In the United States this coming Tuesday is what is known as “Super Tuesday.” It’s a day that 15 states plus American Samoa hold their primary elections. In addition to my home state of California, these other states are having their primaries: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, and Virginia.
Super Tuesday earned its nickname because its the date the most states hold their primaries and caucuses, meaning it’s also when the most delegates are at stake to earn the party presidential nominations, which are announced at the respective political party conventions in July and August.
In the past, Super Tuesday is the day that is seen to most accurately forecast how the presidential primaries will play out. Every four years, the contest is when millions of Americans in a wide swath of states head to their polling places.
But this year, we already know that the Democratic presidential nominee will be the incumbent president, Joe Biden, and his vice presidential nominee will be the incumbent vice president, Kamala Harris.
We also already know that the Republican presidential nominee will unfortunately be Donald Trump, but his running mate is yet to be determined. So this year’s Super Tuesday event is not going to have the impact on the presidential election that Super Tuesdays have had in the past.
Every registered California voter automatically receives election ballots in the mail. My wife and I completed our mail-in ballots yesterday and we’ll be dropping them off today in official ballot drop boxes.
Because there is not much at stake in these primaries this year, at least at the presidential level, primary voter turnout is expected to be low. But there are also primaries in most of these states for seats in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives as well as for statewide, countywide, and local elections, which is what prompted my wife and me to get it done and drop them off to be counted.
Anyway, if you happen to live in a Super Tuesday state, I encourage you to get out and vote. Because even though the presidential contenders may be a foregone conclusion, who wins the other state and local primaries could have a major impact on your quality of life starting on January 20th of 2025.
This, That, and the Other 
I always wanted to go to American Samoa on my way to New Zealand.
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Have you ever been to New Zealand?
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No, but when you wrote about it, I looked it up on a map and saw that it is in between Hawaii and New Zealand.
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I didn’t know that California was also mailing out ballots to every registered voter. That’s awesome!
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Just dropped mine off at city hall! This time I did pay research every name on the ballot – we have to be very vigilant these days.
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Good for you!
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I’m trying to feel some kind of “draw” to vote and I just can’t seem to get the spirit. I’ll vote, but until the election I think I’ll try to enjoy my life, such as it is.
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I think the voter turnout on Tuesday is going to be very low because there really isn’t much of a draw.
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Alabama was part of Super Tuesday, and maybe that’s part of why these lawmakers were scrambling. What a weird article. What the hell is this? A set of Freudian slips? Is someone going to be fired? Under the link is an long excerpt with a couple insertions.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/02/27/alabama-republican-ivf-immunity-00143706
“No action, suit, or criminal prosecution shall be brought or maintained against any individual or entity providing goods or services related to in vitro fertilization except for an act or omission that is both intentional and not arising from or related to IVF services,” the one-and-a-half-page bill states.
The proposal comes a little more than a week after the state’s high court ruled that frozen embryos should be considered children under a state law on wrongful [non-criminal] deaths of minors — leading three fertility clinics to pause their operations [not by “force” but wishing not to be held responsible for negligence…] setting off a national debate over in vitro fertilization and challenging Republicans already struggling to win the messaging fight on abortion. GOP Gov. Kay Ivey has voiced support for a fix that would allow IVF services to resume in the state.
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Ivey said Tuesday that lawmakers were “working diligently on the issue” and that she expected a bill on her desk shortly.
The measure is set to sunset on April 1, 2025, which means it will only serve as a stopgap to allow clinics to restore abortion services, and some believe the state will need a more permanent fix. …
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Doug Jones (civil rights lawyer and former senator) was on the msnbc show called Ayman, yesterday, and said he’s not sure the bills so far are sufficient as all they do is grant immunity. He was a guest for another topic, but was asked about this at the end. I haven’t been able to find it to share. Basically, people can’t be bothered to learn in order to govern meaningfully.
https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2024/02/23/alabama-ivf-embryo-ruling-tuberville-src-vpx.cnn
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I just found out IVF often uses fentanyl, clearly a dangerous substance. Sure, let’s rule out civil cases.
Here is one random article I found when I double-checked to see if it’s true fentanyl is used: https://www.dea.gov/press-releases/2022/10/06/yale-agrees-pay-308k-resolve-allegations-violations-controlled-substances
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ORANGE, Conn. – Vanessa Roberts Avery, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, today announced that Yale University, on behalf of Yale Medicine and the Yale Fertility Center, has entered into a civil settlement agreement with the federal government in which it will pay a total of $308,250 to resolve allegations that it violated civil provisions of the Controlled Substances Act.
The Yale Fertility Center is a fertility medical practice located on Yale University’s West Campus, in Orange, Connecticut. The Yale Fertility Center is operated by Yale Medicine, the clinical practice for the Yale School of Medicine, and a component of Yale University (collectively, “Yale”). The settlement resolves allegations that Yale <b>failed</b> to maintain complete and accurate records concerning the controlled substances it purchased and dispensed at the Yale Fertility Center, and <b>failed</b> to provide effective controls and procedures to guard against theft and diversion of controlled substances.
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https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/either-all-life-begins-at-conception-or-it-doesnt-simple-right/
The Alabama Supreme Court got it exactly right. In LePage v. Center for Reproductive Medicine, the court declared that “the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act applies on its face to all unborn children, without limitation.”
What is the Wrongful Death of a Minor Act? In 1968, the people of Alabama passed Amendment 2, by a majority of 61%, amending the state’s constitution “to declare and otherwise affirm that it is the public policy of the state to recognize and support the sanctity of unborn life and the rights of unborn children.”
In its decision, the court affirms that “an unborn child is a genetically unique human being whose life begins at fertilization and ends at death … throughout all stages of an unborn child’s development, regardless of viability. Unborn children are ‘children’ under the Act, without exception based on developmental state, physical location, or any other ancillary characteristics.”
… No other conclusion is possible. {Note from me, Marleen: Without further definitions to specifically allow a parent to give authorization to destroy or donate embryos by, say, day fifteen of development after oocyte fertilization any other decision would have been arbitrary.} …..
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Why then are Republicans, from former President Donald Trump to the GOP legislators following him in a stampede, rushing to say: No, IVF is great and must not be threatened by this Alabama ruling (which specifically cites the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision in support of its position)? Why indeed? Because IVF is popular with voters, donors and even legislators, so defending Alabama’s reductio ad absurdum [law] would be political suicide.
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… But now they’re protesting that they didn’t mean to endanger IVF, even though a 2017 version of the same bill did include an IVF exception that was omitted in the current bill.
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The article above — to which I linked and from which I already quoted — ended this way, an assertion with which I disagree in the disingenuous or shallow implications: “Either life begins at conception, in which case the Alabama court decision is correct and IVF is impermissible by definition, or life doesn’t begin at conception, which allows us to enter into conversation about the competing claims of the embryo and the prospective mother.”
The same author earlier, as a reader can see, said:
“The Alabama Supreme Court got it exactly right.”
Thus SHE can’t have it both ways. Or, to be more charitable to her, we get to think beyond oversimplification of complex and hopefully infinite science (as I hope we can continue human life on this planet) and beyond two sides or the stupid parties we seem to serve or fall under where our humanity and intelligences are subsumed. I feel a little sorry for anyone like her who can’t see this. (Of course, I don’t know anything about her; she might not be an honest person.)
It is true that the state in which the considered Court functions — the state, I said, and specifically the legislature — didn’t resolve the IVF question previously. The state, too, did not outlaw IVF. It is not true that the ruling said IVF is impermissible. It is also not the case that resolution in the written form of law for the future can’t be done now. Additionally, nothing has gone wrong in terms of law at this point.
At least one couple (and I think still three) which involve three women, and supportive partners, have decided to seek redress for things that went wrong in their process of pursuing IVF and beyond (the goal isn’t usually only to have accomplished something in the test tube). As I shared, earlier, the fact that a scary substance is often used implies another area of redress that could conceivably come up in somebody’s situation someday. Now, unless we don’t believe in providers needing to live up to good faith, it makes sense for these to go forward.
Life does begin at fertilization of the egg (which then is different from an egg alone). AND (even therefore) we can enter into conversation about competing claims. What is interesting in a tragic way is that what is being pushed (by lobbied interests) is that the prospective mother would have no claims about her actions. Worse, said pushing is being done not by the mother but in the name of the mother against the mother.
https://www.princeton.edu/~prolife/articles/embryoquotes2.html#:~:text=Life%20Begins%20at%20Fertilization%20with%20the%20Embryo's%20Conception&text=“Development%20of%20the%20embryo%20begins,together%20they%20form%20a%20zygote.”&text=”Human%20development%20begins%20after%20the,known%20as%20fertilization%20(conception).
“Human development begins after the union of male and female gametes or germ cells during a process known as fertilization (conception). “Fertilization is a sequence of events that begins with the contact of a … (spermatozoon) with a … (ovum) and ends with the fusion of their pronuclei (the haploid nuclei of the sperm and ovum) and the mingling of their chromosomes to form a new cell. This fertilized ovum, known as a zygote, is a large diploid cell that is the beginning, or primordium, of a human being.” [Moore, Keith L. Essentials of Human Embryology. Toronto: B.C. Decker Inc, 1988, p.2]
“Embryo: the developing organism from the time of fertilization until significant differentiation has occurred, when the organism becomes known as a fetus.” [Cloning Human Beings. Report and Recommendations of the National Bioethics Advisory Commission. Rockville, MD: GPO, 1997, Appendix-2.]
“The question came up of what is an embryo, when does an embryo exist, when does it occur. I think, as you know, that in development, life is a continuum…. But I think one of the useful definitions that has come out, especially from Germany, has been the stage at which these two nuclei [from sperm and egg] come together and the membranes between the two break down.”
[Jonathan Van Blerkom of University of Colorado, expert witness on human embryology before the NIH Human Embryo Research Panel — Panel Transcript, February 2, 1994, p. 63]
“Zygote. This cell, formed by the union of an ovum and a sperm (Gr. zyg tos, yoked together), represents the beginning of a human being. The common expression ‘fertilized ovum’ refers to the zygote.”
[Moore, Keith L. and Persaud, T.V.N. Before We Are Born: Essentials of Embryology and Birth Defects. 4th edition. Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders Company, 1993, p. 1]
“Although life is a continuous process, fertilization is a critical landmark because, under ordinary circumstances, a new, genetically distinct human organism is thereby formed…. The combination of 23 chromosomes present in each pronucleus results in 46 chromosomes in the zygote. Thus the diploid number is restored and the embryonic genome is formed. The embryo now exists as a genetic unity.”
[O’Rahilly, Ronan and M�ller, Fabiola. Human Embryology & Teratology. 2nd edition. New York: Wiley-Liss, 1996, pp. 8, 29. This textbook lists “pre-embryo” among “discarded and replaced terms” in modern embryology, describing it as “ill-defined and inaccurate” (p. 12}]
“Almost all higher animals start their lives from a single cell, the fertilized ovum (zygote)… The time of fertilization represents the starting point in the life history, or ontogeny, of the individual.”
[Carlson, Bruce M. Patten’s Foundations of Embryology. 6th edition. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1996, p. 3]
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That is so interesting! I’m glad you voted, and got your votes in early!
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