TGIF: Welcome Back to Both 1973 and 1984
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Hello and welcome to another episode of TGIF. My name is Nellie Bowles, and I'm back again to give this week's news an ultrasound and to say, oh my God, it's a birthing person. And with me again is journalist, filthy communist, and the only real host of the Blocked and Reported podcast, Katie Herzog.

Hi, Katie. Hi, Nellie. Good to see you again. Katie, welcome back to 1973. Gas prices are up, inflation is through the roof, and abortion is back at the center of the culture war. This week, Andreessen Horowitz and Oracle decided to back Elon Musk's Twitter takeover. Dave Chappelle was attacked at the Hollywood Bowl, and war rages on in Ukraine. But the big story of the week that we're going to focus on today is the leak.

Good evening. We begin tonight with breaking news. Politico has obtained an initial draft majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito that would strike down Roe v. Wade. A draft Supreme Court majority opinion was leaked to the press. Politico is reporting it has received a draft opinion circulated among Supreme Court justices

that suggests the majority of them are ready to overturn Roe v. Wade. Legal experts say the opinion would be the most consequential abortion decision in decades and would transform women's reproductive health in America. It calls for Roe v. Wade to be overturned. It was written by Justice Alito back in February, and his opinion, which calls Roe egregiously wrong from the start, was co-signed by the conservative flank, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett.

Interestingly, missing is John Roberts. It could be a game changer, and this reportedly started circulating three months ago. It is important to note justices can and sometimes do change their votes. As those draft opinions make the rounds, major decisions can have multiple drafts,

And changes can be made in the days before the court releases an official decision. And the ramifications for this are obviously enormous. First off, it made me realize that we've gone from 1973 all the way until now without either party using their power to pass an abortion law. I mean, abortion rights were hanging on this controversial Supreme Court decision and everyone knew it. And yet Congress never acted. And then I read a little bit more and I realized that

Actually, the parties have occasionally put forward legislation on abortion, but it's almost always designed to fail.

Right now, the Democrats are talking about reviving one of those bills that failed earlier this year. This is about freedom, about freedom of women to have choice, about the size and timing of their families. The bill's called the Women's Health Protection Act. The Women's Health Protection Act would put Roe versus Wade in statute, so it would become the law of the land. The most important thing this bill will do

And it would bar any state restrictions, even 20-week abortion bans, and allow abortion up until fetal viability. But also afterward, in, quote, the good faith medical judgment of the treating health care professional. It defines health care provider very broadly and medical judgment, too.

not differentiating whether it's a mother's physical state or her mental one. So it's not at all crazy for people to interpret this act as making abortion legal at any time in a pregnancy. If signed into law, it would create a national standard to allow for abortions for any reason at any stage of pregnancy, up to birth. This is a law that not only couldn't get bipartisan support,

it couldn't pass through with just Democrats either because many moderate Dems wouldn't sign on. The bill failed earlier this year because it's obviously not something that's going to pass. It is not designed to pass. It's not designed to compromise. And then before I get all finger-waggy at the Democrats, though I love to do that, Republicans have put forward similarly extreme legislation when they've had power.

bills that would put such strict restrictions on legal abortion that they couldn't even pass their own party. So, Katie, you're a volunteer abortion doctor.

Why haven't Democrats been able to get a bill together that might actually pass? Well, first of all, Nellie, I would just like to point out that earlier this week, I drove past a group of people holding signs that said, my body, my choice. And for a second, I wasn't sure if they were pro-choice protesters or anti-vax mandate protesters. Oh, my God. Which I think says something about the moment that we're in. But

But the bill that you refer to doesn't actually seem, as you noted, like a good faith attempt to get this legislation passed. And instead, it's just a political posture, an attempt to rally the base. And it's this sort of seesaw where the right proposes something insane and then the left responds in kind and it goes back and forth forever instead of just passing real legislation that would actually impact people's lives.

Of course, it's not as though a more conservative bill that still sanctifies the right to an abortion would have passed in the current Congress. There are Congress members, plenty of them, committed to ending abortion altogether. So this is all just symbolic. It's a way of rallying the base and saying, hey, the GOP won't work with us on this. Yeah, but it's a bill that...

Even I think it's a little out there. Yeah, most Americans would probably agree with you. Polling shows that our views on abortion are more nuanced than just illegal or in favor. But the bills that are being proposed don't really reflect that nuance at all. Yeah, like all the polls that I found for this week's TGIF, I'm looking up where are Americans right now on abortion? And interestingly, it's a pretty stable, moderate poll.

Like we're pretty much split 50-50. Most Americans think abortion should be legal some of the time. 45% of Americans think abortion should be illegal most of the time.

But most Americans aren't either this sort of black and white pro-choice or pro-life. They're somewhere in the middle. They're somewhere where they want common sense restrictions, but not crazy banning of IVF or banning of IUDs, which we'll get to later.

But yeah, most Americans are genuinely moderate on this and have stayed moderate. Unlike issues like gay marriage, where Americans really have changed and gotten much more progressive. On abortion, it's pretty stable and pretty moderate. I think it's worth asking ourselves why pro-choice activists in particular haven't been able to move the public much on that issue. Something is going wrong with the messaging. I don't think shouting your abortion, for instance, is changing people's opinions. Completely. Yeah.

It's sometimes a little disturbing, the pro-choice rhetoric. Like, to pretend that it's a nothing burger event or, again, like, shout your abortion, it's off-putting. It's like, no, I mean, listen, this is a serious...

thing that sometimes has to be done. And it's a sad thing. And it's not like going to sway people who are on the fence if you're pretending like that's a crazy sensibility to have. Yeah. And people keep just sort of talking past each other about this. Like, I think that

Many liberals genuinely think that conservatives are pro-life only because they literally want to control women's bodies. But if you actually talk to people who are pro-life, they will tell you the reason they are pro-life is because they literally think that life begins at conception and therefore ending that life is.

is murder. On the other side, conservatives genuinely think that liberals don't care about babies, when in reality what liberals actually care about, pro-choice activists actually care about, is bodily autonomy. This should be obvious. It's literally written on people's signs, but we have these sort of cartoonish ideas about what the other side believes, and so it's impossible to get anything done. It's impossible to talk about this.

We don't even acknowledge that the other side, even if we disagree with them, has good faith arguments for their side. Completely. And this is, it's the most extreme example of that. Yeah, it's good versus evil. Yeah. It's funny. I was talking to a friend earlier this week and she is pro-life and she was saying, you know, honestly, I'd settle for Denmark's abortion laws. And I kind of paused for a second because I was like,

wouldn't Denmark's abortion laws be much more progressive? But I looked it up and I had no idea about this. So in Denmark, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Italy, I'm literally reading through lists, abortion on request is banned after 12 weeks. Of course, in the case of danger to the mother, you can have an abortion later, but it's banned at 14 weeks for France and Germany,

Spain, at 16 weeks in Austria, at 18 weeks in Sweden. These are dates that would sound incredibly conservative to an American. And yet Europeans have figured out that this is actually what works in terms of a compromise between the right and the left to get an abortion protection law on the book.

which we haven't managed to do. Yeah, I don't think that most liberals would find 12 weeks to be an adequate compromise. Yeah. The bigger picture to me when I think about this is that without the Roe v. Wade decision, we will have states with radically different laws around abortion. And...

That's not a casual thing. It's not like pot. If you have a radically different law around abortion, it means that you're wanted for homicide in Mississippi for something you did in California. Are Tennessee cops going to be hunting down a woman in Seattle? Are there going to be quick pregnancy tests at state lines?

Am I wrong to be focusing so much on this national compromise law? Like, to me, that's the only way through this. But am I being naive to think that we need this thing or that it can even happen here? Well, I don't think you're naive to think that we need it. You might be naive to think that it can actually happen. You know, and this is tricky because in the states that outlaw abortion...

Abortion isn't popular. Outlawing abortion is popular. So in this way, kicking this back to the states really is part of the democratic process.

And I think there's a lot of catastrophizing going on here. I mean, I am not in favor of overturning Roe. I am pro-choice. I always have been. But for instance, I've seen friends on social media who live in places like Brooklyn saying that they're worried for their daughter's future. And I'm thinking, well, unless your daughter moves to Oklahoma, this probably isn't going to be an issue for you personally. That doesn't mean that it's okay. One of the reasons that this is so disturbing is that it will affect primarily Roe

Yes, marginalized people, poor people, people who don't have access to workarounds, people in these states. But this also shows us sort of the messy side of democracy. I personally don't want to live in a world where the majority can decide to take away rights from the minority any more than I want to see the Supreme Court do it. You know, the Supreme Court seems good when it does things that I like and bad when it does things that I don't like. But kicking this down to the states does mean that people will be able to choose what they think is best for their state. I don't think

that this is going to have positive outcomes, but it is democracy. Yeah. Okay. So now I want to get into how this went down.

The court's decision isn't totally shocking, right? Roe v. Wade has been trounced as a bad law by Republicans, but also by a lot of prominent Democrats like Joe Biden and famously Ruth Bader Ginsburg. So what's really precedent breaking here isn't Roe v. Wade being tossed. It's that someone working in the Supreme Court leaked this. This is a bomb at

at the court, really a bomb. And it undermines everything the court stands for internally and institutionally, that they trust their law clerks, that they trust each other, that they work on things jointly. The reporters who are covering this, and these are, of course,

liberal reporters living in D.C. say that the thing that's most shocking to them is the leak itself. I guess all bets are off now at the court and norms and traditions that have stood intact for centuries, if not for decades, are gone. And now we just leak opinions. This is a full-flown Pentagon Papers type compromise of the court's work.

And they won't be able to trust each other for a very long time. And they won't be able to trust their law clerks in the same way either. Now, of course, the question is, who's the leaker? There are some theories. And Katie, I want to know where you come down on this. Who leaked and why? I don't want to name anyone. And also, I don't know anyone's names. But I suspect that this was a liberal campaign.

or liberal staff are trying to drum up some public pressure. There's been, of course, wild speculation there. I can see the arguments for this being a conservative trying to lock in the argument, but I can also see the argument for liberals trying to drum up some public pressure to change this. I'm not sure. I would love to know. I think that whoever did it should just go ahead and come out and tell us so they can

save us from the investigation, but it's possible we'll never find out. Weirdly, I think my money's on it being...

I'm probably wrong, but still my money's on it being a conservative leak because John Roberts not being signed on makes me think maybe he was lobbying to have some, someone's vote change and to stop this from happening. It also leaked that he didn't want this to, to come to fruition. Right. But no matter who it was, what's clear now is that there's

a massive amount of distrust within the Supreme Court. I saw the Supreme Court, for better or worse, as America's last very respectable...

unbroken institution. These are people who are trying to be apolitical. These are the best and brightest. Like they're famous for getting along, right? RBG and Scalia were friends. They went on vacation together. It seemed, they always seemed above the fray to me. And especially both of us live really in the fray and see our institutions being so corrupted. And I

I don't know. I thought they were better than this. I agree with you. But I don't think that the leak is as big a deal as the actual argument itself. I think people, at least people who are pro-choice, are much more upset about that, about the future, than about the leak itself. After a quick break, news about a big shift happening in the Republican Party, Katie on The Truth Czar,

And breaking orgasm-related news. That is unfortunately really sad. Stick around.

There are no other shows that are cutting straight to the point when it comes to the unprecedented lawfare debilitating and affecting the 2024 presidential election. We do all of that every single day right here on America on Trial with Josh Hammer. Subscribe and download your episodes wherever you get your podcasts. It's America on Trial with Josh Hammer. Welcome back to TGIF. And a big congratulations to the Republican nominee for Ohio Senate, J.D. Vance. Wow. I got to say.

I thought this would feel good. It feels even better than I thought it would. Thank you all so much. This week, in a dramatic conclusion to what turned out to be a really expensive and brutal primary, Vance won his primary race against a lot of other candidates who were supported by sitting senators like Ted Cruz or Rand Paul. Well, Vance was financially supported by, well, billionaire contrarian Peter Thiel. And in a dramatic fashion in the final weeks...

by former President Donald J. Trump. Now, this campaign, I really think, was a referendum on what kind of a Republican Party we want and what kind of a country we want. We went to battle, ladies and gentlemen, in this primary, we went to battle against one of the grossest organizations in professional establishment Washington called the Club for Growth. And I call them the Club for Chinese Growth. Thank you. There are a lot of Trumpy reads on this, but to me, what I'm taking away is that

The populist movement on the right

just gained a very big new voice. The question presented in this primary was, do we want to have a border that protects our citizens? Do we want to ship our jobs to China or keep them right here in America for American workers and the American people? Do we want a Republican Party that stands for the donors who write checks to the Club for Growth? Or do we want a Republican Party for the people right here in Ohio? Ladies and gentlemen, we just answered the question.

I think there's also like J.D. Vance is so unpopular on Twitter. And I think that this shows how, once again, Twitter does not reflect the real world. Yeah. So next, a story that you and I, Katie, are both really interested in, which is youth medical transitions. The

movement of treating young people who are experiencing gender dysphoria with medical interventions like puberty blockers and hormones and surgeries like double mastectomies for teens.

So this week, a top gender transition surgeon, Marcy Bowers, who is herself trans and a major voice of moderation in the movement, made a pretty stunning admission. Every single child who was or adolescent who was truly blocked at Tanner stage two was

is has never experienced orgasm. At a virtual conference held by Duke, she said that every single child or adolescent she worked with who went on puberty blockers early as part of their transition was completely unable to experience an orgasm later in life. I mean, it's it's really about zero. These are the of course, these are just assigned male at birth. So trans feminine. And it's because they never in their lives are exposed to testosterone.

So blockers prevent the rise of testosterone and they don't really go on testosterone at or around surgery or into adulthood. So we don't know. They're going to have this sensation. There's no question about that. But are they going to be able to achieve sexual satisfaction? So the people who are saying they're protecting trans kids are, and you won't like this language, but in a way neutering them.

Katie, tell me the argument that this is okay, to let a kid decide that they're never going to reach sexual maturity and never going to have an orgasm. Can you possibly consent to something you've never had? Yeah, this is something that I've changed my mind on. I used to think that in some isolated, very severe cases, puberty blockers would ultimately benefit kids. But after hearing people like Marcy Bowers say,

I've changed my mind. And I think that there's a great irony in that the same people chanting protect trans kids are advocating for a medical procedure that could permanently impair their ability to enjoy sex as adults before they're even able to comprehend what that means. And even people who generally support gender dysphoric kids and want what's best for them

They need to grapple with the fact that there are an array of complications with taking blockers, from infertility to thinning bones. Activists will tell you over and over that puberty blockers are totally reversible, but that isn't actually true. And to me, this comes down to an issue of consent.

Can kids consent to giving up something that they cannot conceptualize? And I don't think that they can, and I don't think it's fair to these kids. And I don't think that it's fair to give these to kids when they literally don't understand what they're actually taking, what they're signing up for. How dark does your mind go on this? Because I get really dark on this. I almost think that there is a push to...

de-sex, like, young gay boys. I mean, I don't think everyone has the same story for why they're supporting this, but in a way, it's like a modern day sending your slightly effeminate young boy to join the church. It's a way of saying...

you're never going to reach sexual maturity. You're never going to reach the adulthood that would have you performing the life that you might want. I think parents are genuinely trying to do what's best for their kids. The problem is that they're getting messaging from their own doctors, from gender clinics, from medical organizations, and from activists saying that if you don't give your kids, your kid puberty blockers, your kid is going to kill themselves. The data doesn't bear that out. It's very dangerous messaging, but I don't think

I think this is a conscious attempt to hurt children. I think that's just the byproduct of it, which in some ways is worse. I think people are generally genuinely well-meaning, but I also think that this is absolutely a scandal. And in five or 10 and 15 years, we're going to look back at this the same way that we look back at lobotomies. I think you're totally right. And I think that's absolutely the medical comparison. The, the, um,

I just, I have a hard time believing that we've gotten to this place of thousands of young people looking at an adulthood where they will never reach sexual maturity and never be able to have an intimate sexual relationship without something darker going on in our society other than just good wishes. Like,

can this actually be that people just want to not harm kids? It boggles my mind when I actually think about it. When you step back and think about, okay, several thousand kids are being neutered by doctors right now, and we're all sort of living as if it's totally okay. And the Biden administration is putting out memos saying this is best practices, that puberty blockers are considered part of their list of best practice medical treatment for gender dysphoric kids.

Yeah, it'll be interesting to see what happens in the future. There are already countries like in the UK and in parts of Northern Europe where they have walked back the guidance on puberty blockers because they've shown that the complications are too great and the outcomes aren't necessarily positive for these kids. I don't think there's any sort of grand conspiracy here, but I do think that this is absolutely a scandal. I can't get you on my conspiratorial team on this one? No, sorry, Chris Ruffo.

It's supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, even though the sound of it is something quite atrocious. If you say it loud enough, you'll always become... Okay, so for our last story, Katie, who is America's truth czar? And do you pledge your allegiance to her all-knowing eye?

Yes, I think I have to at this point. Yeah, so Nina Yakovich, she's apparently a disinformation expert, and she was recently tagged to head the new Disinformation Governance Board, which is basically a government committee on disinformation that will operate out of the Department of Homeland Security, if that's reassuring. Chairman Schiff and distinguished members of the committee, it is an honor to testify before you today on the degradation of our information ecosystem and its exploitation by malign actors.

This is a threat that is dismantling democracy. As Americans right now exercise their democratic rights, it is critical the nation is informed about how disinformation might blunt their voice and their vote. And she seems like a very interesting woman. In addition to her work, she writes these sort of glee club songs about things like misinformation and Elizabeth Warren. Informational ornery.

is really quite ferocious. It's when a huckster takes some lies and makes them sound precocious by saying them in Congress or a mainstream outlet. So disinformation's origins are slightly less atrocious. It's how you hide a lie. She's basically the weird Al Yankovic of progressive women. When Rudy Giuliani shared that in town from Ukraine. Or when TikTok influencers say COVID can cause pain. They're laundering disinfo and we really should take note and not support their lies.

And the hilarious thing about her being named to head this department is that she's guilty of spreading disinformation herself, specifically about the Hunter Biden laptop story being Russian disinformation. And not only do I not want this woman in particular deciding what's disinformation or misinformation and what isn't, but it's as though people forget that power shifts in

And it is possible that in just a couple of years, the Trump administration could have a disinformation governance board. And do I really want the Trump administration telling me what's true and what's Russian disinformation? I definitely don't. So I think that this was a political mistake on the Biden administration's part. This issue is just way more complicated. And I think that getting the government involved will not help anything. It's funny. When I

when I was at the Times, worked on the tech team and I worked with a lot of the people who

really started the drumbeat on this disinfo stuff and really like crafted the messaging on it. And we're very gung ho on, we have to have a truth czar in America. We have to make laws around this. And nothing to me that our media is doing right now is more foolish than this disinfo thing. It's so short-sighted about what can happen. And the idea that it's running out of the Department of Homeland Security is,

The whole thing is like out of a movie. Yeah, it's very 1984. It really is. We're in 1973 and 1984. We actually are. Katie Herzog, as always, thank you so much for coming on. Anytime, Nellie. As always, please go to listen to Blocked and Reported. You can find it at blockedandreported.org. This has been TGIF. It's a podcast inspired by my weekly news roundup that I publish at Common Sense.

Go sign up to get it every Friday. TGIF, everyone.