Nothing defines the great political divide in America like the defeat of Republican Judge Roy Moore by Democrat Doug Jones for an Alabama senate seat long held by Republican Jeff Session who resigned his senate seat to become Trump's Attorney General. It was practically a replay of the Trump-Clinton election with emotions running high on all sides but with a Democrat victory instead of a Republican victory. Alabama is a very red state where Trump squashed Clinton 62-34. For this reason, Moore was expected to win. While the upset Jones victory stunned some Republicans and other Republicans actually hated Moore so badly that they wanted Jones to defeat Moore, this election, like nearly all elections, has some vitally important lessons.
Before getting into why I believe that Moore lost, I want to disclose that I supported Moore. As someone who is generally distrustful of the religious right, its motives and its operatives, I supported Moore because I believed that he was highly likely to vote similar to Sen. Rand Paul who votes as a constitutionalist.
Last night was a huge victory for gun control, open borders, the neocons, the globalists, the Deep State, socialism, statism, the TPP, the Paris Climate Accord, more taxes, the UN, global governance, and loading up America with welfare dependent 3rd world immigrants. It was also a huge victory for those who despise US sovereignty and the constitution.
Liberty lost on the evening of December 12, 2017; tyranny won. Yeah, the totalitarian thug left and its vile media had a huge victory, a victory that holds the potential to carry over into midterms and all future elections.
The Senate will now be 51 R's and 49 D's, well 47 D's and the 2 independents who caucus with the Dems. Republican control of the Senate hangs by a thread.
Welcome to cultural Nazism, American style, where the saints are Harvey Weinstein, Bill Clinton, Matt Lauer, Charlie Rose, those who protect them and many other Democrat sexual predators. They were redeemed. The only sexual predators in America are now conservatives who had consensual sex with an underage girl 40 years ago.
Every media headline is calling Roy Moore a pedophile and a pervert; everybody believes the admitted liar Gloria Allred and well, everybody is finally happy!
Throughout this entire fiasco, I never saw one piece of credible evidence evidence against Moore, a man who was destroyed by sleazy accusers, lies, false accusations and innuendo for consensual sex that allegedly happened 40 years ago. While it was not uncommon for older men to have consensual sex with teenage girls 40 years ago anymore than it is today, the suggestion that Moore is a pedophile and child rapist is insane.
Moving on, there were indeed issues with Moore. Exit polls disclosed that Moore performed poorly with women and young voters.
Moore is deeply affiliated with the religious right, its agenda and to the point where he has been accused of being a Biblical literalist. He became famous when, as Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, he refused to remove a marble monument of the 10 Commandments from the Alabama Judicial Building pursuant to a federal court order. Moore was removed from his position of Chief Justice in 2003 by the Alabama Court of the Judiciary. He was reelected Chief Justice again in 2013 but was suspended from that position 2016 when he ordered Alabama judges to enforce its ban on same sex marriages after the US Supreme Court unconstitutionally decreed that same sex marriages were legal, constitutional and must be performed throughout every state.
America is a Republic and federal powers are specifically enumerated in Article 1 of the constitution; those powers do not confer upon the federal government or the federal judiciary the right to legislate marriages and who can and cannot be married. This is clearly a state right or was until SCOTUS intervened.
Moore is a religiously motivated vocal opponent of homosexuality and gay marriage. The argument can certainly be made that Moore is a principled man whose positions on the issues of the 10 Commandments and gay marriage are indeed constitutional and that the founding fathers never intended for the federal government to butt its nose into these issues.
However, what has changed is American culture and most Americans could care less who marries whom simply because moral opposition to gay marriage based on religious views is hardly even an issue these days. Moreover, nobody really cares about the 10 Commandments so banning them from public property offends very few anymore except those who adhere to Christian theology as their ultimate guide for morality.
Morally, Americans tend to be more Libertarian on the social issues and embrace a 'Live and Let Live' attitude. The so-called culture wars were largely spawned by the intolerant left who so hate religious folks and all symbols of Judeo Christian culture that they have waged battles in the courts for decades to eradicate Christian culture and morals.
Libertarians tend to accurately argue that the gay marriage issue is the direct result of government intervention into the marriage. Prior to government controlling who could marry and who couldn't, marriage was essentially a private religious ceremony. If two people want to unite into a legally defined union complete with an enforceable contract, it certainly should be their right under contract law. Religious people should not have the right to decide who can and cannot contract for a domestic relationship. The entire marriage issue had been legally engineered either to piss off some folks and/or to please other folks, busybodies who like telling folks how they should live their lives.
However, the gay marriage issue is more complicated than a a marriage certificate. Some folks want to ban gays from adopting children and some religious folks have even gone so far as to attack the parental rights of gay parents. Yes, gay folks do reproduce and have children. As a judge, Moore once ruled that a lesbian mother could only see her child in the presence of supervision. More seems to strongly oppose the rights of gays to even raise their own children because of his religious belief that homosexuality is wrong.
The issue of abortion is another hot button social issue in America, although it has been relatively quiet in recent years. Still, a not insignificant percentage of the Republican base is strongly prolife, believe that human life begins at the precise moment of conception and absolutely condemn abortion as a murder of a human being. Some have even gone so far as to advocate that women who had abortions should be arrested, criminally prosecuted for murder and executed.
With regard to human life in the womb, science divides it into 4 categories, a zygote (freshly fertilized egg), a blastocyst (egg growing into an embryo), and an embryo that grows into a fetus, an unbirthed human being. Many on the religious right view a zygote as a human being, although science disagrees while acknowledging that a zgyote, blastocyst and embryo are indeed potential human beings.
Clearly, how a person defines unborn human life affects their views on the issue. The prolifers started a movement a few years ago to get the issue on a voter referendum, that issue being a law to define human life as beginning at the precise moment of conception. The southeast US is the most religious part of America. Mississippi was deemed to be the most prolife state in America and the launching point for the 'life begins at the precise moment of conception' movement that was expected to spawn a multi-state movement. Clearly, the goal was to use state law to overturn Roe v. Wade by re-defining the definition of human life and when it begins. Call it crazy, call it clever or call it a moral imperative. These amendments were drafted as Personhood amendment, meaning that a freshly fertilized egg is legally defined as a person.
In Mississippi, one of the most pro-life if not the most pro-life states in America, the folks voted and the Personhood amendment went down 58% to 42%. It was a whopper of a defeat for the Personhood movement that pretty much died with the Mississippi vote.
Judge Moore was not only a vigorous advocate for the Personhood movement, he even went so far as to define his position on the issue and not with the typical op-ed but with a legal opinion as judge. The case involved prosecuting pregnant woman who used drugs. Moore wrote:
Because a human life with a full genetic endowment comes into existence at the moment of conception, the self-evident truth that “all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights” encompasses the moment of conception. Legal recognition of the unborn as members of the human family derives ultimately from the laws of nature and of nature’s God, Who created human life in His image and protected it with the commandment: “Thou shalt not kill.” Therefore, the interpretation of the word “child” in Alabama’s chemical-endangerment statute, § 26-15- 3.2, Ala. Code 1975, to include all human beings from the moment of conception is fully consistent with these first principles regarding life and law.
Let's get back to the mostly young female vote in Alabama that clobbered Moore in the election. While many women in Alabama are indeed prolife and would hesitate to have an abortion, they still don't want to criminalize abortion or restrict it. They based such views on "I haven't lived her life, walked in her shoes so it's up to God to judge her and not me". That's an opinion that is strongly held in Bible Belt states as well as every other state. Furthermore, such views are indeed influenced by the belief that women do not want abortions to be driven back into filthy backrooms where women died from infections and abortions performed by folks with little to no medical training. Like it or not, abortion isn't going away, it's either going to be legal and safe or illegal and deadly.
Besides Moore's culturally unpopular positions on abortion and gay marriage, Moore has stumbled on other big issues, notably civil rights and slavery issues. While on the campaign trail, Moore was asked by a voter, presumably motivated by Trump's 'Make America Great Again' slogan, when he thought that America was last great. Astoundingly, Moore replied "I think it was great at the time when families were united. Even though we had slavery, they cared for one another. ... Our families were strong, our country had a direction." That is definitely not the kind of talk that wins hearts, minds and elections, especially in the south where the struggle to overcome scourge of the slavery era is ongoing, extremely sensitive and focused on redemption for past sins.
Overall, Moore was a flawed candidate who was driven by his personal religious beliefs and he also made a morally shabby attempt to somehow justify human slavery as an institution that kept families together.
Finally, his defeat is more easily understood when viewed through the prism of the contentious social issues, theocracy, Christian fundamentalism and racial opinions that are cringe worthy. What is not understood is how a smart guy like Steve Bannon got behind Moore. How could Bannon NOT know that highly controversial issues and views would surface?
More information on Moore is contained in the following links:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Moore
https://ballotpedia.org/Mississippi_"Personhood"_Amendment_(2015)
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/09/lets-talk-about-roy-moores-extremism-on-abortion.html
