Murdoch ‘ruperter’ Adam Creighton’s idiocy has been a source of amazement on this blog before, when he thought he was an epidemiologist1,2 and knew better than all epidemiologists how to deal with Covid-191. In addition, he was a spruiker for the Swedish model of dealing with Covid-19. However, after King Carl XVI Gustav, in his December 2020 address, stated that the Swedish method of dealing with Covid-19 had been a failure, all the Murdoch spruikers, including Creighton, went a bit quiet2.
Now, in a short tweet, Adam Creighton has clearly demonstrated that the opprobrium and ridicule he receives is entirely justified. In this tweet he said: “End of Roe v Wade infuriates authoritarian elitists”3. While it is possible that Creighton was being sarcastic; however, given his previous equine ordure and the fact that he writes in The Australian, Murdoch’s national budgie-cage liner, it is extremely unlikely.
Roe v. Wade, is the legal case in which the US Supreme Court, on January 22, 1973, ruled that unduly restrictive state regulation of abortion is unconstitutional. In a majority opinion (7-2), the Court held that a set of Texas statutes criminalising abortion in most instances violated a woman’s constitutional right of privacy, which it found to be implicit in the liberty guarantee of the ‘due process’ clause of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution (i.e. “…nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law”)4.
Now the religious nutters are trying to overturn that with the help of some of the religious right-wing judges Trump appointed to the US Supreme Court; Gorsuch5, Kavanagh6 and Barrett7 along with Alito, who was appointed by George W. Bush8, and whose draft decision was leaked from the court. The Chief Justice Roberts confirmed the draft’s authenticity, but emphasised it was not final9.
What could happen if Roe v. Wade is overturned? While Alito’s draft opinion would not itself ban abortion nationwide it would allow the states to drastically restrict or even ban abortion. More than 20 states have laws that could restrict or ban abortion soon after the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade. One type of statute, called a ‘trigger law’, is designed to take effect as soon as possible after such a Supreme Court ruling. Some states also still have abortion bans on the books that haven’t been enforced because of Roe v. Wade. According to a 2017 study, nearly 25% of women in the US are expected to get an abortion at some time in their lives. 58% of US women of reproductive age (i.e. 40 million) live in states ‘hostile’ to abortion, and which are likely to enact some restrictions or bans10.
This will allow the rabidly religious, via their Republican puppets, to prevent a woman from having an abortion if she wishes to have one. And the astonishingly limited Creighton believes that the people who do not wish to tell women what to do, are the authoritarians. It makes you wonder if he knows what the word means. On top of this, he refers to those who want to allow women to decide for themselves as the elites, when he writes at the instruction of one of the most malevolent members of the billionaire elite, Rupert Murdoch. While accusing others of the crimes you commit is stock in trade for conservatives, and especially the Murdoch media11, this effort from the poor benighted Creighton takes the cake. I suspect he was probably shipped off to the United States as his columns were the source of much mirth in Australia, and reporting on the bizarre activities of RWNJs in the US makes him appear less ludicrous by comparison.
Sources
- https://blotreport.com/2020/03/31/the-ignorance-of-adam-creighton/
- https://blotreport.com/2021/01/29/the-swedish-model/
- https://twitter.com/Adam_Creighton/status/1521869793866964993
- https://www.britannica.com/event/Roe-v-Wade
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gorsuch
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brett_Kavanaugh
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_Coney_Barrett
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Alito
- https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-supreme-courts-alito-cancels-conference-appearance-after-abortion-ruling-leak-2022-05-04/
- https://www.npr.org/2022/05/03/1096094942/roe-wade-overturned-what-happens-next
- https://blotreport.com/2019/04/18/accusing-others-of-the-crimes-you-commit/
