By Sonali Kolhatkar
Republicans are resorting to their age-old tactic of manufactured moral outrage to distract from the fact that they have no economic agenda other than to enrich the already wealthy.
It couldn’t have been clearer than in the GOP response to President Biden’s State of the Union address. While the president at least paid some lip service to policies meant to help working people, Sarah Huckabee Sanders delivered a bigoted invective against LGBTQ people, teachers, and more in her response.
It would be laughable if their culture wars didn’t have a deadly impact on people’s lives.
As if overturning Roe v. Wade weren’t enough, 20 GOP state attorneys general are now targeting pharmacy chains for fulfilling mail orders of the abortion drug mifepristone. The pill is now used in more than half of all abortions nationwide, likely in response to the rapidly disappearing access to surgical abortions.
Although Republicans claim they’re working in the interests of women’s health, these pills are — and going through pregnancy and childbirth is far more dangerous to women’s health than abortion. No wonder both infant and maternal mortality are higher in states with harsh anti-abortion laws.
The GOP’s war on transgender people has also gained steam. They are battling the right of transgender people to transition via surgeries, hormone supplements, or other medical treatments recommended by doctors. It’s a shocking attack on people’s right to be who they want and need to be — one that targets young people in particular.
GOP lawmakers in Texas have introduced 35 anti-LGBTQ bills, three of which would classify this medical care as child abuse. The Trevor Project has found that “86 percent of transgender and nonbinary youth say recent debates around anti-trans bills have negatively impacted their mental health.” This cruel debate has further encouraged bullying — and the risk of suicide.
Their third major battlefront is the classroom.
Claiming they are fighting a college-level academic approach to history called critical race theory, GOP leaders such as Florida Governor Ron DeSantis are busy banning books and classes at all levels of education. DeSantis’s latest assault is a ban on a new AP-level high school African American studies course that the College Board spent years devising and was set to pilot in 60 schools across the country.
Around the same time, Republicans took aim at Representative Ilhan Omar (D-MN), unceremoniously stripping her of membership in the House Foreign Affairs Committee over false charges of anti-semitism — even as Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Paul Gosar (R-AZ), whose antisemitism is well documented, are now poised to regain their committee seats.
In a speech on the House floor, Omar rightly pointed out that the Republican attack was about “who gets to be an American.” She called out the GOP for its earlier culture war aimed at the nation’s first Black president, Barack Obama, and for spreading rumors that he was a secret Muslim and not a natural born U.S. citizen.
The message that emerges from the conservative party is that if you’re not a straight white man or in service of their supremacy, you’d better fall in line — or face prohibition and the threats of violence.
All the while, congressional Republicans are hoping to cut support to American families by taking the economy hostage.
According to the Washington Post, “the party has focused its attention on slimming down federal health care, education, science and labor programs, perhaps by billions of dollars.” And some have pitched deep cuts to Social Security and Medicare.
These extremists are aggressively attacking marginalized people and hoping voters let them off the hook for their regressive economic policies. In truth, both are deadly.
Sonali Kolhatkar is the host of “Rising Up With Sonali,” a television and radio show on Free Speech TV and Pacifica stations. This commentary was produced by the Economy for All project at the Independent Media Institute and adapted for syndication by OtherWords.org.
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Jackson1955 says
Just don’t vote for Republicans. If they think about anything, it’s only about causing chaos. They can’t see beyond the end of their nose.
There was a time when there were thoughtful conservatives. That time ended in 1994 with Newt Gingrich’s Contract on America.
I think it’s time to remind everyone ….that the “Beloved GQP President Ronald Reagan” is the president that started to TAX SOCIAL SECURITY & MEDICARE. It’s been a while….. OK DEMS… start screaming!! A big boost to all SR’s would be to make Social; Security non- taxable at the State & Federal level!!
YankeeExPat says
That was a” Contract Out on America”
by the ole Newtster
DaleL says
The changes enacted in 1983 were aimed at shoring up the program’s shaky financial footing. (Sound familiar?) They included increasing the payroll taxes that fund Social Security; gradually raising the normal retirement age to 67; and making 50 percent of Social Security benefits taxable for recipients with incomes above $25,000 for an individual and $32,000 for married couples filing jointly.
This was a bipartisan law. The sponsor in the House was Daniel Rostenkowski, a Democrat. A Republican and a Democrat co-sponsored the bill.
It is the Congress which passes laws for the President to sign or veto. It would be good for the Country if Republicans could work with Democrats to find a solution, rather than pushing “Culture Wars”.
Deborah Coffey says
“Republicans are resorting to their age-old tactic of manufactured moral outrage to distract from the fact that they have no economic agenda other than to enrich the already wealthy.” Exactly. Republicans no longer have any morals so, those would have to be “manufactured.” They have only two targets: their racist, bigoted, and unhappy base (whom they worked so hard to keep miserable) and their corporate/business donors. These are now the only two groups that keep them in power even though they are the minority in the country, getting fewer votes. If a Republican says “freedom” one more time, you know they’re stupid or lying.
C’mon man says
Very disrespectful picture of someone.
Pierre Tristam says
It’s a caricature. You did not complain when we ran DonkeyHotey’s caricatures of Bernie Sansders or Hillary Clinton.
Laurel says
Huh! I didn’t notice it was a caricature, I thought it was an actual, accurate portrait. She sneers all the time.
For Real says
Looks just like her.
bob says
fits well with what she said and the way presented
Skibum says
The GOP absolutely loves to lie to the American people, telling us all of the latest, greatest things they are going to do for the economy, for our wallets, for our healthcare, etc. etc. etc. Then when and if they actually worm their way into elected office, they ALWAYS suddenly turn their attention to the myriad social issues because they have no real plans or desires to do the hard work that leaders are supposed to do to make our lives better. Just take a minute and ask yourselves, where is the wonderful GOP healthcare alternative to “Obama Care” that has been continuously talked about but NEVER once produced in the last 13 years? I remember the disgraced lying and impeached former president repeatedly telling America that he and the GOP came up with a great and wonderful healthcare plan that was only weeks away from being presented to America. LIES!!! They had none, and to this day still have not even been able to conjure up a basic alternative to the one Barack Obama successfully put into place to help Americans obtain affordable healthcare. And the reason is simple… the only plan they wanted was to completely scrap that new healthcare plan and go back to allowing medical insurance companies to screw Americans like they always did, and they knew that was going to never be a successful plan, so now they don’t even try to talk about an alternative healthcare plan anymore. The GOP is much more interested in the smoke and mirrors concept of governance, where once elected, they can work on all of the “important” issues like banning books, trying to reverse history and eliminate any and all same sex marriages, prohibit women from making decisions along with their doctors about having an abortion (even with a pill) and even to save the life of the woman or in the case of 12 year old rape victims. The GOP loves to tout themselves as “pro police” even after being involved in an attempted and unsuccessful overthrow of our nation’s government on Jan. 6th where GOP rioting insurrectionists caused the death of police officers at the U.S. Capitol then lied about the insurrection and tried to get America to see that sordid, ugly day as just another tourist visit to the Capitol! There unfortunately is NOTHING good coming out of the latest iteration of the national or FL state GOP, just hateful, deceitful, undemocratic, anti-freedom bullshit that harms everyday Americans and empowers the crazies and most extreme individuals who are stuck on power trips and performative antics in front of Faux infotainment TV cameras.
Laurel says
Skibum: I totally agree with you; you pretty much summed it up. Now, it’s time to give the Democrats some shit!
What a great, damned speech Biden gave! He told middle class Americans what he has done for them, gave Republicans credit for bipartisan work, what he is going to do for Middle class Americans, infrastructure, manufacturing, teachers, medicine negotiating, education and much, much more while the Republicans sat there like they were bored with all these achievements that were not aimed at, and for, the very wealthy. They kept quiet and didn’t cry jobs, jobs, jobs, did they? He clearly showed the Republicans do not give a damn about the American middle class. It was priceless! Then, Biden brilliantly played the Republicans, by knowing how they would react, by bringing up the fact, and it is a fact, that there are Republicans who are working at getting rid of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. This, Republicans knew was bad to bring out to the general public, so they feigned protest. Then, Biden masterfully stated that we are all in agreement that Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid is off the table, right? For all to see! Beautiful!
So now, Democrats, are you still going to want a different, younger person to run in 2024? Meanwhile, the Trumpers will wave flags with Trump baring Rambo muscles, head scarf and a machine gun. Do you still give Biden a 45% rating? If so, you are as hopeless as the Republicans.
Then Sour Sarah came on and made a complete fool of herself.
Skibum says
And I agree with your assessment as well. Sour Sarah, LOL! She was a laughable puppet mouthpiece for the orange guy, even when it was so obvious back then that everything coming out of her mouth was nonsensical word salad denials of what we all were seeing with our own eyes. So fast foward to now, and the crazies in her state elevated her to Gov. Sour Sarah, and she didn’t disappoint with her very dark visions mixed with more word salad. But I digress… Biden has not been given his dues for what he has been able to accomplish so far in his presidency. He has so much institutional knowledge from his decades in Congress, but I can also acknowledge that being president is a very stressful job and he is no spring chicken. I wouldn’t be surprised if he and Jill had some heart to hearts and he ends up deciding not to run for re-election… we’ll just have to wait and see.
Laurel says
Skibum: Don’t worry about Biden. He knows so well what he is up against, and obviously, how to handle it! Most men who have become President, and learned first hand just how difficult it is, turned grey within a term (with the exception of one who cared not for this country). This, to Biden, is like breathing. We need him to continue on, and I hope he decides to run again. I just hope the Democrats are smart enough to finally realize this.
Atwp says
People keep voting for them.
Charles says
She has no qualifications all her jobs her Daddy has gotten for her.
The GQP Should Move To Afghanistan says
Not that it’s anyone’s damn business but I was prescribed mifepristone before I had an endometrial biopsy to check for endometrial cancer. I’m not getting into specifics why because you have no need to know. It was between me and my doctor which is how ALL medical decisions should be made.
The public. Politicians. Facebook Doctors. Men. Stop meddling with women’s health. How about we regulate your balls? Hmm? Your Viagra? No circumcision, that’s gender affirming care. Need testosterone men? Gender affirming. We can do this all day. Women should be able to choose what health care she receives and what she does with her own damn body. Are you all lining up to adopt these kids? No. They are being placed in DeSantis’ state run pedo system that he calls foster care. Yet somehow these kids end up with pedos at hotels that he doesn’t fine. Yet he goes after Disney…hmm. The guy that runs around with pedos and sex traffickers.
Hillary was too kind when she called these people deplorables. .