Voting On It

I LIVE IN A RED STATE, a small, poor, red state which usually ranks forty ninth or fiftieth in everything that counts, including per capita income and education. A state so red tat it votes sixty forty for Trump. That kinda red. Trump will no doubt carry the state this November, even if he happens to be incarcerated in federal prison at the time. The state has a right wing extremist Republican governor who endorsed Trump, and, of course, a Republican dominated legislature. It is alarming how far and wide this right wing plague,in the form of the Trump movement, has come. Gender affirming care for LGBTQ people is now illegal in, I believe, twenty seven states, book banning is becoming fashionable, and the very thought that there is any racism at all in America is taboo, forbidden. Like all the other red states in America, this one has burdened itself with the same bizarre, retrogressive, malignant laws; one cannot talk about racism or sexual identity in public schools, many good books are banned, it is illegal for doctors to treat LGBTQ people like LGBTQ people, and so forth. And, of course, abortion is basically prohibited, so restricted as to be very difficult to the point of being nearly impossible to get an abortion. Therefore, a citizen's group has organized for the purpose of getting the abortion question on the ballot this November, so that we the people can decide whether abortion will be legal, whether women will have autonomy over their own reproductive health care. The group is now trying for the third time to get this question on the ballot. The previous two times, the state Attorney General, a Republican, found technicalities with thich to diswualify the petition. The Republicans, in their typical style, are using any trick in the book to avoid allowing democracy to proceed, simply because they know full well that ther agenda does not have majority support among the people at large. The pro choice group is now gathering signatures on its petition, will need at least ninety thousand according to state law, and will almost certainly get more than that number. If the people of this state actually have the oportunity to vote on whether aortion will be legal, as it seems it probably will, then in all probability the electorate will vote to legalize abortion, to return bodily autonomy to women. If fact, if the people in all fifty states voted on whether to legalize or criminalize abortion, most probably they would vote to legalize it in all fifty states, as they already have in the extremely conservative state of Kansas, among several other states. In fact, a majority of Americans beleive that reasonably regulated abortion, with restrictions, should be legal, and that the state should not have power over a woman's reproductive choices. The majority is not huge, but it is a majority. Wouldn't it be better to let the American people decide this eternally vital question,rather than nine old people wearing black robes, or rather than a small group of millionaire men in small smoke filled rooms? In or modern era of computers and telecommunication, voting should be easier, more accessible, and therefore more common. We the people could and arguably should hold state and national referendums on any issues we choose. But, in order for that to happen, we must make clear our desire for such things to our corporate masters, who, as always, will be fearful of us the people, and, as always, resistant to our desires.