BY CAROLYN WATERMAN

Oklahoma … Arizona … Virginia … What do these three states have in common? New, repressive, regressive regulation and legislation.

Oklahoma legislators hate women! This has to be said out loud. If they didn’t, they would not be passing such repressive anti-woman legislation under the guise of protecting the unborn.

Anyone with any sense can see through this legislation and see what these bills are doing. They are trying to do an end run around Roe v Wade and make abortion illegal. These legislators are too young. I am old enough to remember when abortion was illegal, and what happened to poor girls who became pregnant and needed an abortion. They were almost killed by the coat hanger abortionist in a basement of a house in our small Kansas town.

The rich girls were flown to Mexico City for a safe medical abortion by their parents. The middle class girls visited their “aunts” in Kansas City or Denver for five or six months, and put the baby up for adoption.

The legislators should put up money for birth control information to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies. Attack the cause, not the symptom.

Arizona legislators hate people who are different from them. This new legislation is more than repressive or regressive. It is the beginning of a police state. Everything in this goes against the U.S. Constitution and the ethos of our country.

I am reminded of the poem attributed to Pastor Martin Niemiller: “First they came for the Communists, and I was not a Communist … then they came for the trade unionists, but I was not a trade unionist … then they came for the Jews, and I was not a Jew …”

First they came for the Mexicans, but I am not a Mexican … then they came for …??? Fill in the blank here.

I cannot believe that I have lived long enough to see this happen in my country. I want my country back!!!

The Virginia governor belongs in the 19th Century, and is issuing edicts that pander to the Confederate mindset. There is no noble lost cause for the South to mourn. They wanted to protect slavery – their “peculiar institution” – at all costs. I have no sympathy for them. In addition he is taking away rights from other minorities which are hard won.

My husband and I were planning to return to Virginia this May to visit more historical sites, after a wonderful visit last October. We will not be going. We will not be going to Virginia until this dark night of Gov. McDonnell is over.

I will avoid even flying through Phoenix on my way to San Diego to see my sister. Sorry Southwest.

If I didn’t live in Oklahoma, I certainly wouldn’t visit. After all, I am a woman, a despised sex.

What is happening in our country? This is scary. I want my country back – the country of Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Abraham Lincoln. PLEASE!!!

– The author lives in Bethany, OK