Following Friday's landmark decision by the Supreme Court which overturned Roe v Wade and sent the question of the legality of abortion back to the states, Joe Biden delivered a rambling speech which many have yet to decipher.
Veteran journalist Robert Stacy McCain provided a translation at The Other McCain blog which is offered here as a public service. The following are excerpts:
Joe Biden: Today is a — it’s not hyperbole to suggest a very solemn moment. Today, the Supreme Court of the United States expressly took away a constitutional right from the American people that it had already recognized.
RSM: Can you tell me where to find the word “abortion” in the Constitution, Joe? Because it’s very hard to take away something that doesn’t exist, and nothing in the Constitution even remotely suggests the existence of the “right” which you claim was “already recognized.”
Biden: They didn’t limit it. They simply took it away. That’s never been done to a right so important to so many Americans.
RSM: To whom is this “right so important”? To the abortion clinic operators who make millions of dollars of campaign contributions to Democrats every campaign cycle.
Biden: This landmark case protected a woman’s right to choose, her right to make intensely personal decisions with her doctor, free from the inter- — from interference of politics. It reaffirmed basic principles of equality — that women have the power to control their own destiny. And it reinforced the fundamental right of privacy — the right of each of us to choose how to live our lives. Now, with Roe gone, let’s be very clear: The health and life of women in this nation are now at risk.
RSM: There’s so much to unpack here, and I don’t want to get too bogged down, but am I the only one mystified as to what “basic principles of equality” the Roe decision allegedly “reaffirmed”? Because that 1973 decision voided state laws against abortion that had existed before some of the Justices on that court were even born. Abortion has been regarded as a crime in Anglo-American common law dating back centuries. But we are expected to believe these ancient laws, deeply rooted in our nation’s customs and culture, violated some “principle” to which Biden committed. The idea that discouraging abortion is somehow a threat to “the health and life of women” is another claim about which Biden will never be asked any serious questions by the press corps that politely ignores the bastard grandchild spawned by the president’s dopehead son.
Biden: And it was a constitutional principle upheld by justices appointed by Democrat and Republican presidents alike. Roe v Wade was a 7 to 2 decision written by a justice appointed by a Republican President, Richard Nixon. In the five decades that followed Roe v Wade, justices appointed by Republican Presidents — from Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, George W. [H.W.] Bush — were among the justices who voted to uphold the principles set forth in Roe v Wade. It was three justices named by one President — Donald Trump — who were the core of today’s decision to upend the scales of justice and eliminate a fundamental right for women in this country.
RSM: An important reason why 74 million of us voted for Trump. But again, the problem is that Biden speaks of “constitutional principle” and “a fundamental right” when no such thing is to be found in the actual Constitution and when, as I say, abortion had previously been outlawed everywhere the English common law prevailed.
Biden: We need to restore the protections of Roe as law of the land. We need to elect officials who will do that. This fall, Roe is on the ballot. Personal freedoms are on the ballot. The right to privacy, liberty, equality, they’re all on the ballot. Until then, I will do all in my power to protect a woman’s right in states where they will face the consequences of today’s decision. While the Court’s decision casts a dark shadow over a large swath of the land, many states in this country still recognize a woman’s right to choose.
RSM: Yes, a “dark shadow” — infanticide will be illegal again! Democrats hate babies! Vote for us so we can keep killing babies!
Biden: The consequences and the consensus of the American people — core principles of equality, liberty, dignity, and the stability of the rule of law — demand that Roe should not have been overturned. With this decision, the conservative majority of the Supreme Court shows how extreme it is, how far removed they are from the majority of this country. They have made the United States an outlier among developed nations in the world. But this decision must not be the final word. My administration will use all of its appropriate lawful powers. But Congress must act. And with your vote, you can act. You can have the final word. This is not over.
RSM: Except, yeah, it probably is over — everything but the riots, vandalism and arson promised by the true extremists of “Jane’s Revenge.” What I expect to happen is that Democrats are going to make abortion the centerpiece of their campaign, until they realize most people don’t really care that much about this “fundamental right” when they’re paying over $5 for a gallon of gas while worried about getting carjacked by violent criminals turned loose by liberal district attorneys.
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