A cautionary note on a used electric car purchase. A family bought a 2014 (that's not long ago) car for $11,000. It needs a new battery, which would cost $14,000 to replace IF there were any available, which there aren't. The result? The car's dead and will need to be replaced. Not very "eco".

BTW, this is where the government could do some good. Mandate that EV car makers supply parts for them (such as batteries) for 20 years, as a start. Make sure that as people are forced to convert to electric vehicles that they can actually use them.


"Avery Siwinski is a 17-year-old who's parents spent $11,000 on a used Ford Focus Electric car, which is a 2014 model and had about 60,000 miles when it was bought, according to KVUE.

The teenager had the car for six months before it began giving her issues and the dashboard was flashing symbols.

"It was fine at first," Siwinski said. "I loved it so much. It was small and quiet and cute. And all the sudden it stopped working."

She told the news outlet that the car stopped running after taking it to a repair shop, and the family eventually found out that the car's battery would need to be replaced.

The problem? A battery for the electric car costs $14,000,

https://www.foxbusiness.com/technol...roblem-replacement-battery-costs-more-vehicle

 

You rarely hear about "fun" things businesses are doing, but a couple of restaurants started having competing signs which would be fun to see. Apparently, before the pictures below, McDs asked DQ if they wanted to have a sign fight, and DQ said they were "too busy making ice cream".

LOL, personally, I like the bank's input the best. (oh, and btw, it really IS "Arvest" bank. When you look at it you figure it's "Harvest Bank" with the "H" missing, but, "nope". It's Arvast Bank.







https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle...AAZExNV?cvid=c10ac31fad5e4610a06c45534f75cdcf

 

Anyone who claims political actions have anything to do with the seriousness of the underlying event is being deliberately obtuse.

 

The problems with the courts started in 1973 when they allowed a legal decision to take the place of a law created by elected representatives. All the problems the country face now are the fruit of that poisonous tree.

Any doctor who says they are afraid to treat a woman who has had a miscarriage is either a complete idiot or an activist trying to mislead you -- anyone saying such a thing on t.v. is far more likely to be the latter. "Performing an abortion" means taking an infant's life with the INTENT of taking an infant's life. It does not, for example, apply to situations like an ectopic pregnancy (surgical removal of the same to save the woman results in the death of the fetus) or for Heaven's sake a d&c after a miscarriage.

On the 10 year old girl's story, do you really think the inconvenience of having to cross state lines to go to a doctor is the family's concern at this point? That man raped and traumatized that little girl and robbed her of her childhood. She will probably never fully recover, not really. That is what is going to be consuming the family, not the addition of 1/2 hour of driving time to get to a doctor's office. She was given an abortion. She had to cross state lines to do so because The People of her state don't believe in later term abortions regardless of the reason (apparently). That's what they want there. If they don't want it, they can vote for something else. That's the way the system works. BTW, one thing I haven't seen discussed much is that the perpetrator was 31 years old but listed as a minor in the doctor's report to the state. Why did the doctor make such a change? What gain was there for her or for the suspect in her doing so? If the doctor's "mistake" was deliberate, have they been punished for the same? Why not?

If you think our current "lack of rights" are sick, get off your duff and start writing letters to your members of Congress. Organize local action groups, protest. DO something about it! That's the way the system is supposed to work, aggrieved people making changes to our laws. It's NOT supposed to be the case that 9 UNelected people make the rules that govern our society.

 

In America, "The People" are the ones who determine what "rights" we have to our own bodies, as opposed to a King or other such unelected body telling us what rights we have. That's the whole point of our country! If you do NOT think it's the right of the people to determine these rights, who DO you think should determine what's legal in the US? Biden? The Supreme Court? The UN?

Or are you a Libertarian to the point you believe one should have the right to do literally anything to yourself? For example, to buy and use heroin, meth, etc. legally as it's "your body" to do with what you will and society be damned? How about seat belts and motorcycle helmets? Does the state have a right to FORCE you to protect yourself?

All citizens DO have basic rights. Those that are enumerated in the Constitution are managed by the Federal government. Rights NOT managed by the Feds are managed by the States, and something is no less a right for being managed by a state.

On your last part, I understand your POV completely. I also understand that some people believe that the developing child is an innocent person and has a right to life as well, even if it burdens the young mother. I'm NOT saying that's my view, but I recognize it exists, just like I recognize that some people feel we should euthanize patients with Alzheimers, the demented elderly, etc. while others believe they have a right to life and care. There's more than one POV out there for every tough ethical decision, and *someone* has to decide what's legal for each state or the country. Personally, I'm glad we have the option of letting the states decide instead of being forced to wait for Congress to do something nationally, as Congress currently is proving itself unable to accomplish much. Or to put it another way, allowing the states to decide isn't "revolting", it's the best thing we have at this point in time.

And just so the point doesn't get lost, it was NOT the right idea to have the Supreme Court effectively pass a law because they were tired of waiting for Congress to do so. You might not appreciate it now, but this court has done a real service for the country in overturning Roe. Once the court has its foot in the door as a writer of laws, who knows what law they might wish to write next? Actually, as Purri pointed out they already *did* write another law, the "Defense of Marriage" act. You'll recall it was passed by Congress and signed by the President to say marriage was between one man and one woman, and the SC came out and said that what that really meant was that gay marriage was legal across the country. The SC decided the law meant the exact opposite of Congress' intent. LOL, that might seem great from an "end justifies the means" pov, but I bet you won't feel the same way the next time a Dredd Scott or Plessy court is in power, and now has the right and ability to craft laws of their choosing.

Nope, if someone didn't put the brakes on the Supreme Court's overreach, in another generation for practical purposes we could effectively disband Congress and accept our country had become an oligarchy.

 

You really believe that all the SC did was to "interpret the case before it" in Roe? Texas said the state had a right to protect the lives of the unborn, and only allowed abortion to save the health of the mother and allowed NO abortions otherwise, and that's what they wanted to continue with. Roe wanted the right to an abortion to be absolute - the right to abortion at any time for any reason. So what did the supreme court do? First, they *invented* a "right to privacy" that they said existed (without, you know, actually being written down) in the Constitution, and then They *invented* the trimester system saying what regulations states could impose on abortion during each trimester of pregnancy! Before the SC came up with this idea, neither side in the case said anything remotely like wanting a trimester system. There's just *no way* you can (honestly) say the SC was just interpreting a case when they made up their own framework to use as law going forward in perpetuity. That is WRITING law, not interpreting it.

I give much more weight to the "originalists" claims than those of the "living Constitution, reinterpret things for the complexities of today" crowd. I was just now washing my coffee pot and thought of an example of why. Mom dies, and wrote a will years ago to distribute her assets. Now her heirs aren't happy with the way Mom wanted things, and basically say that what Mom *really* wanted was for them to have the authority to say where the money went, as Mom wrote the will a long time ago and didn't understand the complexities, responsibilities and demands of her will in today's world. Both sides could argue their cases, but for me? If Mom said she wanted all over her money to go to the animal shelter instead of her kids, that's what should happen. The kids shouldn't be able to come up with some slick talk to take her money themselves after she's dead and can't speak for herself. Similarly, the Courts should do what they were MEANT to do. Interpret laws as Constitutional, or not, not re-write them to suit their own pleasure.

Boy, was he wrong!

Right. *Striking down* an unConstitutional law is fine. Re-writing a law to make it say what the court wants it to is NOT fine.

Isn't that how it should be? People deciding for themselves how they want to live? So far everyone who has wanted an abortion has gotten one, regardless. How do I know that? Because as sure as I am the sun will come up tomorrow I'm sure there are a whole batch of left wing journalists and activists waiting to find a woman being forced to carry a pregnancy to term so they can hoist her up and parade her around in support of their cause. Since that hasn't happened yet, it hasn't happened yet.

Even before Roe was overturned rural access and access of the poor to abortion was difficult. *Everything* is difficult for the poor, that's part of being poor. It's rather ironic that you are using OB/GYNs leaving because of this, saying it will hurt the poor. The truth is GYNs have been leaving these same areas for YEARS *because* of the poor. The malpractice rates for GYNs is 4 times that of anyone else, because they are a favorite target in lawsuits from the poor who aren't happy with one thing or another. If the .gov had immunized these docs from lawsuits, many of them wouldn't have left. That was brought up, but the trial lawyers put a stop to it. My rambling point? The poor are responsible for the lack of OBs treating the poor, not Roe.

I agree with you here, but what you wrote depresses me. Why? Because implicit in your statement (much like the right to privacy in the Constitution ) is the acknowledgement that Congress isn't going to live up to its responsibilities and pass a law regarding abortion and fix the situation once and for all. That's sad.

Hey, one final thought on your Hamilton quote. He thought the Constitution represented the long-term will of the people, and laws their passing fancies, as it were, right? Thinking about it, abortion restrictions were present in the country since it's inception, and it wasn't until Roe that abortion on demand became the law of the land. Why would there be such a profound and sudden change? Well, what was going on in the country at the time? The 70's! Freedom without responsibility and hedonism. I think you could make a good case that in passing their "law" the SC was acting not as a stable Constitutional agent, but as an flighty agent of the day, following the zeitgeist of their time. Perhaps now more serious heads are saying the party's over and it's time to go back to work and pay the bills that the good-timers have racked up.

 

Yes. Inventing a framework for abortion exceeded their authority. As far as a bad law being precedent? Plessy vs. Ferguson was ALSO in effect for over 50 years before being overturned. Are you saying we should respect that precedent and go back to "separate but equal" as the law of the land? I bet not, and since you wouldn't want to do that, your whole "but we should respect precedent" argument is shown to be b.s. You only want to respect precedent when you want the outcome of respecting precedent. -oh, and btw, even though there were troubles in the decades after Plessy was overturned, the end result for the U.S. is *better*. It stands to reason, then that the same thing will happen here. Initial tribulations followed by improvement to the country overall.

And I have to call b.s. on your "states don't allow abortion to protect the life of the mother". WHICH states have laws like that? Name one. You can't? Didn't think so. And don't waste our time saying that people are "planning" to do something. You could write a book with all the crazy stuff someone is "planning" on doing, but those things aren't laws.

I liked that Cornell article. Very informative and concise. It to me shows the court was doublethinking in their rationale though in Roe. On the one hand, they said abortion could be permissible as fetuses weren't "persons" and therefore had no due process rights. Then they said that because of the state's interests in protecting life, it may proscribe abortion after viability. So... if the baby is viable, why isn't it a person? You can't have it both ways, a baby isn't Schrodinger's cat.

Yes, I believe the original intent should stand unless modified by Congress. The SC should not be making its own changes to the Constitution.

If that'll convince you of my point, I'd be happy to do so, from no less an authority than the Supreme Court itself.

https://d3i6fh83elv35t.cloudfront.net/static/2022/06/19-1392_6j37-2.pdf

No, no we won't. And "yes" I'm sure there are going to be plenty of women who are going to be affected by the correcting of the law. Like I said though, I think at the end of the day doing things the right way will be better for the country than having the SC backdoor a policy on what's literally a life or death issue.

Meh, just my .02. And the type of lawyer that takes these cases work on contingency as they know their clients can't pay. They then take the lion's share of any payout obtained.

The Supreme Court can NOT strike down a Constitutional Amendment, that becomes the Law of the Land and they are bound to follow it regardless of how they feel about it.

Ehh... Remember that the Guttmacher Institute is connected to Planned Parenthood, and isn't an "objective" source. I've posted a link below to an alternative source of information. One thing you'll note is that if you go down to the bottom to look at the (mother's) deaths from abortion, the only time there were "thousands" of deaths were in the 1930s and 40s, which coincidentally also happened to be in the pre-antibiotic era. By the 60's there were "only" 180 ish maternal deaths, by the 70's there were about 50, and now there are about 20/year. I'd say that most of the change had nothing to do with the legality of abortion, and everything to do with 1. the introduction of antibiotics and 2. improvement in surgical techniques and supportive care. A hospital today is not what it was in 1950!

IOW, at this point I think it's safe to say that PP's screeching about "1000's of women dying every year" is baloney. There will most likely continue to be 10-40 maternal deaths per year now that Roe has been repealed just like there were when Roe was NOT repealed. (and, of course, 930,000 fetal deaths per year ((USA Today, for 2021)))

On how many abortions there were prior to Roe? No one really knows. What we do know is that in the early 1970's after Roe was passed (and after a couple of years to make sure people were reporting them) about 600,000 abortions/yr were reported. This increased to 1,200,000/yr by 1980. It would seem reasonable to say that around 600,000 abortions were performed annually in the yeas immediately preceeding Roe. It would NOT make sense to believe the Guttmacher Institute's numbers and say that before Roe there were *1,200,000* abortions a year, and this number decreased by half after passing Roe to 600,000? Does that make sense? Having legalized abortion cut abortions in half? Nope, it doesn't, especially as the papers looking at abortion rates have shown an *increase* after legalization. It took almost a decade of legal abortion to reach the 1 million mark, so I *strongly* doubt Guttmacher's claim about the pre-abortion era.

a site with the opposite bias as guttmacher, but with good tables:

https://www.liveaction.org/news/abortion-numbers-today-before-roe-v-wade/

A great scholarly article that I confess I didn't read all of but skimmed for what I was looking for.

https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/10.1146/annurev.pu.04.050183.001255

 

What has changed? In the days of slavery blacks were determined by the Supreme Court to not be persons, so they couldn't sue for their freedom. Now Supreme Court says that a 9 month old baby (up to the time of delivery) is not a person and can be killed at will by its birthing person.

I agree. It's sad we're still struggling with this.

Oh, and the right to vote is not on the same level as the right to life. It's restricted even today for all sorts of things.

 

Didn't you read Purri's post? The numbers of abortions didn't change radically before and after Roe was "passed", so it stands to reason they won't change radically now that Roe has been repealed, for all of PP's fear-mongering to the contrary.

Oh, and if you REALLY want to make women dependent on men? Start telling men to get a job and support their families!

 

Those aren't *laws*, are they? The point is there is NO state in the nation where you can't have an abortion to protect the health of the mother.

 

So Calif. police arrested two men with 150,000 fentanyl pills. They were let out on cashless bail by the state, as I'd posted before. Now here's the shocking part: Neither one of them appeared in court for their arraignment ! I hope they're o.k., It's not like they have any reason to leave town or anything -- maybe they were in an horrific traffic accident or something and can't physically get to court. I mean, I highly doubt they would commit a crime by not going back for their arraignment on their prior criminal acts. Anyone who would do something like that would have to be a... a... a criminal!

"
Two accused drug traffickers busted with 150,000 fentanyl pills during a California traffic stop last month failed to show in court Thursday after being released on cashless bail.

Defendants Jose Zendejas, 25, and Benito Madrigal, 19 – released on their own recognizance less than 24 hours after their arrest with the large stash of illicit drugs – were scheduled to appear for their arraignments at the Tulare County Courthouse in central California Thursday morning, but failed both men failed to show

https://battleroyaleforums.com/forum/threads/some-craziness.307962/page-379#post-15754292