GOP Texas lawmaker introduces bill to allow death penalty for women who have abortions

A Republican lawmaker in Texas has introduced a bill that would allow the death penalty for women who have abortions.

“Today, I filed HB 3326 to Abolish Abortion in Texas,” Texas State Rep. Bryan Slaton (R) said on Twitter.

“The bill will end the discriminatory practice of terminating the life of innocent children, and will guarantee the equal protection of the laws to all Texans, no matter how small,” he said.

Under HB 3326, a person who has an abortion or performs an abortion could be charged with assault or homicide, which is punishable by death, the Texas Tribune reported.

Slaton’s legislation also says that certain parties may have to testify in cases of death or “bodily injury to an unborn child,” and offers immunity to those that do.

The legislation also directs the state’s attorney general to “direct a state agency to enforce those laws, regardless of any contrary federal statute, regulation, treaty, order, or court decision,” the newspaper reported.

The bill would also ban abortions at fertilization, whereas most abortions in Texas are prohibited after 20 weeks.

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Consent That’s Manufactured By Propaganda Is Not Informed Consent

A new Twitter post by Secretary of State Tony Blinken reads as follows:

“We will never hesitate to use force when American lives and vital interests are at stake, but we will do so only when the objectives are clear and achievable, consistent with our values and laws, and with the American people’s informed consent – together with diplomacy.”

Like pretty much everything ever said by Blinken, and indeed by every US secretary of state, this is an absolute lie.

Firstly, US military force is never used to protect “American lives” in modern times, unless you count the lives of US troops and mercenaries in foreign lands they have no business occupying in the first place. The US military is never used to defend American lives against an invading enemy force; that simply does not happen in our current world order. It is only ever used to protect the agenda of unipolar planetary domination, which would be the “vital interests” which Blinken obliquely refers to above.

Secondly, Blinken’s claim that the Biden administration will never use military force without “the American people’s informed consent” has already been blatantly invalidated by Biden’s airstrikes on Syria last month. The American people never gave their consent to those airstrikes, informed or uninformed. A nation the US invaded (Syria) was bombed because troops are being attacked in a second nation the US invaded (Iraq) on the completely unproven claim that a third country against whom the US is currently waging economic warfare (Iran) supported those attacks. At no time were the people asked for their consent to this, and at no time was any attempt made to ensure that they were informed of the situation before it happened.

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Biden AG Nominee Merrick Garland Wrote in 70s That Song About ‘Military Rape’ Was ‘Hilarious’

President Joe Biden’s attorney general nominee Merrick Garland as a college student at Harvard University wrote in a review of a musical that a song about rape was one of the play’s “hilarious group numbers.”

In a Harvard Crimson article published January 22, 1976, he wrote in a critique of the play (emphasis added):

A combination of factors, however, keep the vocal problems from becoming disastrous. Most important are the Jones-Schmidt songs themselves, simple and engaging melodies with a few tender ballads like “Try to Remember” and some hilarious group numbers like “it Depends on what You Pay,” which provides a shopping list of rapes for sale (e.g. “the military rape–it’s done with drums and a great brass band.”)

The play was “The Fantasticks,” performed by an all-freshmen cast. It is about a nearly 20-year-old college student and a 16-year-old girl, who are young lovers.

The article was submitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee on January 26, 2020, as part of a questionnaire Garland filled out for consideration by the committee next week. Question 12 asks the nominee to list published writings — books, articles, reports, letters to the editor, etc. — and public statements.

The song about rape has come under public scrutiny in the past for its lyrics, which include:

We’ve the obvious open schoolboy rape,
With little mandolins and perhaps a cape.
The rape by coach; it’s little in request.
The rape by day, but the rape by night is best.

Just try to see it.
And you will soon agree, señors,
Why
Invite regret,
When you can get the sort of rape
You’ll never ever forget.

You can get the rape emphatic.
You can get the rape polite.
You can get the rape with Indians:
A very charming sight.
You can get the rape on horseback;
They’ll all say it’s new and gay.
So you see the sort of rape
Depends on what you pay.
It depends on what you
Pay.

The song’s lyricist, Tom Jones, made changes to the song in 2006 when the play was revived in 2006.

“For years I didn’t think and then gradually it began to seep into my consciousness. My consciousness was raised. I really began to think, you know, rape isn’t funny,” Jones told NPR in 2006. The word “rape” was later changed to “abduction.”

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Twitter Will Enforce a ‘Strike System’ Against Coronavirus Vaccine ‘Misinformation’

Social media giant Twitter announced this week that it will begin labeling tweets that share “misleading information” about the coronavirus vaccine and will implement a strike system for repeat offenders of the “misinformation policy.”

The Verge reports that Twitter announced on Monday that it will begin labeling tweets that share what the company decides is misleading information about coronavirus vaccines. The labels will link to relevant information from government bodies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and a system allowing for five strikes will be implemented for users that repeatedly violate its misinformation policies.

Repeated violations of the policies could lead to Twitter locking or permanently suspending accounts. The new labels are similar to Facebook’s anti-misinformation banners which were launched as part of Facebook’s attempts to curb what it considers coronavirus misinformation last December.

Twitter plans to apply the new labels through a combination of human and automated review systems and will begin the rollout with English language content first. The criteria for labeling coronavirus posts have been outlined in Twitter’s misleading information policy but overall Twitter is focusing on five categories of false or misleading information, according to the Verge:

Misinformation about the nature of the virus
Misinformation about the efficacy of treatments and preventive measures
Misinformation about regulations, restrictions, and exemptions in association with health advisories
Misinformation about the prevalence of the virus and the risk of infection or death
Misleading affiliations (for example, claiming to be a doctor or public health official)

Labels will also play a major part in the new strike system. Twitter has stated that a tweet deemed harmful by the company counts as one strike. A tweet that adds to a larger conspiracy connected to the virus that Twitter deems dangerous, such as the idea that vaccines include microchips to track people, may also be deleted by the platform.

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