Democrats & Liberals: Archives

Bert- these are three of the easiest responses for me, so I can resist:

1. there is absolutely completely no contradiction between supporting the death penalty and opposing abortion. The death penalty is a punishment of a guilty person for something he did. Abortion is the killing of a little child for doing nothing more than being inconvinent to a woman. How can that possibly be a contradiction? I think the bigger contradiction is thinking that those who take human lives should have a right to life, while unborn children, who have done nothing to harm anyone, should be killed for any reason whatsoever. (Note, I am not for or against the Death Penalty- there is nothing morally wrong with it, but I dont see what good it does. As of now, our legal system is probably too flawed for the death penalty to continue, but someone like Osama or Saddam should be put to death when there is little to no doubt of their guilt).

2. Also, I ask you to point me to one Republican elected in Congress (or in the executive) that says abortion should be banned when the life of the mother is at stake. Please provide exact quotes from them supporting this position. I would love to see it.

3. Your point implying that most support for banning abortion comes from men is just factually incorrect. As I have pointed out numerous times on this board, support for and against abortion is equal among the genders. In fact, a group of MALES started the modern pro-abortion movement. For the poll data to prove my point, you can see this link- http://www.coaauw.org/boulder-oldsite/aauwb_center_for_gender_equality.html. For more interesting polling data on abortion go here- http://www.pollingreport.com/abortion.htm.

You can do your own indepedent research, but I assure you that almost every poll you find will show about an equal division between pro and anti abortion people between the genders- and with good reason. Whether or not you believe an unborn child is a human being depends on your thinking and logic, not on your gender.

I believe one of the points that Bert was making is that if all life is sacrosanct, then those who profess to be pro-life should also oppose capital punishment. That’s the stance the Catholic church maintains.

I guess so- but many pro-life people are not catholic at all. In fact, a lot of people who identify as catholic support abortion….

Misha,

You’ve made assumptions about my views, and have taken inferences from my merely posing a question. Again, as I state in my first paragraph, I am not firm on my stance, however, I appreciate your detailed response.

1. If pressed, I’d have to say I’m pro-choice and for the Death Penalty. However, my perception of a stated sense of contradictions about pro-lifers, is because I would expect the same ‘purity and sanctity’ rhetoric applied to the Death Penalty, at least, occasionally.

2. Nowhere in my piece do I state any Republican elected official has publicly endorsed a ban on rape, incest, etc type abortions. In fact, I do not cite any such individual, by name.

3. I actually state my impression that the leading figures of the pro-choice movement are all White Males. Therefore, your accurate data is appreciated, but not necessary.

Many ardent pro-lifers tend to be anti-birth control. That is hypocritical, because better birth control would help reduce the number of abortions.

I love the defense Christian Pro-Lifers offer when one asks if a mother should be held accountable for a spontaneous abortion. They say, of course not, that is an act of god. If god has the will and power to intervene and determine which fertilized eggs are brought to term and which are aborted, what side of the fence does God sit on?

Additionally, if God intervenes in spontaneous abortions, does he not intervene in all other matters of human affairs - after all we thank God that the 9/11 losses were not more devastating. And if so, is not a mother’s choice to abort divinely inspired as well. Perhaps she is just doing God’s will, eh?

From where does one acquire one’s view of human supremacy over all other creatures on this earth? The answer to that often determines one’s position on abortion. With cannibalism taking place in the DR Congo, and attempted genocide of the Pygmies, can morality stem from divine intervention, or does it stem from the human mind’s capability to be so much more, and so much less, than other creatures on earth?

It’s a complicated question, the affairs of humans are complicated, the decisions we are called upon to make individually and collectively are complicated. Who is to say we have decided well or not on Roe V. Wade? I say it is too complicated an issue for the collective to make for an individual, and too complicated for a small group to make for the collective society. Roe V. Wade implies this rationale, and thus I agree with Roe V. Wade as the best possible answer to an immensely complicated issue.

David:

I expect more from you than that silly argument. There are those in the WB from whom I expect such arguments (I’m so very tempted to name them, but I won’t—they probably wouldnt understand anyway—ha ha), but not from you.

You obviously didnt take much time in your post to consider the concept of “free will”, which is what God gives mankind. That means that we don’t always follow his will—it means we have the freedom to make choices that are not in our best interest, to choose the wrong path, to say or do the wrong things. We also have the freedom to choose the Right path, though its very hard to do consistently in all areas.

For you to suppose that perhaps the act of killing an innocent person is in keeping with God’s will is simply not well thought out. All you need to do is to read what God has to say about it for you to understand that.

I can respectfully disagree with you if you choose not to believe in God, or to not believe in God as I see him. But for you to simply make foolish and unsustainable arguments is not like you. I look forward to better posts from you.

Misha wrote:
The death penalty is a punishment of a guilty person for something he did. Abortion is the killing of a little child for doing nothing more than being inconvinent to a woman.

So its morally acceptable to kill a fully grown person, but not okay for a woman to make a decision to terminate a bundle of multiplying cells that can fit into a petri dish. Perhaps cancer should be next - after all its part of living person and it also multiplies.
I suppose it is also okay that the death penalty is sometimes punishment for something the person DID NOT DO.

Misha:
How can that possibly be a contradiction? I think the bigger contradiction is thinking that those who take human lives should have a right to life, while unborn children, who have done nothing to harm anyone, should be killed for any reason whatsoever.

And who exactly do you think becomes a killer who might deserve the death penalty? Look at the majority of those in prison - the overwhelming percentage come from a background where they were: extremely poor, lacked parental guidance and care, and lived in communties who didn’t have the resources to deal with problems such as drug and alcohol addiction, gangs, or child abuse and neglect.
Conservatives don’t believe in funding social programs to deal with such issues, but they think its all right to make mandates about a womans personal decision over being a mother - even when she doesn’t want to, or can’t afford to raise a child properly.

Misha:
support for and against abortion is equal among the genders. In fact, a group of MALES started the modern pro-abortion movement.

Perhaps this is because some men realize that the government has no right to tell women what they can and can not do with their bodies.

Misha wrote:
Whether or not you believe an unborn child is a human being depends on your thinking and logic, not on your gender.

This is a simple question of liberty. The constitution guarantees us the separation of church and state. When government officials start interferring in an American womans freedom and privacy by trying to enact legislation based on their own personal religious beliefs, then they are unfit to serve America.

> In fact, a group of MALES started the
> modern pro-abortion movement.

I agree with your point that a person’s gender ought not to add or subtract credibility to one’s opinion on abortion, but I would add that men comprise most of the leadership of most of today’s anti-abortion movement, too. The irony of the photograph on this page is striking.

-Cf

Hey Bert!
I wonder how many more jobs we would have needed over the last 40 years, if we hadn’t given people the right to be judge/jury/and pro-choice? Do you think we took care of unemployment too? The “little ones”, which is the meaning of fetus, probably don’t really care, since there with their Creator now. But I wonder about the mental and emotional scars that never heal, regardless of years gone by. Not just on a women, or the dad, but with the whole family - the Grams and Gramps all the way down to the smallest person that eventually finds out that mom got rid of the other ” little one” before me! I know, outa sit outa mind - Ping

Hey Bert!
I wonder how many more jobs we would have needed over the last 40 years, if we hadn’t given people the right to be judge/jury/and pro-choice? Do you think we took care of unemployment too? The “little ones”, which is the meaning of fetus, probably don’t really care, since there with their Creator now. But I wonder about the mental and emotional scars that never heal, regardless of years gone by. Not just on a women, or the dad, but with the whole family - the Grams and Gramps all the way down to the smallest person that eventually finds out that mom got rid of the other ” little one” before me! I know, outa site, outa mind - Ping

i have discussed this issue with misha before, and i will reiterate:

having been with a woman who while we were in relations got pregnant and decided to abort her child, it is a tremendously hard thing to go through…

this is never an easy issue…its a dangerous medical procedure, and it is painful emotionally for everyone involved…

yet you people make it sound like those that are pro-choice are pushing people into clinics, young girls are getting pregnant just to go have an abortion cuz killin is fun!

please….that is a heartless attempt to demonize a young woman and her right to make a VERY TOUGH CHOICE.

are there those that abuse the right to abortion, yes obviously….

but those of us who have been through the experience can tell you it is painful, and regretful, yet both the woman i was with (who is now a very close friend) and myself both agree it would have been a much greater mistake to keep the child when we were both totally unprepared for the responsibility.

and, the emotional wounds do heal….

until you walk in their shoes….lets keep the judgements to ourselves ok? at least try?

Rob, while I respect your opinion, I dont think your argument is the slam-dunk you think it is. Or even close. For example, say we took Peter Singer’s advice and made “abortion” or whatever you want to call it legal until the child was 6 months old (that is, 6 month after the child was born). I am sure the decision to end the life of a kid who is 3 months old would be incredibly painful and a VERY difficult decision- as difficult as the one you and your loved one had to face- but that wouldnt mean that we shouldnt stand up and call infantacide infantacide. I should hope that if such a practice was going on whole-sale in this nation, you would not ‘keep the judgments to ourselves.’

Of course, the pro-abortion people here will counter that somehow the unborn child is completely different from the born child (making that silly clump-of-cells argument that was made above; or making a straw man argument like Adrienne did, who cant possibly understand that someone who is unreligious like myself can still think that an unborn child deserves all of the protections our country is SUPPOSED to afford all people under the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, even if those people are incovinient for a group of women)- but then we are back at square 1, talking about whose conception of when life begins is right. And in that discussion, no one should keep their judgements to themselves.

promise keepers is a male xian group, build to instill xian values into men. So there is nothing hypocritical about them being predominantly male. that would be like worrying that NOW is predominantly female. I am not a member or anything, just pointing this out.

Misha wrote:
Of course, the pro-abortion people here will counter that somehow the unborn child is completely different from the born child (making that silly clump-of-cells argument that was made above; or making a straw man argument like Adrienne did, who cant possibly understand that someone who is unreligious like myself can still think that an unborn child deserves all of the protections our country is SUPPOSED to afford all people under the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, even if those people are incovinient for a group of women)- but then we are back at square 1, talking about whose conception of when life begins is right. And in that discussion, no one should keep their judgements to themselves.

You’re absolutely right, I am pro-abortion, although I happen to think that an abortion shouldn’t be done after the first trimester - unless it endangers a womans life.
I hope women never have to go back to the days where a scared young girl or woman has to go into a bad part of town to some filthy guy wielding a coat hanger in order to terminate a pregnancy and sometimes lose her life.
You can get all up on your horse about when life begins regarding a bundle of cells with the potential for life (which is what we speak of during the first trimester - whether you think its “silly” or not) and the fourteenth amendment (which was never intended to apply to people incapable of living outside the womb and was in fact ratified in 1868 - when giving birth often meant death to the woman and/or child), but you must understand that if Roe vs Wade is overturned and the government denies a woman a safe proceedure done in a medical setting you will see coat hanger abortions and the death of young women return as a result.

But then, those who see no moral dilemma over the death penalty probably wouldn’t really care about those young women would they? I could imagine some would say they actually deserved to die, or be incapable afterward of having a child they truly wanted later in their lives. (BTW, don’t think I didn’t notice how you moved straight on the abortion debate rather than address any of what I said regarding the moral muddle of supporting the death penalty while opposing abortion.)

I’ll only add this, if Roe vs Wade is overturned you will see a whole army of women who will protest and fight strenuously to reinstate the law - because collectively we have no intention of going backward - in fact, we would like to go forward as Europe has by making the morning-after pill an inexpensive, over-the-counter alternative to the difficult and painful decision of choosing abortion.
But true to form, pressure from the conservative religious right has so far helped to block this alternative in our country. They won’t be happy until the separation of church and state is only a foggy memory from the past.

1. So let me get this straight- the 14th amendment wasn’t written with unborn children in mind- so it does not apply to them. Yet, Roe v. Wade, which is based on a reading of the 14th amendment is a good decision, even though there is absolutely not one shred of evidence that anyone who voted for the 14th amendment would have believed that it would require allowing on-demand abortions for any reason. Is there even any attempt at consistency?

2. What Roe v. Wade says is that based on some strange, un-historical, un-principled reading of the constitution, the people are not allowed to protect unborn children. It attempts to make some strange distinction based on trimesters, which has absolutely not basis in science, moral reasoning or anything else. If Roe were overturned, we would not have abortions outlawed, it would mean that the American people would get to decide if we will treat unborn children with the respect all human beings are due, or with the careless disregard that we have been treating them with in the last 25 years.

3. We currently have 1.3 million abortions done in this country today. While the couple of thousand coat hanger abortions you point to are an ugly picture to paint, when you compare the 1.3 million unborn children that are killed currently, 98% of them when the mother’s life is not threatened and there is no case of rape, the hideous effects of the pro-abort movement are clear to see. Also, more women TODAY die from abortion than died during the coat hanger days (this is so because while today’s abortions are safer than the coat hanger ones, there are so many more abortions today that the net total deaths from abortion are higher).

4. What exactly do you want me to address about the death penalty, since you think I skipped over it in some way? My opinion is that, in principle, if the person kills multiple people, there is nothing wrong with putting them to death. That does not mean I support the death penalty- I am agonistic about it. I think that in the case of someone like Osama its probably a good idea, but if we lock a regular murderer up in prison for life, thats a perfectly fine option as well. Thats why I said before- what exactly did I miss?

Misha wrote:

So let me get this straight- the 14th amendment wasn’t written with unborn children in mind- so it does not apply to them. Yet, Roe v. Wade, which is based on a reading of the 14th amendment is a good decision, even though there is absolutely not one shred of evidence that anyone who voted for the 14th amendment would have believed that it would require allowing on-demand abortions for any reason. Is there even any attempt at consistency?

The Supreme Court decided Roe vs Wade - obviously they saw nothing inconsistent about using the fourteenth amendment in their ruling on the case. Thanks to that ruling it is a womans legal right to have an abortion, and whether you approve of it or not, women now have autonomy over their own bodies regarding reproduction.

Misha:
What Roe v. Wade says is that based on some strange, un-historical, un-principled reading of the constitution, the people are not allowed to protect unborn children. It attempts to make some strange distinction based on trimesters, which has absolutely not basis in science, moral reasoning or anything else.

All amendments to the constitution were based on strange, unhistorical events - that is why they are _amendments_.
Based on science an abortion in the first trimester is not immoral.
Based on moral reasoning it is not immoral for a woman to choose not to have a child _that she doesn’t want_. It is immoral, however, to have unwanted children suffer because of neglect, poverty or abuse.

Misha:
If Roe were overturned, we would not have abortions outlawed, it would mean that the American people would get to decide if we will treat unborn children with the respect all human beings are due, or with the careless disregard that we have been treating them with in the last 25 years.

There are fewer children neglected or treated with careless disregard due to abortion being legal. This is especially true now that the majority of women must work full time in order to support themselves and their families.

I will not bother to reply to your opinions or statistics regarding coat hanger abortions vs abortions done currently. The truth is, there are no reliable death statistics from the past because abortions done then were not only illegal, but considered shameful to the woman and her family. Hopefully we will never have to return to those backward days of the past.
You said nothing about the morning after pill and its being blocked by the religious right as an alternative to abortion… don’t want to touch that one, eh?

Misha:
What exactly do you want me to address about the death penalty, since you think I skipped over it in some way? My opinion is that, in principle, if the person kills multiple people, there is nothing wrong with putting them to death.

So that two Wrongs can make a Right? I don’t buy that.

Misha:
That does not mean I support the death penalty- I am agonistic about it.

I think that the death penalty is morally wrong. And since it has been shown that it is not a deterrent to crime, I believe it shows that our society is not as evolved and civilized we like to think it is, or as it should be.

This is all I will say on these subjects - obviously we must agree to disagree, for I am not one who enjoys beating my head against a brick wall.

Adrienne:

This blog is designed to have logical responses to comments, though some are just barely remotely logical. Please try to meet that requirement.

You accuse Misha of arguing that two wrongs make a right….but that is only because you conclude that the death penalty is a wrong. Misha of course does NOT consider it a wrong.

I also have no strong moral objection to putting a proven killer to death as a means of punishment. I dont believe that punishment is wrong, though I understand those who feel certain degrees of punishment are wrong. I’m actually a bit against the death penalty because of the flaws in how it is enforced and administered, but I have no moral qualms about using it as a “punishment” for a guilty person. I dont have a problem with you having a moral objection to it, though. If you prefer to have certain criminals locked away for life with no parole, I’m not against that as a replacement for the death penalty. Some people think that’s actually a harsher penalty.

I also understand your position on abortion, which seems to be that a “fetus” is not a human being, but rather a bunch of cells, during the first trimester. I disagree with this opinion though.

The problem I DO have with this position is that science will change this position. It used to be that a 7 month preemie was as good as dead, but now science allows regularly for these children to live. The time will come that a 2 month “bundle of cells” will be able to live outside the womb (for that matter, Louise Brown never was IN a womb). I choose to NOT let science dictate my moral thinking.

Joebagonuts wrote:
Adrienne:

This blog is designed to have logical responses to comments, though some are just barely remotely logical. Please try to meet that requirement.

This blog is about news and _ opinion_ .
I gave my opinion to Misha and I felt I did so in a logical manner. Since that is the case, I don’t feel the need to apologize for failing to meet your own personal requirement for logical responses. :)
And since I’ve already said all I wanted to say on these subjects, I’ll just repeat what I said to Misha: Let us agree to disagree.

Also, more women TODAY die from abortion than died during the coat hanger days

You’re gonna need to cite something for this claim if you have any hope of convincing me - it’s just too far out there.

for that matter, Louise Brown never was IN a womb

:) Well, she wasn’t conceived in a womb, but she did spend most of the next 9 months in one.

Adrienne:

Please start playing with the <blockquote> tags. They’ll make your comments much easier to read.

The DNC played a video at the convention Monday night depicting John Kerry’s advocacy on behalf of a baseball little league made up of children with Down Syndrome and their struggle for equal rights in forming a league.

I find this pandering more than mildly hypocritical in light of the Democratic Party’s proabortion stance. The party’s stance on abortion has led to babies identified with Down Syndrome, deafness, cleft palate — you name it — being aborted because of their birth defects. And this trend is increasing. Check recent NY Times articles profiling parents who have aborted babies in the womb for lesser reasons than the list I’ve written. Two Sundays ago, the Times Magazine essay regarded a women who was found to have triplets and aborted two of the three babies because she and her live-in boyfriend coudn’t afford the time or money to take care of three.

For those of you who are pro”choice” this is what your position hath wrought. We won’t need stem cell research — if we can figure out all defects, diseases and other problems ahead of time, we can abort all the undesirables. Sounds like a holocaust to me.