On her MSNBC show this morning, host Tiffany Cross and provocateur par excellence Elie Mystal vented their fury at the Texas law limiting abortions. And in doing so, they made a number of outrageous and absurd statements.
Highlights:
-- Continuing her penchant for casting pro-life people as caricatures out of "The Handmaid's Tale," Cross said the Texas law "sounds like something straight out of Gilead," the fictional land in the story. And as she has done before, Cross again branded Justice Amy Coney Barrett as "an actual Handmaid."
-- Cross claimed "they really must hate women in Texas and all across the country."
-- Flaunting her hipness, Cross described as "ten stacks" the $10,000 that private citizens can potentially be awarded for helping enforce the law. Turns out "stack" is slang for $1,000. Very cool, Ms. Cross!
-- Based on her "lived experience," Cross described herself as very frightened by what she called the "vigilante" enforcement mechanism in the law. She said: "we know all to well what happens when dangerous white men are in power." Dangerous white men? Like Amy Coney Barrett and Clarence Thomas? And note Cross's use of that favorite liberal phrase: "lived experience."
Cross then turned to Mystal for solutions, ways to block the Texas law. Mystal said there were no easy solutions, but urged Biden to go "buck wild." Someone with diminished command of his faculties going buck wild? Sounds like a dangerous combination! Among the approaches Mystal proposed:
Biden should hire a "force" of "doctors" and send them into Texas to perform abortions. A veritable invasion of Texas by an army of Biden abortionists! Mystal claimed that as federal employees, the abortionists wouldn't be subject to enforcement under the law.
Turn military bases into "enclaves" where abortions would be performed, again supposedly beyond the reach of the law's enforcement provisions. In a variation of Rush Limbaugh's famous line about "the Clinton Presidential Library and Massage Parlor," under Mystal's proposal would we have "the Fort Hood Army Base and Abortion Clinic?"
In a discussion of the Texas law limiting abortions, MSNBC's Tiffany Cross speaking of her fear of "dangerous white men," and Elie Mystal suggesting Biden hire a "force" of abortionists and send them into Texas, was sponsored in part by Walmart and AT&T.
Here's the transcript.
MSNBC
The Cross Connection
9/4/21
10:00 am EDTTIFFANY CROSS: We have to begin with the latest on Texas’s new abortion law, which honestly, sounds like something straight out of Gilead . . . It relies on citizens, regular citizens just like you and me, to enforce it, basically letting them sue anybody who helps a woman get an abortion. And it awards them ten stacks if they succeed.
. . .
This entire thing about protecting the fetus, when they care so little for life in this country is beyond comprehension. It just feels like they really must hate women in Texas, and all across the country. How is it possible the Supreme Court allowed this to stand? I know that they haven’t ruled on it. But they could rule later. We have an actually Handmaid on the Court. So I have to tell you, I’m not so excited about depending on them to protect me and my right to choose.
. . .
The frightening thing about this is incentivizing vigilantes. I mean, you can imagine my lived experience in this country. Vigilante justice is something that's very frightening. And we know all too well what happens when dangerous white men are in power, and decide to exert that power over those of us who are not in power.
. . .
So legally, Elie, what can be done? What should we be demanding of the Biden administration to immediately bring this to a screeching halt. I heard your frustration, but what I'm looking for is, how do we stop this?
ELISE MYSTAL: None of this is easy, guys, and none of this is clean. And to stop these people at this point, it’s going to require some creativity. And it's going to require the Biden administration willing to get its hands dirty. There are solutions here, but there’s no silver bullet, there’s nothing Biden can do and they stay behind like — oh, this is institutionally the way that things — no, no, no, you have to be creative. You have to be willing to go buck wild in order to stop this.
So, one option would be for Biden to federalize doctors—hire a federal force of doctors, send them into Texas to protect people’s constitutional rights. Because the Texas law is only enforceable through private civil action, federal employees are protected from private civil lawsuits through the doctrine of qualified immunity
. . .
There’s also federal enclave law. That would allow military bases to basically perform medical services without being sued by, again, private citizens.
