Did you see what happened in Nevada this year? It can't happen here? Can it?

It can't happen here. Can it? That's something Sinclair Lewis pondered, more than a half-century ago about the hypothetical importation of Fascism into our country. Amazon says about Lewis's novel,

A cautionary tale about the fragility of democracy, it is an alarming, eerily timeless look at how fascism could take hold in America.

Ya think?

Digby, in addition to writing about Speaker Pelosi's reluctance to initiate impeachment inquiries or proceedings, starkly reflected on history that projects a darkened reality onto what several states have done this week to further stomp out the personal sovereignty of roughly half of the population.

Notably, Alabama, Georgia, Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Dakota, and Ohio. In 2019. Several more states are poised to likewise pass laws intended to ban abortion rights, virtually or outright. But NOT Nevada.

Social media platforms are teeming with posts decrying moves by states ruled by misogynists. Thousands of people excoriate the audacity of theocratic fascists (such as the Center for Arizona Policy) who claim to be pro-life but abandon the concept once a human child takes her/his first breath.

But Digby highlighted the concept when she found Foreign Policy staff writer Amy MacKinnon's piece, What Actually Happens When a Country Bans Abortion?

Romanian orphans in a Bucharest orphanage shortly after the December Revolution in 1989. KEVIN WEAVER/GETTY IMAGES

As lawmakers in Alabama this week passed a bill that would outlaw abortion in the U.S. state entirely, protesters outside the statehouse wore blood-red robes, a nod to Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale, in which childbearing is entirely controlled by the state. Hours later, the book was trending on Twitter.

But opponents of the restrictive abortion laws currently being considered in the United States don’t need to look to fiction for admonitory examples of where these types of laws can lead. For decades, communist Romania was a real-life test case of what can happen when a country outlaws abortion entirely, and the results were devastating.

In 1966, the leader of Romania, Nicolae Ceausescu, outlawed access to abortion and contraception in a bid to boost the country’s population. In the short term, it worked, and the year after it was enacted the average number of children born to Romanian women jumped from 1.9 to 3.7. But birthrates quickly fell again as women found ways around the ban. Wealthy, urban women were sometimes able to bribe doctors to perform abortions, or they had contraceptive IUDs smuggled in from Germany.

Yet Romania’s prohibition of the procedure was disproportionately felt by low-income women and disadvantaged groups, which abortion-rights advocates in the United States fear would happen if the Alabama law came into force. As a last resort, many Romanian women turned to home and back-alley abortions, and by 1989, an estimated 10,000 women had died as a result of unsafe procedures. The real number of deaths might have been much higher, as women who sought abortions and those who helped them faced years of imprisonment if caught. Maternal mortality skyrocketed, doubling between 1965 and 1989. [...]

“For many women, sexuality represented a fear and not a part of life that can be enjoyed,” Ilisei said.

Another consequence of Romania’s abortion ban was that hundreds of thousands of children were turned over to state orphanages. When communism collapsed in Romania in 1989, an estimated 170,000 children were found warehoused in filthy orphanages. Having previously been hidden from the world, images emerged of stick-thin children, many of whom had been beaten and abused. Some were left shackled to metal bed frames.

What would be reasonable to expect if the Draconian laws just passed in so many states are allowed to go into effect?

Beside women's marches with dramatically higher participation and likely casualties? More from the Foreign Policy article,

Romania’s abortion ban was compounded by a ban on contraception, which was not mentioned in the Alabama bill. But the Trump administration took a swipe at birth control in 2017 when it allowed employers to opt out of providing it as part of employee insurance plans on the grounds of religious belief. This decision was halted by a federal judge in January of this year.

The ultimate goal IS to have SCOTUS overturn Roe v Wade.

If they succeed with that goal, there will be further turmoil.

Let's hope it doesn't come to that.

Perhaps the light at the end of the tunnel is coming from Carson City, Nevada.

Since Nevada seated the nation’s first majority-female state legislature in January [2019], the male old guard has been shaken up by the perspectives of female lawmakers. Bills prioritizing women’s health and safety have soared to the top of the agenda. Mounting reports of sexual harassment have led one male lawmaker to resign. And policy debates long dominated by men, including prison reform and gun safety, are yielding to female voices.

I'm in Arizona. Can THAT happen here? I think it can. I will celebrate when it does.

NOTE: Season 3 of The Handmaid's Tale premiers on HULU on June 5th.