particular program," he said. "That's what's important for the American people to understand. I am doing what you expect me to do, and at the same time safeguarding the civil liberties of the country."
So he's violating your constitutional rights in order to "safeguard" them.

Under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the NSA in urgent situations can already eavesdrop on international telephone calls for 72 hours without a warrant, as long as it goes to a secret intelligence court by the end of that period for retroactive permission. Since the law was passed in 1978 after intelligence scandals, the court has rejected just five of 18,743 requests for wiretaps and search warrants, according to the government.
Ah, but it's the mere indignity of having to go to a court to ask permission to pursue authoritarian policies!

In asserting the legality of the program, Bush cited his power under Article II of the Constitution as well as the resolution authorizing force passed by Congress after the Sept. 11 attacks. The resolution never mentions such surveillance, but Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales said it is implicit and cited last year's Supreme Court decision in Hamdi vs. Rumsfeld , which found that the force resolution effectively authorized Bush to detain U.S. citizens indefinitely as enemy combatants.
Even the Democrats are outraged:

Several senators pressed the matter further. Specter and Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) sent letters to Alito promising to grill the nominee on the issue at confirmation hearings next month. Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) raised the prospect of a special prosecutor investigation and said Gonzales would have to recuse himself. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) sent an inquiry to presidential scholars asking if they agree with John Dean, the White House counsel during Watergate, who she quoted as saying that Bush has admitted to an impeachable offense.
Breaking: Rep. Conyers has introduced a censure motion in the House. More in subsequent post.

Those were his words. The full sentence is:

What can be made of this opportunity to advance the goals of bringing about the eventual overruling of Roe v. Wade and, in the meantime, of mitigating its effects?

Read his memo (.pdf).

The Buzz has a link to the hush hush secrecy around this crusade.

Can it be any plainer?

It doesn't get much clearer than this: Today, the Reverend Moon's publication, The Washington Times, reports that Samuel Alito clearly seems predisposed to overturn Roe:

Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr., President Bush's Supreme Court nominee, wrote that "the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion" in a 1985 document obtained by The Washington Times.

"I personally believe very strongly" in this legal position, Mr. Alito wrote on his application to become deputy assistant to Attorney General Edwin I. Meese III.

The document, which is likely to inflame liberals who oppose Judge Alito's nomination to the Supreme Court, is among many that the White House will release today from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.

And it's sure to reassure the radical right wing, whose litmus test for Supreme Court justices got Harriet Miers the hook.

"It has been an honor and source of personal satisfaction for me to serve in the office of the Solicitor General during President Reagan's administration and to help to advance legal positions in which I personally believe very strongly," he wrote.

"I am particularly proud of my contributions in recent cases in which the government has argued in the Supreme Court that racial and ethnic quotas should not be allowed and that the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion."

A leading Republican involved in the nomination process insisted that this does not prove Judge Alito, if confirmed to the Supreme Court, will overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 Supreme Court ruling that made abortion a constitutional right.

"No, it proves no such thing," said the Republican, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "In fact, if you look at some of the quotes of his former law clerks, they don't believe that he'll overturn Roe v. Wade."

And if you believe that, I have a bridge in New York I'd like to sell you.

So now we know why Samuel Alito passes the right-wing litmus test of having ideological attitudes in favor of criminalizing aborted pregnancy.

The question is why the supposedly "pro-choice" Democrats continue to mumble about no litmus test.

[via Fred Barbash, Washington Post Blog]