Ed Kilgore on McCain, Obama, SCOTUS, and the idea that the GOP could win by talking about activist judges again:

Seven of the current nine Justices were appointed by Republican presidents.

Going back a while, 12 of the last 14 Supreme Court appointments were made by Republican presidents (two by Bush 43, two by Bush 41, three by Reagan, one by Ford, four by Nixon, as opposed to two by Clinton and zero for poor Jimmy Carter).

When it comes to abortion, five of the seven Justices who concurred in the original Roe v. Wade decision striking down state abortion laws were appointed by Republican presidents. All five of the Justices who voted to reaffirm Roe in the crucial Casey decision of 1992 were appointed by Republican presidents.

In terms of future appointments, it is universally believed that the three Justices most likely to retire during the next four years are Stevens, Ginsburg, and Souter. They are three of the five current Court members who are willing to uphold Roe (including Justice Kennedy, who’s recently exhibited a willingness to support major restrictions on abortion rights), and three of the four Justices generally thought to constitute the Court’s “liberal wing,” though none of them are really “liberal activists” in the tradition of past figures like Douglas, Brennan or Warren.

So: the idea that Barack Obama would be in a position to engage in any “social engineering” via the Supreme Court is, well, preposterous. The real issue here, as every honest conservative will admit, is that a President McCain could finally consolidate a conservative activist revolution on the Court that’s been a work in progress since the 1970s, and that is focused obsessively on the overturning of Roe. And it’s extremely clear that conservatives will demand, and will receive, an appointment from a President McCain that would represent the fifth vote to overturn Roe, in addition to a variety of other big constitutional changes from today’s center-right Court.

This is awesome:

One e-mail making the rounds on the Internet says: “Instead of (actually, in addition to) all of us all sending more e-mails about how absolutely horrible she is, let’s all make a donation to Planned Parenthood in Sarah Palin’s name.”

Katie Groke Ellis, field manager for the Planned Parenthood of the Rockies Action Fund, predicts that the five-state chapter of the group alone could draw $100,000 in donations. [...]

Planned Parenthood sends a handwritten thank-you card to the donor. If a donation is made in someone’s name, he or she gets one, too.

In this case, the Palin cards will go to Republican presidential nominee John McCain’s national headquarters.

The National Women’s Law Center is alerting supporters to the new HHS proposal that could further limit women’s access to health care.

The Bush Administration’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently released a proposed rule that would undermine patient’s access to vital health services and information by greatly expanding existing laws intended to govern the right to refuse to provide abortion care.

By failing to provide a definition of abortion consistent with accepted medical standards, the proposed rule leaves the door open for doctors, nurses, insurance plans, hospitals, and nearly any other employee in a health care setting to deny access to most forms of birth control. In addition, the proposed rule reaches even further than birth control and abortion: it expands the scope and reach of existing law to limit information on and access to the entire range of health care services — including treatment of infertility, depression, drug addiction, HIV/AIDS, and more.

Their suggested “protest” email:

I am writing in opposition to the regulations that the Department of Health and Human Services proposed on August 26, 2008, that allows patients to be denied health services and information based on the moral beliefs of their provider.

This rule creates problems where none now exist.  It disregards the needs of patients, even in medical emergencies, and causes confusion about laws already on the books that protect the religious beliefs of all employees, including health care providers, while allowing employers to ensure that patients get access to vital health care services and information.  I seriously urge you to reconsider this dangerous regulation.

And in the meantime, keep rules like this in mind when you’re shopping for a doctor.  A simple question like “does he/she prescribe the morning after pill?” before you make your first appointment could save you LOTS of trouble down the road.