From Esquire

(Permanent Musical Accompaniment To This Post)

Being our semi-regular weekly survey of what's goin' down in the several states where, as we know, the real work of governmentin' gets done, and where Ma Rainey and Beethoven both unwrap a bedroll.

We begin this week in the newly insane state of North Carolina (Art Pope, Prop.), where their incredible desire to make a bad thing worse continues to amaze and astound. Just recently, the entire government got together and cobbled together a watery "compromise" on the bathroom bill that was lame enough to buy off the NCAA. Undaunted, the state legislature (Art Pope, Prop.) moved ahead with a bill that would…wait for it…make marriage equality illegal. From NBC News:

The Republican-sponsored bill, titled the Uphold Historical Marriage Act, asserts the U.S. Supreme Court "overstepped its constitutional bounds" when it struck down North Carolina's constitutional ban on same-sex marriage. "The General Assembly of the State of North Carolina declares that the Obergefell v. Hodges decision of the United States Supreme Court of 2015 is null and void in the State of North Carolina, and that the State of North Carolina shall henceforth uphold and enforce Section 6 of Article XIV of the North Carolina Constitution, the opinion and objection of the United States Supreme Court notwithstanding," the bill reads.

What makes this measure remarkable should be obvious. It is outright nullification, the presentation of an argument that was pretty much settled at Appomattox. It also is an out-and-out refusal to recognize the Supremacy Clause. This is the most naked assertion of these philosophies since Joe Johnston surrendered to Bill Sherman at Bennett Place in Durham. This was obvious even to the Republican party of North Carolina (Art Pope, Prop.), according to CBS News:

House Speaker Tim Moore of Kings Mountain said in a statement Wednesday that the bill introduced this week won't be considered because the nation's highest court "has firmly ruled on the issue."

Story continues

Still, you may wonder, how does a bill so clearly beyond a pale that's existed for 152 years get brought up at all? Well, perhaps it's because people in the newly insane state of North Carolina go out and actually vote for guys like this. From the News and Observer:

A commenter reminded Pittman that the Supreme Court ruling settled the law on gay marriage and that the lawmaker should "get over it." Pittman's response: "And if Hitler had won, should the world just get over it? Lincoln was the same sort (of) tyrant, and personally responsible for the deaths of over 800,000 Americans in a war that was unnecessary and unconstitutional."

Punchline?

Pittman is the pastor of Ridgecrest Presbyterian Church in Stanly County and has served in the House since 2013.

Old times they are not forgotten, I'm fairly sure.

Let us move along to South Dakota, where the newly energized "war" on drugs has taken an alarming turn. From the Times-Argus:

Through the patterned light, he saw a fifth officer filming the procedure. His pants were loosened and pulled below his waist. Then, pain. A nurse at Avera St. Mary's Hospital in Pierre inserted a pencil-sized tube into Sparks' urethra to drain his bladder. Moments later, an officer with the Pierre Police Department held a cup of Sparks' urine that soon would be sent off for drug testing. "It was degrading," Sparks said. "I was angry. I felt like my civil rights were being violated."

Pretty safe call, I'd say.

Hours earlier, police responded to a domestic dispute at Sparks' home. When officers observed him acting "fidgety," they asked for a urine sample. When Sparks refused, police sought a warrant from a Hughes County judge to obtain a urine sample by "medically accepted means." In Pierre, those means have repeatedly included forcibly catheterizing people who refuse or are unable to provide a sample. Officers subjected a 3-year-old boy to a similar procedure in February as part of a child welfare investigation, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. "Quite frankly, it's cruel and barbaric to forcibly catheterize anyone, let alone a 3-year-old child, and this process raises serious constitutional concerns," said Heather Smith, executive director of the ACLU of South Dakota. The Pierre Police Department and Avera Health declined repeated requests for interviews. The police department deferred questions to the Hughes County State's Attorney's office, which also did not respond to multiple phone calls.

Tell me again that normalizing torture overseas doesn't have a corrosive effect at home. They put a bag over a guy's head and stick a tube up his dick. How is this not torture? And, if somehow it isn't, how about this?

Kirsten Hunter said her 3-year-old son, Aksel, was forcefully catheterized at the Avera hospital in Pierre in late February after her boyfriend failed a urine analysis. Authorities wanted to have her and her two children tested to see if they also had drugs in their system. Pierre police officers and a Department of Social Services employee showed up at her home and said if her kids couldn't produce urine, they would be taken from her. Hunter said her son isn't potty-trained. So while she and her 5-year-old daughter were able to provide a urine sample, her young son couldn't. He was held down and forcibly catheterized by nurses. "They just shoved it right up there, and he screamed so bad," Hunter said. "He's still dealing with a staph infection, and we are still giving him medication."

A three-year-old, forced against his will into a painful medical procedure so as to gather evidence against his mother's boyfriend? There are too goddamn many places in this country where the Constitution doesn't reach because the people who swear to uphold it don't give a damn about it. And with an attorney general committed to ramping this foolishness back up again, god knows when, if ever, they'll start giving a damn about it again. A three-year-old. My god in heaven.

Let's skip on down to Louisiana, where they're still trying to wind down the many deplorable policies on which "Bobby" Jindal planned to run for president back when that idea didn't make people dissolve into hopeless laughter. One of these "reforms" changed the way worker's compensation claims were handled. A local judge ruled that these "reforms" pretty much were designed to make filing these claims harder, and not easier. From The Louisiana Voice:

Judge Johnson struck down provisions which:

Stipulated that when a carrier/self-insured employer fails to return LWC forms within the five business days it is deemed to have denied such request for authorization;

Provided an automatic "tacit denial" of medical treatment;

Allowed OWC to enforce variances from medical treatment guidelines;

Denied treatment not covered by medical treatment guidelines;

Allowed the OWC a workers compensation carrier to arbitrarily submit-and the OWC medical director to accept-any information it desires without notifying the injured worker of the "evidence."

The suit was brought against the Louisiana Workforce Commission (LWC) in 2013 by attorney Janice Hebert Barber and several physicians and injured workers who were denied benefits under the new law. Baton Rouge attorney J. Arthur Smith III represented each of the plaintiffs. Also named as defendants were LWC Secretary Curt Eysink, Hataway, and former OWC Medical Director Dr. Christopher Rich.

This is what is called a "business-friendly" environment by ambitious Republican governors like "Bobby" Jindal, who warped faster than any other piece of presidential timber this side of Scott Walker.

And we conclude, as is our custom, in the great state of Oklahoma, where Blog Official Sagebrush Topiary Inspector Friedman of the Plains brings us yet another wonderful argument for retrograde policies that are going to pass anyway. From Public Radio Tulsa:

The severity of the diagnosed birth defect does not matter. Women would be prohibited from aborting a fetus expected to live even just a few hours after birth, and there is not exception for the life or health of a mother. House Democrats pressed Faught on why there are no exceptions for cases of rape or incest either, asking whether those are an act of God. "Well, it's an act of sin. We live in a sinful world. Men and women do horrible things, but God can bring beauty out of ashes," Faught said.

These really are the fcking mole people.

This is your democracy, America. Cherish it.

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