monitoring Trump and relevant contemporary events

Here it comes again. The U.S. House will vote Tuesday, for the third time since 2013, on a national ban on abortions that occur after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

As on the previous two occasions, the Senate will block any action on the bill (which would need 60 votes to overcome a certain filibuster by most Democrats and at least a couple of Republicans). It is also blatantly unconstitutional under prior Supreme Court precedents. And it also is aimed at addressing a nonexistent crisis of late-term abortions (the CDC estimates that 98.2 percent of abortions occur by the end of the 20th week of pregnancy, and 96.9 percent by 17 weeks).

So why is this legislation coming up again? And for that matter, why have 20 states enacted versions of it, despite strong indications that it would never pass constitutional muster?

The short answer is that 20-week bans reflect a long-standing strategic decision by the anti-abortion movement to focus on a tiny number of late-term abortions, even though their ultimate goal is to ban the vast number of abortions that occur earlier, mostly in the first trimester of pregnancy. Coupled with lurid imagery and misinformation about the nature and frequency of late-term abortions, this strategy achieved the movement’s biggest-ever legal victory, the 2007 Supreme Court decision in Gonzales v. Carhart, in which a 5-4 majority upheld a congressional ban on so-called “partial-birth abortions,” defined as a specific abortion method (“intact D&E”) that Congress “found” never to be medically necessary.

The bill [to make silencers easier for gun freaks to purchase and use], which we've been keeping an eye on in recent months, was poised to come up for a vote this week, but in the wake of the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history, GOP leaders have delayed consideration of the legislation.

If that sounds vaguely familiar, it's because this isn't the first time: Republicans initially delayed the bill on silencers because of the mass shooting that nearly killed House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.). In other words, a mass shooting delayed a Republican gun bill, which made a comeback, only to be delayed by another mass shooting.

While the attack in Las Vegas this weekend has been called the worst mass shooting in modern history, allies of President Donald Trump told Axios they don’t think the President will pivot left on the gun control debate like he did on the debt ceiling.

Axios spoke with more than 20 sources inside and outside the White House since the shooting, including former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, who said the reaction from Trump’s base would be “actually worse” if he made a deal with Democrats on gun control than if he had supported comprehensive immigration reform.

“Impossible: will be the end of everything,” Bannon told Axios in a text message.

Longtime former Trump adviser Roger Stone made similar comments.

“Base would go insane and he knows it,” he said.

While the attack in Las Vegas this weekend has been called the worst mass shooting in modern history, allies of President Donald Trump told Axios they don’t think the President will pivot left on the gun control debate

“Look, we have a tragedy. We’re going to — what happened in Las Vegas is in many ways a miracle. The police department has done such an incredible job, and we’ll be talking about gun laws as time goes by.”

It's all about being a slave to fear. You have to be pretty frightened to need all those guns and talk about wearing body armour just to go to the shops.

These people aren't free, far from it.

Unless there's some way to put all the 2nd amendment crusaders in a colony somewhere.

It's all about being a slave to fear.

Americans do seem fearful. Not sure where that came from - it started before 9-11 but sure escalated then.

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Americans do seem fearful. Not sure where that came from - it started before 9-11 but sure escalated then.

I'm not entirely sure where it comes from, either. But I'm fairly certain that it is stoked and perpetuated by the fact that fear is profitable. To wit - gun sales just spiked as a result of this latest massacre.