Another state copies—and intensifies—Texas abortion law. Oklahoma lawmakers on Tuesday voted to totally ban abortion except in cases where the mother’s life is at risk—and to put citizens in charge of enforcing the law.
This measure, which is more extreme than the Texas one that was passed last year in Texas, would ban abortion for six weeks. Individuals can also sue those who help someone get an abortion.
These early abortion bans were often declared illegal by the courts. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Texas law could be enforced privately by citizens and courts, not state officials. This meant the Court couldn’t preemptively stop it being implemented.
In the wake of that declaration, Republican-controlled legislatures across the country have been trying to pass similar abortion restrictions. Idaho already has copycat laws, and Missouri and Tennessee have also introduced them.
“Abortion activists warn of this disaster since months. The bounty hunter laws in the United States will cause a chain reaction, with more and more states banning abortions almost completely. Roe V. WadeIt is the law of land,” Elisabeth Smith said in a statement.
Like the Texas law, the Idaho and Missouri versions would ban abortion as soon as fetal cardiac activity can be detected—around four weeks post-conception (which is known as six weeks of pregnancy). Both the Oklahoma- and Tennessee versions ban all abortions Right from the startThe importance of pregnancy.
The Oklahoma measure—HB 4327—would be enforced by private citizens, who could sue anyone who “performs or induces” or “aids or abets the performance” of an abortion and be awarded at least $10,000 for every illegal abortion performed.
It passed the state’s House of Representatives 78–19 on Tuesday and now goes to the Senate. It would be effective immediately after the governor of the state signs it if it is passed.
“While abortion remains legal in Oklahoma for now, this vote comes one week after the Senate Health and Human Services Committee passed five other anti-abortion bills—including six-week and 30-day abortion bans—in less than an hour,” notes Planned Parenthood.
BREAKING NEWS: A total ban on abortion has been approved by the Oklahoma House. It can now be implemented by private citizens.
This ban will take effect as soon as it is approved by the Senate.
Oklahomans have lost the ability to manage their lives and control their destiny.
— ACLU (@ACLU) March 23, 2022
Free Minds
Inflated IQ estimations can lead to masculinity. Published research in Frontiers of Psychology looks at gender differences in self-reported intelligence. Men and women of both sexes scored well in masculinity.[ed]Higher self-estimates,” according to the paper by Glenda and David Andrews (Australian researchers). A pattern of systematic underestimation was also noted by the researchers.
“Psychology is unambiguous. Men and women are not different in their actual intelligence,” writes Reilly. Neuroscience News. When asked about IQ scores, men scored “more often than not overestimate” while female scores were “more often underestimated.” More:
We next looked at the most reliable predictors for self-estimated intelligence after statistically correcting for effects of measured IQ. Results showed that biological sex was still the most important factor in predicting intelligence. Males were more intelligent than their female counterparts. But psychological gender also played a significant role in the prediction. Subjects who were highly masculine rated their intelligence higher, but there was no correlation with femininity.
A strong link was made between participants’ general self-esteem and their intellectual self image. Men report higher self-esteem, than women.
The full paper can be found here.
FREE MARKETS
Warren’s Crypto Bill is a source of contempt. The Digital Asset Sanctions Compliance Enhancement Act, introduced by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.) The Digital Asset Sanctions Compliance Enhancement Act, introduced by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), is apparently about Russia. This would permit the government to block all transactions made through digital asset platforms and facilitators of transaction that are controlled or owned by “any person” with respect to whom sanctions were imposed in the United States. It would allow the Treasury Department to “order that no digital assets trading platform nor digital asset transaction facilitator doing business in the United States transact or fulfil transactions of digital address addresses known to be affiliated with people headquartered in or domiciled within the Russian Federation” if it is in the United States’ national interests to do so.
However, it goes further than Russia. It states that the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network requires United States individuals involved in transactions exceeding $10,000 in digital assets via 1 or more accounts other than the United States to notify the Federal Government.
Notes: “Everyone hates” the bill Futurism:
Analysts at the DC-based Coin Center think tank wrote in a blog post that the bill’s key conceit—suggesting Russian oligarchs could use crypto wallets to launder tons of money—is implausible, given the public nature of blockchains, which record every transaction on open digital ledgers. The bill’s broad language could criminalize many activities that, according to its writers, aren’t criminal. …
Some Democrats on the opposite side of Capitol Hill have taken offense at Warren’s efforts to regulate this burgeoning sector.
Rep. Ritchie Torres (a New York City freshman congressman) stated that “the future of finance should not be left up to a gerontocracy a regulators who seem to be on an individual crusade against cryptocurrency.” PoliticoInterview about the bill. “Congress should have final say, as it has a new generation in legislators.”
He said, “You shouldn’t define technology by its worst use.” Cryptocurrency is more than ransomware. Just like money laundering, there are more to it than crypto.
QUICK HIT
• Today marks the third day of the the Senate Judiciary Committee’s hearings on the nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court. This is what took place yesterday. (See also Josh Hawley’s Attack On Ketanji Brown Jackson Illustrates The Emotionalism She Criticized.
• The city of Los Angeles got more than $600 million in COVID-19 relief funds from the federal government in 2021 and gave around $317 million of it to the Los Angeles Police Department for “payroll expenditures.”
• The Legal Aid Society is challenging the New York City Police Department’s use of a DNA database. The group accuses New York City of using an unregulated and illegal DNA database, in violation of the state law. The New York Times. “The lawsuit calls for DNA profiles that were collected illegally to be erased from the database and to be completely shut down.”
• J.D. Tuccille: Your favorite crisis doesn’t justify a dictatorship.
• BuzzFeed shareholders want to shut down BuzzFeed News.