FRIDAY 'ROUND-THE-HORN.

Fuck it, this is still great.

•     In the wake of Donald Trump's brief advocacy of "punishing" women who have abortions, there have been several stories published asserting these women are already being punished by absurd restrictions in several states. In Texas, for example, you have to get a medically-unnecessary transvaginal ultrasound, a shaming lecture, and a 24-hour waiting period. Soon, in Indiana, you'll have to give your fetus a funeral. Many states make it so tough to open a clinic that they have only one abortion provider; Kansas has three, down from four when Dr. George Tiller was murdered in 2009. (And some states make women go to the clinic twice for one abortion.) Meanwhile conservatives are always trying to make it worse: last year North Dakota tried to make abortion illegal after six weeks, and was only blocked because they got a good judge -- who knows what future graduates of the Scalia School of Law will do. But don't tell this to National Review's David French, who thinks abortions in America are like a sweet trip on the good ship Lollipop:

These writers aren’t making a serious argument. They’re simply following the standard leftist playbook by redefining words in service of shrieking hyperbole. To “punish” typically means to make “someone suffer for a crime or for bad behavior.” But if it serves a woman’s right to kill her unborn child, the Left will happily stretch “punishment” to include any minor inconvenience... 

...Yes, some women are inconvenienced in their quest for an abortion, but not so inconvenienced as to prevent abortionists from plying their deadly trade more than 700,000 times per year. No, women are not punished, and neither are their unborn children. To argue otherwise is to imply that an aborted fetus is guilty of some transgression, when in fact it’s the opposite: the innocent fetus is simply killed.

That last part is merely Jesus-gibberish, but note the similarity of "it serves a woman’s right" to "it serves a woman right" -- composition can be psychologically revealing. Their current shtick is to pretend they'd never, ever punish women who want abortions; it's just their accomplices who'd get the chair. But, as is proven by the crazy laws they've managed to pass, they'll torment women who defy them any way they can.

•     It's hard to pick a Wingnut Whine of the Week as all their weeks are whiny these days, but I'm short of time so I'll just say they're all winners/whiners and leave you with this one by Steve Berman at The Resurgent, in which he gets a load of all the youngsters going for Bernie Sanders and commences to sputter:

The word “socialism” has lost its boogeyman quality to these young people who grew up with No Child Left Behind, Hope scholarships, Obama phones, and heathcare as a right. Basically, they see daddy-nanny-government as the way things should be, and the left is happy to hand them even more goodies. 

Even Trump likes to play candyman (“nobody will die in the street”).

"Nobody will die in the street"! God, way to encourage the moochers, Donny!

....We (me being among the last of the baby boomers) have screwed them and they know it. Sanders’ appeal is just the beginning of the trend, if conservatives can’t force-feed a government grown fat and comfortable some very bitter medicine.

"Force-feed"! It's the revenge of the Down Our Throaters! Yeah, expect to see this guy with his head shaved and crying for a Golden Dawn next election cycle.