RAG RADIO / Thorne Dreyer : Jim Hightower Brings the Lowdown on 'Poopgate' and 'Tinkle-Down' Economics

Texas populist gadfly Jim Hightower at the studios of KOOP-FM in Austin, Texas, September 13, 2013. Photos by Roger Baker / The Rag Blog.

Rag Radio podcast:
Famed Texas populist commentator
and political gadfly, Jim Hightower

In 30 years, we’ve gone from Ronald Reagan’s ‘trickle-down’ to the Koch Brothers’ ‘tinkle down’ economics. We are resurrecting the robber barons and imposing a plutocracy over our democracy.

By Thorne Dreyer / The Rag Blog / September 26, 2013

Texas populist writer, commentator, and political gadfly Jim Hightower was our guest on Rag Radio, Friday, September 13, 2013.

Rag Radio with Thorne Dreyer is a weekly syndicated radio program recorded at the studios of KOOP 91.7-FM, a cooperatively-run all-volunteer community radio station in Austin, Texas.

Listen to or download the podcast of our September 13 interview with Jim Hightower here:


Texas progressive populist writer, public speaker, humorist, radio commentator, and political gadfly Jim Hightower was twice elected Texas Agriculture Commissioner and is a former editor of the Texas Observer.

He is the New York Times best-selling author of seven books including Swim Against The Current: Even A Dead Fish Can Go With The Flow; Thieves In High Places: They've Stolen Our Country And It's Time To Take It Back; If the Gods Had Meant Us To Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates; and There's Nothing In the Middle Of the Road But Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos.

Jim Hightower broadcasts daily radio commentaries that are carried on more than 150 commercial and public stations, on the web, and on Radio for Peace International. He publishes a populist political newsletter, The Hightower Lowdown, which now has more than 135,000 subscribers, is the fastest growing political publication in America, and has received both the Alternative Press Award and the Independent Press Association Award for best national newsletter. His newspaper column is distributed nationally by Creators Syndicate.

'Tinkle-down' economics

Jim Hightower told the Rag Radio audience that “we have a greater share of our wealth going to the tiniest portion of our people than any time in the last century.”

“In 30 years,” he said, “we’ve gone from Ronald Reagan’s ‘trickle-down’ to the Koch Brothers’ ‘tinkle down’ economics.” According to Jim, “We are resurrecting the robber barons and imposing a plutocracy over our democracy.”

“This is a structural change,” he says. “this isn’t a recession, this isn’t a technical glitch in the system. Thie is deliberate. We’ve enthroned the corporate powers to rewrite the rules.”

And we have a Congress “that is so ideological that they don’t care. And so many of them really don’t know regular workaday people. They’re millionaires, most of them,” he said. “You’ve got both parties that are tied to the corporate money.”

Thanks to gerrymandering and the dominance of big money in electoral politics, the politicians “rig the system so that they keep getting elected.” The Republicans, who “have voted 40 times to repeal Obamacare," play to a “Republican tea party fringe that doesn’t represent 10 percent of the American people.”

They “ignore the real problems” like “joblessness and rampant underemployment,” and “play games with these phony political issues.”

Hightower faulted the corporate-run media. (“A reporter used to be a working stiff. They worked in rumpled clothes, went home to a working class neighborhood, drank at a bar named Joe.”)

We do have some strong progressive media, he said, citing the country’s numerous independent community radio stations, many of which air Hightower's commentary -- with special praise for Austin’s KOOP and Rag Radio -- and the Texas Observer. “And we’ve got voices like Rachel Maddow and Paul Krugman,” he said.

Texas pols -- and 'Poopgate'

On the show, Jim talked about the recent “flapdoodle” in the Texas legislature over abortion and women’s health that drew thousands of activists to the Texas Capitol and was highlighted by State Sen. Wendy Davis’ remarkable filibuster.

“It’s about abortion,” Jim said, “but it really is about power. Mostly men, wanting to go back to ‘Father Knows Best’ years, the 1950s, before women got uppity...” In this case, the dramatic citizen activism “defeated the Republican leadership and embarrassed them. And, quite honestly, frightened them.”

“It was a hoot,” Jim says, “to hear Rick Perry say, ‘It was a mob. Mob rule! Mob rule!' And (Lt. Gov. David) Dewhurst saying, ‘Socialists, socialists!’ One representatives even said we had terrorists in the Capitol.”

Jim wrote about the events at the Capitol in the Hightower Lowdown: “If you’ve never seen a pack of pompous state legislators fall into a panic, you’ve missed a scene of truly uproarious low comedy.”

And then there was ”Poopgate!”

According to Hightower, Lt. Gov. Dewhurst (“he’s such a prissy guy anyway, a multi-millionaire public servant who doesn’t like the public...) got spooked by all the women in the State Capitol building.

Dewhurst “had heard that they were going to bring tampons and other ‘feminine projectiles’ into the Senate chamber, to toss down on the floor,” Jim says. So he had the state troopers search ladies’ purses at the Capitol entrances and confiscate anything resembling a tampon.

And then, as if that wasn't enough, “Dewhurst claimed that they had also confiscated some 19 jars of feces and urine.” But, when pressed by the media, he couldn’t come up with any evidence. So the reporters asked the troopers at the Capitol gates, and they didn’t have a clue what Dewhurst was talking about. “They said, No, that they hadn’t seen any excrement -- except what was in the Lt. Governor’s memo!”

“It’s just astonishing,” Jim said. “The extremism that is loose. And they seem to think that this is leadership.” But, “not only the women who were there, but just people of good will recognize that and think, maybe we can do something. Because there was such a force there that can’t be denied.”

“Throughout our history, we’ve had to do a little screaming, and confrontation, and rebelling -- when the skids are greased and the system is rigged against people. Because that’s what happened that night.”

Whether or not Wendy Davis runs for governor, Hightower believes that real change is in the works for Texas politics. The long-dormant state Democratic Party is alive and kicking, he says, under the “vigorous and vibrant” leadership of new party chair Gilberto Hinojosa, who is committed to returning the party to grassroots organizing.

The Texas Democrats “got way too cozy with the lobbyists and with the money,” Jim says. “We had people sitting in the office down by the Capitol, just talking to each other.” Now the party has 20 organizers working in the field.

Concerning efforts at voter suppression, Hightower asked, “Why don’t Republicans want people to vote?” “We should make it an issue,” he said, “that these bozos are trying to keep people from voting in the United States of America!”

From left, Rag Radio host Thorne Dreyer, populist commentator Jim Hightower, and Rag Radio's Tracey Schulz.

Corporate trade scams and NSA eavesdropping

One issue that raises Hightower’s hackles is the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (a secretive and very controversial “nuclearized and supersized NAFTA” that would involve 11 nations, including China and Japan). “It’s not about free trade,” Jim Says. “It’s a corporate coup d’etat. Against us… It’s about enthroning corporate power.”

Jim says there’s strong opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership that's being organized by Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch, a "wonderful project that's been battling these issues for years." “We’ve defeated 10 of these kind of trade scams just in the last decade,” Jim says. “So people really will make a difference.”

“You know, Lyndon Johnson said, ‘You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken manure.' So, the more people know about this thing, the more that they’re smelling that manure.”

Jim is also enraged about the NSA’s massive eavesdropping program. “This is not just another entity that’s poking into our personal privacy and lives... this is a comprehensive violation of at least the first and fourth amendments, and possibly the fifth and sixth as well. And a violation of the privacy laws of the United States.”

“It’s one thing to use spooks to go chase down terrorists, which we certainly want them to do, but to then decide that the entire 330 million people of the United States of America are suspects, that’s another thing altogether.”

“There are 3 billion phone calls made in the United States every day. They get them all... These are not metadata, as they call them, these are profiles. They’re little pieces of us. And they draw a picture.”

They are “using these super-supercomputers, and using this fog of fear that was generated by the powers that be, using 9-ll, to take away our core rights.”

“Snowden, to me, has done a tremendous public service by revealing all this,” Jim said.

Also read "Jim Hightower and the 'Populist Moment'" on The Rag Blog from April 11, 2012, and listen to our earlier Rag Radio interview with Jim Hightower here.


Rag Radio is hosted and produced by Rag Blog editor Thorne Dreyer; Tracey Schulz is the show's engineer and co-producer.

Rag Radio has aired since September 2009 on KOOP 91.7-FM, an all-volunteer cooperatively-run community radio station in Austin, Texas. Rag Radio is broadcast live every Friday from 2-3 p.m. (CDT) on KOOP and is rebroadcast on Sundays at 10 a.m. (EDT) on WFTE, 90.3-FM in Mt. Cobb, PA, and 105.7-FM in Scranton, PA. Rag Radio is now also aired on KPFT-HD3 90.1 -- Pacifica radio in Houston -- on Wednesdays at 1 p.m.

The show is streamed live on the web and, after broadcast, all Rag Radio shows are posted as podcasts at the Internet Archive.

Rag Radio is produced in association with The Rag Blog, a progressive Internet newsmagazine, and the New Journalism Project, a Texas 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation.

Rag Radio can be contacted at ragradio@koop.org.

[Thorne Dreyer, a pioneering Sixties underground journalist, edits The Rag Blog, hosts Rag Radio, and is a director of the New Journalism Project. Dreyer was an editor of The Rag in Austin and Space City! in Houston, was on the editorial collective of Liberation News Service (LNS) in New York, was general manager of Pacifica's KPFT-FM in Houston, and was a correspondent for the early Texas Monthly magazine. Dreyer can be contacted at editor@theragblog.com. Read more articles by and about Thorne Dreyer on The Rag Blog.]

Coming up on Rag Radio:
THIS FRIDAY, September 27, 2013: In their first father/daughter interview, newsman Dan Rather and Austin-based environmentalist Robin Rather.
Friday, October 4, 2013: Novelist Thomas Zigal, author of Many Rivers to Cross, set in post-Katrina New Orleans.

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Anne Lewis : Texas Women Who Misbehave

Texas Sen. Wendy Davis speaks to a crowd of thousands at the Texas State Capitol, Austin, Texas, July 1, 2013. Photo by Phillip Martin / The Frisky.

Deep in the heart of Texas:
Women who misbehave

While pro-life sentiment is used to cut funding for women’s health, sanctity of life has not affected the State’s number one status in executions.

By Anne Lewis / The Rag Blog / July 8, 2013

“They never preached or sat in a deacon’s bench. Nor did they vote or attend Harvard. Neither, because they were virtuous women, did they question God or the magistrates. They prayed secretly, read the Bible through at least once a year, and went to hear the minister preach even when it snowed. Hoping for an eternal crown, they never asked to be remembered on earth. And they haven’t been. Well-behaved women seldom make history; against Antinomians and witches, these pious matrons have had little chance at all.” -- Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, 1976

AUSTIN, Texas -- Around midnight on Tuesday, June 26, 2013, thousands of Texans took their Capitol. The crowd, predominantly young women, defied a group of sour and narrow legislators by yelling at them so loudly that they couldn’t vote for the bill that they planned to pass.

The “pro-life” bill is designed to shut down all but five of the abortion clinics in the state, forcing them to meet state requirements for “surgical ambulatory care.” It’s interesting that Milla Perry Jones, Texas Governor Rick Perry’s sister, serves as Vice President for Government Affairs for United Surgical Partners International, a major provider of surgical ambulatory care. Doctors, even those dispensing pills, would be required to have privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the clinic.

The law would prohibit abortions after 20 weeks -- the time when, according to a disputed study, the fetus can feel pain. Or pleasure, as U.S. Congressman Michael Burgess (R-Texas), an OB/GYN, appears to believe. Burgess, when arguing before a House committee in June that abortion should be banned at 15 weeks, suggested that that's when male fetuses start masturbating.

Rape and incest and the mental health of the mother were not exceptions -- only the mother’s physical health and “serious” abnormalities of the fetus.

Planned Parenthood, NARAL, and the Texas Democratic Party, along with many local progressive and radical organizations -- the Workers Defense Project, the International Socialist Organization, the United Students Against Sweatshops, TSEU women, the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, Rise Up Texas, Occupy Austin, and others -- had come to the Capital that night.

The Capital vibrated with the yelling of the crowd. It was the largest, most energetic, and by far noisiest indoor protest I’ve ever seen.

The Texas legislature is dominated by right-wing fundamentalist Republicans who rose to power through gerrymandering, redistricting, and voter suppression in the midst of significant demographic change. Texas is majority non-white and Latino according to the 2010 census: 45.3% white, 11.8% African-American, 3.8% Asian, 37.6% Hispanic, and 3.5% other (including Native American).

The Republican attacks have a white supremacist edge. Right after the June 25th Supreme Court repeal of Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said that the Legislature's 2011 redistricting plan should be immediately implemented along with Voter ID. Federal judges in Washington had blocked the redistricting plan, saying that it intentionally discriminated against minorities.

An on-going legislative attack on the public sector has placed Texas 49th among states in spending per pupil, 46th in students graduating from high school. Texas has the most people without health insurance in the U.S. and ranks 47th in expenditures for mental health. Texas ranks 49th in reproductive health, including 46th in teen birth rates and 4th from the bottom in sex education.

"Pro-life" demonstrator at Capitol. Photo by Anne Lewis / The Rag Blog.

While pro-life sentiment is used to cut funding for women’s health, sanctity of life has not affected the State’s number one status in executions. Since 1982 Texas has executed 500 prisoners, more than half of them coming during Rick Perry's time as governor. 

The anti-abortion bill was filed by Rep. Jodie Laubenberg (R-Parker) who made national news herself. When Rep. Senfronia Thompson (D-Houston), a wire coat hanger attached to the podium, called for the exemption of victims of rape and incest from the anti-abortion bill that Laubenberg had filed, Laubenberg objected: "In the emergency room they have what's called rape kits where a woman can get cleaned out.”

She instantly became the subject of national ridicule.

Laudenberg speaks for more than Christian fundamentalists in the Texas House. She is the Texas State Chair of the American Legislative Council (ALEC) -- a behind-the-scenes organization that is anti-union, anti-choice, anti-environment, and anti-immigrant. ALEC is responsible for the “shoot first” legislation that in part caused the killing of Trayvon Martin.


The sad life of the Anti-Abortion Bill: SB5

I went to the Capitol on Sunday, June 23, to join the people trying to stall the vote in the Texas House. We stood in the hallway leading to the House Gallery waiting to greet the Representatives. A few “pro-life” people had also gathered with tape over their mouths, I suppose pretending to be fetuses.

One miserable looking man in a shiny blue shirt and black tie shouldered me aside. Then they began to hum “Amazing Grace,” written by a reformed slave trader, sung by the Cherokee on the Trail of Tears, brought to life by Mahalia Jackson for use in both the mass Civil Rights movement and in opposition to the Vietnam War, and a source of inspiration on union picket lines. It was as if all that is good and holy had been twisted and perverted.

Demonstrators fill the Capitol stairs. Photo by Anne Lewis / The Rag Blog.

Finally inside the House Gallery I heard the articulate amendment by Rep. Donna Howard (D-Austin). Supported by the Journal of the American Medical Association, the Texas Medical Association, and the Texas Hospital Association, Howard wanted to strike language that might keep doctors and nurses from acting in the best interests of both mother and fetus.

Rep. Laubenberg got up to state her opposition, was asked simple questions about her bill by Lon Burnham (D-Ft Worth), and mumbled something about it gutting the bill. Burnham persisted with specifics. As a result, Laubenberg moved to table all subsequent proposed amendments to the bill without returning to the microphone. This included an amendment by Mary González (D-El Paso) who spoke of the disproportionate impact on women in her community who would have to travel 600 miles each way to the nearest abortion clinic in San Antonio.

We sat in the gallery, occasionally giving voice but quickly silenced by Planned Parenthood and Democratic Party organizers. A succession of amendments by House Democrats and procedural issues delayed voting on the bill into early Monday morning, giving the Senate filibuster a chance to succeed.

Wendy Davis during filibuster..

Like many, I returned to the Capitol Tuesday evening and became part of a long line trying to get into the Senate Gallery to observe Wendy Davis’ filibuster. We snaked in circles. I was thrilled to see my students and former students, young women whom I had not considered activists, in the crowd. Once more we were told to be quiet and follow the rules of decorum. And we did, for the most part, remain quiet and contained.

The "third strike" against the Wendy Davis filibuster took place at 10 p.m., filed by Sen. Donna Campbell (R-New Braunfels) who claimed that the sonogram bill -- which Davis was addressing -- had nothing to do with abortion. I was by then in the Senate Gallery. Campbell stood down below us, the sharpness of her features complemented by a thoroughly unpleasant expression.

The Gallery erupted when Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst ruled in Campbell’s favor. We yelled “Shame” and “Let her speak.” I remember a man with a shoe in his hand and an older woman pointing down at the legislators and yelling at them. Both were removed along with nearly all the people who happened to be nearest the door. Every time the door opened we could hear the crowd outside. They yelled, “Let us in.” The troopers locked the door and the only way out was through the Senate Chambers.


"Let her Speak" June 25 2013 10 07 to 10 10 Texas Capitol from Anne Lewis on Vimeo.

On Wednesday, June 26, Gov. Perry called for a new special session to pass the anti-abortion bill. Just hours later, Perry spoke at the National Right to Life Convention in Dallas, saying, "Texans value life and want to protect women and the unborn."

He attacked Wendy Davis: “It’s just unfortunate that she hasn’t learned from her own example: that every life must be given a chance to realize its full potential and that every life matters.” I wonder at his inconsistencies -- the political opportunism of priorities that shift so quickly from pro-life to pro-death.

There’s an element in Perry’s and the other Republican legislators’ reactions to Wendy Davis that reminds me of the way white supremacists branded white Southerners who took up the banner of racial equality as “race traitors.” How could she, a white woman, betray him? But it wasn’t mainly white women who stood up to the majority in the Legislature.

During the session, Senfronia Thompson, Leticia Van de Putte, Dawnna Dukes, Mary Gonzales, Alma Allen, Judith Zaffirini, Yvonne Davis, and others proved themselves smarter than all of those right-wing men put together and far more competent to govern. I remember the image of this man with a wooden stick poking around on the Senate floor while Wendy Davis filibustered hour after hour -- not allowed to eat, drink, sit down, or use the bathroom.

And it’s not just the Republican men, but also those infantilized right-wing women. Baby dolls that men protect and control, they are sanctimonious, hidden, and vicious when someone calls them out -- very much Ulrich’s well-behaved pious matrons. It’s all about the white man’s party and its ability to rule. Those of us at the Capitol were there to stop them.

At 11:45 p.m. on Tuesday, June 25th, 15 minutes before the end of the session, Sen. Leticia Van de Putte (D-San Antonio) -- who had returned from her father’s funeral in order to be heard -- stood to demand that her colleagues recognize her. It was not the first time she had defied those in power.

In response to the sonogram bill, she had said, in parody of Grover Norquist’s promise to shrink government to a size that could fit in a bathtub, “Texas is going to shrink government until it fits into a woman's uterus." On Tuesday night she asked, “At what point must a female senator raise her hand or her voice to be recognized over her male colleagues?”

That line -- so solidly expressive of misuse of power and male supremacy -- was the cue for the gallery. They yelled and chanted and took over the Chamber.

We could hear the Gallery through the locked door. The whole Capitol filled with a giant roar. We cheered, yelled, and chanted.


"Vote Stopped by Protesters" Texas Capitol June 25, 2013 11:50pm to June 26, 2013 12:01am from Anne Lewis on Vimeo.

I was reminded of those special times during the mass civil rights movement -- and the movement that ended the war in Vietnam -- moments when our relatively minor differences go away, when we act in one loud clear voice against a system of oppression, when we are willing to be obnoxious or even go to jail for our deep-felt beliefs. As Joe Begley from the eastern Kentucky coalfields put it: “Everyone should go to jail for a night or two.”

What a wonderful night of misbehavior it was!

[Anne Lewis, a senior lecturer at the University of Texas and a member of TSEU-CWA Local 6186 and NABET-CWA, is an independent filmmaker associated with Appalshop. She is co-director of Anne Braden: Southern Patriot, associate director of Harlan County, U.S.A, and the producer/director of Fast Food Women, To Save the Land and People, Morristown: in the air and sun, and a number of other social issue and cultural documentaries. Her website is annelewis.org. Read more articles by and about Anne Lewis at The Rag Blog.]

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RAG RADIO / Thorne Dreyer : Progress Texas' Glenn Smith Talks Wendy Davis, Rick Perry, and More

Democratic political consultant Glenn Smith in the studios of KOOP-FM in Austin, Texas, June 28, 2013. Photo by Roger Baker / The Rag Blog.

Rag Radio podcast:
Talking politics with Glenn Smith,
director of Progress Texas PAC

Glenn Smith, who organized Ann Richards' successful campaign for governor of Texas, talks about Rick Perry, Wendy Davis, and the Texas Legislature, and the prospects for Texas turning blue.

By Rag Radio / The Rag Blog / July 2, 2013

Progressive writer and political consultant Glenn Smith, director of the Progress Texas PAC, was Thorne Dreyer's guest on Rag Radio, Friday, June 28, 2013.

Rag Radio is a syndicated radio program produced at the studios of KOOP 91.7-FM, a cooperatively-run all-volunteer community radio station in Austin, Texas.

Listen to or download our interview with Glenn Smith here:


Glenn W. Smith managed Ann Richards' successful campaign for governor of Texas in 1990. A former reporter for the Houston Chronicle and Houston Post, Smith is the author of the highly regarded book, The Politics of Deceit: Saving Freedom and Democracy from Extinction. Smith, who served as a senior fellow at George Lakoff's Rockridge Institute in Berkeley, currently is director of Progress Texas PAC, “helping the Texas progressive movement develop and deliver disciplined, effective messages.”

On the show we talk politics -- with special focus on the phenomenal developments in the special session of the Texas Legislature, June 23-25, where Sen. Wendy Davis filibustered Rick Perry's draconian anti-abortion legislation. We also discuss the Supreme Court’s landmark decisions on voting rights and gay marriage, the status of immigration reform, and the prospects for Texas turning blue (or at least purple) in the reasonably near future.

We also discuss the efforts of Progress Texas, the progressive multi-issue organization with which Smith works -- and the under-the-radar work of Battleground Texas, the group that's busy applying the Obama campaign's grassroots organizing techniques to the state of Texas.

Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas called Glenn Smith a “legendary political consultant and all-around good guy.” Listen to Smith's earlier appearances on Rag Radio, at the Internet Archive.


Rag Radio is hosted and produced by Rag Blog editor and long-time alternative journalist Thorne Dreyer, a pioneer of the Sixties underground press movement.

The show has aired since September 2009 on KOOP 91.7-FM, an all-volunteer cooperatively-run community radio station in Austin, Texas. Rag Radio is broadcast live every Friday from 2-3 p.m. (CDT) on KOOP and is rebroadcast on Sundays at 10 a.m. (EDT) on WFTE, 90.3-FM in Mt. Cobb, PA, and 105.7-FM in Scranton, PA.

The show is streamed live on the web by both stations and, after broadcast, all Rag Radio shows are posted as podcasts at the Internet Archive.

Rag Radio is produced in association with The Rag Blog, a progressive Internet newsmagazine, and the New Journalism Project, a Texas 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation. Tracey Schulz is the show's engineer and co-producer.

Rag Radio can be contacted at ragradio@koop.org.

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Lamar W. Hankins : Women's Freedom and Texas Republicans

Demonstrator at the Texas State Capitol, Austin, Texas, July 1, 2013. Photos by Deborah Kirksey Coley / The Rag Blog.

Women’s freedom and Texas Republicans

A political party that actually loves liberty would not seek to deny it to any of our citizens, especially pregnant women who may be vulnerable and in need of compassion.

By Lamar W. Hankins / The Rag Blog / July 3, 2013

Any reader of this column is undoubtedly aware of the actions last week of Texas State Senator Wendy Davis, who successfully filibustered the anti-abortion bill known as SB 5, filed in the first 2013 special session of the Texas Legislature called by Gov. Rick Perry.

Gov. Perry has now called another special session to give the Legislature another chance to pass this anti-abortion legislation. What Davis did was try to stop a bill that not only would deprive Texas women of their reproductive freedom without improving women’s health services, but was a clear violation of the Supreme Court’s 1973 decision in Roe. v. Wade.

While there are many opinions about when and if a pregnancy should be terminated, I won’t dwell on that debate because a woman’s right to an abortion is settled constitutional law. The Supreme Court held 40 years ago that a woman’s right to privacy, guaranteed by the Due Process clause of the 14th Amendment, allows her to decide when and if to terminate a pregnancy.

The court established a trimester framework for state regulation of abortion that was not based on the best medical knowledge at the time, and has been widely criticized by both proponents and opponents of abortion.

Clearly, though, under our constitution, a state cannot completely deny a woman the right to terminate a pregnancy. But under Roe v. Wade and its successor cases, states have a legitimate interest in protecting a woman’s health when she undergoes medical procedures, and states have an interest in protecting the potentiality of human life depending on how far along the fetal development is.

These two matters have been the focus of most abortion rights battles over these past four decades.

Under the trimester approach of the court, a state’s regulatory authority over abortions is restricted. During the first trimester (approximately 13 weeks), a state cannot regulate abortion. During the second trimester (weeks 14 through 26), a state may focus on its concerns for the health of a pregnant woman by regulating abortion procedures that can reasonably affect the woman’s health. During the third trimester, a state may regulate or prohibit abortion except when it is necessary to protect the life or health of a pregnant woman.

Opponents of abortion rights have argued that abortion is unsafe and expanded medical protocols are necessary to protect women. But according to research by the Guttmacher Institute, a research, policy-analysis, and educational organization, “Abortion is one of the safest surgical procedures for women in the United States. Fewer than 0.5% of women obtaining abortions experience a complication, and the risk of death associated with abortion is about one-tenth that associated with childbirth.”

Media Matters reports that “Associations representing the OB/GYNs and hospitals of Texas say that a Texas bill mandating new restrictions on doctors and clinics that provide abortions does nothing to improve women's health care and has no medical basis...”

In SB 5, abortion opponents decided to focus their anti-abortion efforts on trying to severely reduce the number of clinics where women can seek an abortion by requiring such facilities to be upgraded by adding expensive services and equipment that do not appear justified by any concern for women’s health. The effect of these new requirements would reduce the number of available clinics, thus limiting abortion facilities to only the most populated metropolitan areas of Texas.

In 2008, there were 67 abortion providers in Texas, and 92% of Texas counties had no abortion provider, according to the Guttmacher Institute. The number and distribution of abortion providers severely impedes access to abortions for one-third of Texas women. Now there are 47 abortion clinics in the entire state of 254 counties. A report from Media Matters concludes that the proposed law Rep. Davis filibustered would reduce abortion clinics in Texas to five.

The old SB 5 and the new HB 2 require that a physician who performs an abortion or induces one with drugs must have “active admitting privileges at a hospital” that is no more than 30 miles from where the abortion or induction is performed. Further, the hospital must provide obstetrical or gynecological health care services that are not offered by all hospitals in Texas.

Oddly, the legislation also requires that the patient be given a telephone number to contact health care personnel 24 hours a day after the procedure, and requires providing the name and telephone number for the hospital nearest to the home of the patient in case emergency care is needed after the abortion is performed. In my experience, providing contact information after a medical procedure or surgery is standard medical practice in Texas, though most physicians may assume that their patients know where the nearest emergency room can be found.

The Texas Hospital Association states that the anti-abortion legislation does nothing to improve women's health because emergency room physicians would be the ones treating a woman who needs emergency care due to complications from an abortion. Emergency room physicians can contact the physician who performed the abortion by telephone, regardless of whether that physician has privileges at the hospital providing the emergency room treatment or how far away the physician may be.

The requirement that an abortion provider have hospital privileges at a hospital 30 miles from where the abortion is performed does nothing to assure that women “receive high-quality care and that physicians (are) held accountable for acts that violate their license.”

Some of the most severe restrictions on physicians in the legislation, which are contrary to practices approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), concern the administration of “abortion-inducing drugs.” Those FDA-approved practices allow the administration of such drugs (namely, what is called the “Mifeprex regimen” and often referred to as RU-486) in a physician’s office or clinic.

Texas State Capitol.

The legislation, however, allows the administration of the Mifeprex regimen only “at an abortion facility” licensed under the Texas Health & Safety Code. This interference in a physician’s normal practice of medicine and a woman’s right to seek the treatment is not justified by FDA regulations, nor by any concern for pain felt by a fetus since the drug regimen is approved only for use within 49 days (seven weeks) of conception. Abortion opponents claim that a fetus can feel pain at 20 weeks, which justifies further regulation of abortion at that point in a pregnancy, but not before then.

The only purpose of this Mifeprex regimen provision is to interfere with the constitutional right of a woman to terminate a pregnancy within seven weeks of pregnancy -- a period well within Roe’s 13-week time frame during which states may not regulate the right to an abortion. And it prevents her from using the services of her primary care physician unless he or she works at an abortion clinic and has privileges at a nearby hospital that provides obstetrical or gynecological health services.

Such a blatant violation of Roe. v. Wade is a sufficient reason, standing alone, to oppose the legislation.

The Texas District of the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists has found that SB 5 is “not based on sound science” and is an “attempt to prescribe how physicians should care for their individual patients.” Without question, the organization of OB/GYNs is, as it describes itself, “the Nation's leading authority in women's health.”

Its “role is to ensure that policy proposals accurately reflect the best available medical knowledge.” Its conclusion about this legislation is clear: “(The bill) will not enhance patient safety or improve the quality of care that women receive...(and it) does not promote women's health, but erodes it by denying women in Texas the benefits of well-researched, safe, and proven protocols.”

Republican claims that the anti-abortion legislation the party is pushing enhances women’s heath are dishonest and bogus.

The way the Republican Party has been behaving, especially in Texas, demonstrates that (to paraphrase the words of George W. Bush) they hate American women for their freedoms. The GOP has become the domestic political equivalent of al-Qaeda when it comes to women’s health care and the right to terminate a pregnancy.

The party of Lincoln constantly conspires to reduce the freedom and liberty interests of Texas women. It works with anti-abortion activists to terrorize Texas women who want to terminate their pregnancies, as well as the physicians who provide them health services.

Rep. Wendy Davis’s valiant filibuster and the efforts of her supporters in the closing hours of Gov. Perry’s first called special session of the Texas Legislature show that many women and men in Texas will not sit idly by while the tribe of Texas Republicans maneuver to take away the constitutional rights of women.

A political party that actually loves liberty would not seek to deny it to any of our citizens, especially pregnant women who may be vulnerable and in need of compassion, understanding, and unfettered medical assistance.

[Lamar W. Hankins, a former San Marcos, Texas, city attorney, is also a columnist for the San Marcos Mercury. This article © Freethought San Marcos, Lamar W. Hankins. Read more articles by Lamar W. Hankins on The Rag Blog.]

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Ted McLaughlin : Wendy Davis, Energized Dems Deal Blow to Texas GOP and War on Women

Pro-choice demonstrators at the Texas State Capitol in Austin, Sunday, June 23, 2013. More than 1,000 packed the place on Sunday and the numbers kept growing during the week. Photo by Alan Pogue / The Rag Blog.

A new day for Democrats in Texas:
New political stars and a raucous crowd
deal blow to GOP's insidious attack on choice

By Ted McLaughlin / The Rag Blog / June 27, 2013

[The Week that Was! As the Supreme Court made landmark decisions about voting rights (two thumbs down) and gay marriage (it's about time!), thousands of cheering pro-choice Texans -- wearing orange shirts that read "Stand With Texas Women" and rooted on by Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards, daughter of the late and great Texas Gov. Ann Richards -- filled the rotunda and packed the galleries of the State Capitol of Texas in Austin for their own marathon filibuster. The enthusiasm was intoxicating.

It was a massive three-day show of opposition to Texas Republicans' attack on women's health in the form of a draconian new abortion law -- and of support for Texas Sen. Wendy Davis and her dramatic filibuster in the Senate chambers. Davis has emerged as a superstar and a legitimate candidate for higher office in Texas. The events captured the imagination of the nation. As MSNBC's Rachel Maddow said Tuesday night: "Texas: Who knew!" Oh, and coming next week: "Kill the Bill, Volume 2." See you there. -- Thorne Dreyer / The Rag Blog]


AUSTIN, Texas -- The teabagger governor of Texas announced Wednesday, June 26, 2013, that he is calling a second special session of the Texas legislature. Three issues are on the agenda -- transportation funding and juvenile justice (both of which died in the last session because Republicans wasted the whole 30-day session trying to shut down the state's abortion clinics), and, of course, the same old anti-choice legislation that was filibustered to death in that first special session.

Perry seems determined to keep the issue alive, and give Democrats something to make sure their supporters remain energized and engaged.

Texas Democrats have been a dispirited bunch for a long time now. It has been more than 20 years since a Democrat held statewide office, and prospects for the future seemed dim because there were really no politicians in the party with true statewide appeal.

That changed dramatically on Tuesday night, when a couple of female State Senators put themselves in the limelight to stop (at least temporarily) an odious anti-choice bill that would almost certainly close 37 out of 42 clinics in the state that do abortion procedures -- and in the process they inspired and renewed thousands of Democrats across the state.

Texas Senators Wendy Davis, left, and Leticia Van de Putte in the Texas Senate Chamber, Tuesday, June 26, 2013. Photo from Jobsanger.

The new Texas political stars are Sen. Wendy Davis and Sen. Leticia Van de Putte. Davis got the ball rolling by declaring she would filibuster the bill (which had to be approved by midnight, when the session ended, or it would die).

She got the floor about 11:15 a.m. and began her filibuster -- and then she held the floor for over 10 hours. She was helped by the other 11 Democratic senators who lobbed her "softball" questions to keep her filibuster growing, but the real work of the filibuster was on her capable shoulders -- and she performed admirably.

With only a couple of hours to go before midnight, the Republican majority was able to stop her by claiming for the third time that she was not being germane to the bill with her discourse. It was arguably not true, but truth or rules have never been very important to Texas Republicans. The other 11 Democratic senators stepped forward with a barrage of parliamentary maneuvers (points of order, parliamentary questions, etc.).

One of the most prominent of these senators who sprang to the defense of Sen. Davis was Sen. Van de Putte. And with only about 15 minutes until midnight, she challenged the Senate president by demanding to know, "At what point must a female senator raise her hand or her voice to be recognized over her male colleagues?" The crowd in the gallery began to applaud her, and that applause turned into more than 20 minutes of shouting and applauding that delayed a vote on the GOP bill.

With time running out, the GOP tried to hold their vote -- but as Democratic senators pointed out, the vote was not finished before midnight, and by Texas law, the session was over at midnight. This caused a big mess -- as Republicans claimed the bill was passed, since the vote started before midnight, and the Democrats claimed the bill was dead since the vote was not finished before midnight.

The official senate record backed Democrats, showing the bill was passed on 6/26 and not on 6/25 as required. The Republicans then tried to fix that by illegally altering the senate record (see below).

The top picture shows the original Senate log, and the bottom one shows the log after being altered by Republicans. The senators then argued among themselves for a while -- and at about 3 a.m. the Republicans backed down and admitted the bill had been passed after midnight, which means the bill was DEAD.

The governor will call another special session and most likely get the bill passed (even if they have to lock the public out and do it in secret). But for right now, the bill is dead. And the Republicans did nothing good for their image, since their shenanigans were observed by hundreds of thousands of Texans and other Americans.

I watched the proceedings on the Texas Tribune's live YouTube feed. More than 182,000 people watched on that stream, but that was just a portion of those watching the proceedings, since there were approximately 199 other live feeds -- not to mention all the traffic on social media like Twitter and Facebook.

And while the Republicans were humiliated, thousands of Texas Democrats (and others) were energized -- and Sen. Wendy Davis and Sen. Leticia Van de Putte were able to increase their political capital immensely. They are now both credible candidates for statewide office. And combined with the new statewide Democratic effort to register new voters, and the added impact of changing demographics, this means Democratic prospects in Texas are brighter than they have been in many years.

To put it bluntly, it was a great night for Texas Democrats and a terrible night for Texas Republicans.

[Amarillo resident Ted McLaughlin, a regular contributor to The Rag Blog, also posts at jobsanger. Read more articles by Ted McLaughlin on The Rag Blog.] 

Photos by Alan Pogue / The Rag Blog:

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