The Inevitability of South Carolina

I was half listening to the Nightly News the other evening when I heard about a car driving into the beach at Daytona.  I harrumphed, because I had visited Daytona Beach a couple of years ago and was totally flummoxed by the fact that cars drive up and down that beautiful beach just because, well, they can.  I just assumed some idiot had gotten distracted.

But as I watched further, it was apparent that this was a different matter entirely.  A woman with three children in a minivan intentionally turned and drove into the surf.  The children were screaming for help, and the oldest trying to wrestle the steering wheel from his mother.  Others on the beach responded to the obvious distress and rescued mother and three children.

As I listened, I felt a bizarre sense of inevitability.  I almost said the words along with the commentator:  the woman was from South Carolina.

In 1994, Susan Smith achieved national notoriety when she claimed that her two children had been abducted by a black man; after a nine day search, she admitted that in fact she had pushed her car into a lake, drowning her sons.  Her stepfather, a Christian Coalition leader, admitted to having sexually molested Smith.

I only relate that story because, as with Ebony Wilkerson, it is pretty much a checklist of what is wrong with South Carolina.  A mentally disturbed woman, victim of spousal and/or sexual abuse, responsible for children.  It turns out that three days earlier, Wilkerson had called 911 from her Myrtle Beach home to report having been raped by her husband.  He had also been arrested and charged with battery in 2005.  This time around, the Myrtle Beach police appear to have been "still investigating" the call when questioned three days after she attempted to kill herself and her children.

Earlier on that same day in Daytona, her sister called the police and reported that Ebony was delusional, talking about Jesus and demons.  They actually stopped her on the road, but had no reason to hold her.

Wilkerson was 27 weeks pregnant.

Obviously, in both South Carolina and Florida, attempts were made to intervene.  But this woman had been wrestling with crises that needed intervention a long time ago.

Here in South Carolina, our governor is working hard to deny people food stamps and health care, two pieces of a struggle that could be easily addressed for so many of us.  More difficult problems of mental illness, spousal assault and isolation would require hard work from our government.  Ebony Wilkerson has had contacts with various government services, and they have been inadequate.

Poverty, racism, inadequate education, lack of family assistance, inadequate health and mental health outreach, lack of sex education and family planning, failure to pursue and prosecute the abusers of women.

I could go on.

It's been quite a number of years since Susan Smith drowned her children.  Sadly, South Carolina continues to be number 1 (or right up there) in all the wrong things.

Isn't it time we stopped worrying about whether we should be feeding people who don't have jobs and just feed them?  And how about knocking it off about the evils of the Affordable Care Act, and taking that Medicaid expansion?
  
Then maybe we can begin to address those tragedies that can be prevented with commitment and work.



   

Opening the Door to Alleys and Coat Hangers

The Texas State Legislature had to lie, cheat and steal to do it, but they have managed to pass their forced-pregnancy bill.

Delusional Rick Perry appears to believe that now that he has taken the criminalization of women and their reproductive rights to new depths in his state, he is ready to give the national stage another try, and so has indicated that he will not run for another term as governor.

What does the passage of this bill really mean?

By making it more difficult for women to seek legal abortions, Texas has opened that door to the dirty, dangerous back-alley abortions of the 50's.  Teenage girls and women alike will return to the options that were available when I was a teenager.  Word of mouth will lead them to the door of the disreputable doctor, or to those old home remedies for pregnancy, like Lysol and coat hangers.  If you are poor and have limited resources, an unsupportive family, or are just terrified, these are the options that will remain open to you in Texas, and in many other states across the country.

These lawmakers have done nothing to provide better education, better health care, better nutrition, a living wage.  These are the means through which a moral nation fights abortion.  In those states where there is hope and means to a decent life, the incidence of abortion is less.  And not surprisingly, teen pregnancy and infant mortality rates are lower.

The sad fact is that the anti-abortion movement has been allowed to use the horrors of Kermit Gosnell's abortion practice and trial to push through the very laws that would make such practices more likely.

Wendy Davis did what she could to bring the real issues and arguments to the national stage.  It will take many, many more women, and men, to stand up and loudly speak the truth, else this awful reality of back-room abortions will spread again across our country.

Texas Bull

While across the country, and in the US Congress, the plot to keep women pregnant and powerless continues, in Texas they have continued to prove that they can do it bigger and better.  In fact, Governor Perry-- who not only can't remember the third thing on any list, he can't recall resigning from the presidential race after becoming a laughingstock-- continues to believe that he has a moral imperative to, well, make women behave.

After Wendy Davis' amazing filibuster, which was cut short by republicans who were just teed off at not getting things their way, Rick Perry had his own personal god-given tantrum.  Unable to get his forced pregnancy bill passed by following the rules that were set up by his own gang, and after his gang couldn't even break their own rules to get it passed anyway, Perry immediately stated that he is going to call for another special session.  Maybe this time there will be a secret meeting place.

Perry, who I believe has way too personal a fear of abortion, projected that fear when he said that because Davis was born into "difficult circumstances" she should know how important it is to prevent women from being able to decide to have an abortion.

In Mr. Perry's small mind, women only (and apparently always) opt for abortion because life's too tough.  Maybe just out of touch, or maybe it's that niggling fear that if his mom had had a choice, there would be no Rick Perry.  Isn't it this fear of women being in control that is determining this whole evangelical passion to force women to bear children?

The other issue surrounding this nonsense coming out of Texas is the fact-free assertion that fetuses feel pain.  Sadly, it was a woman who was blowing hot air on C-Span when I turned it on a week or so ago, and she was nearly in tears over the thought that these fetuses could feel pain.

To all those legislators there in Texas who are feeling the pain of those fetuses, I want you to dry those crocodile tears and pay attention.  Because Texas is helping my state of South Carolina hold down the bottom in terms of health care, education and child nutrition.

It's time to take care of this group of constituents, who we know for a fact feel pain:

From AlterNet

From Dallas Observer

And if you Texas legislators are really into doing some research about pain, you'll find a lot of it in your own backyard.  And you won't have to force women to take the helping hand that will help feed their kids.

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