Ruth Bader Ginsburg died on Friday evening, on what was Shabbat and Rosh Hashanah evening, a holy time. Mitch McConnell wasted no time dancing on her grave, talking that evening about jamming through a Trump appointee to replace her, pronto. RBG, who devoted her life to women’s rights, civil rights and equality will like be replaced by someone who will work against what she fought for.
This is not airy philosophy being fought over here. It’s real life to real people, the majority of whom did not vote for Donald Trump. It likely means the death of the Affordable Care Act, which I have to thank for being the reason I got insurance in my part-time permanent professional job for the state, not temp work in retail. Without the ACA I was paying $500/month, a real hardship on a half-time salary. I think they’re saying 23 million people will lose insurance. Without coverage for pre-existing conditions, how many people in a time of pandemic are going to be turned down for insurance because they’d been infected with COVID? This new appointment will also likely mean a return to back-alley abortions and doctors being imprisoned. The trashing of environmental protections, regulations on large corporations and so on. It’s back to the 1950s.
That all galls me in itself. But what really steams me is the hypocrisy of ramming through a justice 40-something days before the election when McConnell blocked Obama’s pick, Merrick Garland, from even getting a hearing before the senate. This, a man with impeccable credentials, known to be even-handed. This is how the Supreme Court is supposed to be: the most smart and even-handed people available. Instead a right-wing ideologue will be pushed through.
What strikes me now is that there isn’t even a show of fairness for the process, a concern for the nation as a whole or respect for RBG. They know they’re being hypocrites given what happened with Garland, and they do not care. This is what I’ve finally come to see when I would get maddened by unfairness and inconsistency. Didn’t evangelicals see how un-Christlike Trump’s actions have been all his life? The religious right were really OK with his philandering and braggery about it, his lying and cheating and hatred of the poor and of Latino people, the vast majority of whom are religious Catholics? It was a personal game-changer when I realized that they know this, but they just don’t care. They will accept any manner of immoral behavior as long as their agenda is pushed through. I won’t even go into the impeachment hearings and how all the Republican senators except Romney timidly fell in line. Where are the elected officials with a moral sense that transcends loyalty to the party? What about loyalty to the American ideal and the American people?
What this means is that currently there is not even a pretense of fairness and adherence to democratic ideals. It means it’s all about power, and lying and hypocrisy are OK. If I can do it, I will do whatever the hell I want. And that is the dark side of the American worship of individual freedom above all. It means screw society, I’m looking out for #1. That’s what America is to these bullies: the playground where you can stick out your elbows and knock over the widows and orphans (phrase from the Bible, the book they like to tout) as long as they can have 21 billion dollars instead of only 20 billion.
If this conservative Catholic judge is appointed, all I can say is I hope she’s one of the Catholics with integrity about “right to life,” applying it to the whole range of human life, including post-birth all the way to the end, meaning no capital punishment, either.
Rest in peace, and thank you, RBG.
Rhapsody in Blog 