A losing battle
Greg Abbott has definitely cast his lot by throwing his muscle behind voter suppression, killing health measures, and failing to fix a broken energy grid. He is certainly courting those voters and he knows who to target. The question is whether those he targets will be there to vote for him when 2022 rolls around.
Multiple data points indicate that he may be fighting a losing battle. We know anti-vaxxers are more likely to be Republican than Democrat. Numerous other data points indicate that Republicans are dying at a much faster rate than their more progressive counterparts. Abbott certainly has taken care of making sure the wrong people can’t get to the ballot, but you have to wonder if he has stopped to consider that the right ones might be six feet under by the time November of 2022 gets here.
You have to wonder at what point the antics of Texas state gov’t will result in businesses leaving and/or no longer coming here.
Prediction: With the new abortion law in place, the number of “miscarriages” will skyrocket.
1Until women who have had miscarriages are accused (and convicted) of elective abortion. Do not think that won’t happen.
2Not only dead before the next election, but not sending any contributions in the meantime. Wonder which is considered worse?
3My cousin’s husband was just in the hospital for something unrelated to COVID. His doctor told him that the virus is so contagious they were expecting every person who is unvaxxed to get sick, especially in the southern states. I am having a problem feeling sympathy for them and especially for those people who won’t protect their kids. That part of it is an unnecessary tragedy.
4Dying is one hell of a way to have your vote suppressed. You can’t appeal, take it to a judge, or even get a provisional ballot.
As for COVID and Ivermectin; I think this sums up my thoughts pretty well and, what the hell, I needed a good laugh:
https://twitter.com/traecrowder/status/1432427573326143489
“Existence is a nightmare”.
5Sad but true.
I’ve not read the Texas bill that deputizes citizens to sue abortion providers or those who facilitate abortions.
Any consequence to false claims? If someone has a belief that a woman had an abortion after 6 or 8 weeks of pregnancy, can they sue everyone who might have been involved and use the court processes to sort out if any entity is “innocent” of aiding and abetting the woman?
Purely hypothetically — if I donate to a fund to help pay expenses of a woman traveling out of Texas and having an abortion in Colorado, could I be sued?
Also hypothetically — do you suppose someone will be monitoring all females who are members of the legislature or part of the Texas government, their wives & intimate friends, and their female children?
6The right-wing politicians and their wealty donors probably have run the numbers and decided they won’t be losing that many voters. Recall that many of the Jan 6 insurrectionists actually did not vote in in 2020. If you round up to 1 million dead from covid out of a population of 350 million, it’s not a major dent in the numbers.
I’m aware that two weeks ago the number of covid deaths in Florida exceeded the number of votes that DeSantis won by. But the voting suppression being laid on thick will more than compensate for that when he comes up for re-election. [His plurality was something like 32k, but at least 34k Floridians had died as of two weeks ago].
While it would be amusing justice if so many of the doofuses died that the Republicans lose control of state houses and the U.S. Senate, it will take Black Death numbers (25%-30% dead) before it could potentially flip elections.
7Is this number symbolic or ironic or?
“666 new Texas laws go into effect Sept. 1”
https://www.texastribune.org/2021/08/31/new-texas-laws-september-2021/
8The Surly Professor says…and COVID says, “Here hold my beer!”
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