November 18, 2004
Abortion vs Humanity
The item, Broken Nation had two strings for a reason. Economics and Family Values are inextricably linked in the real world. Decisions about which child in this world will live and which child will die before reaching adulthood are often the product of economic choices made far from where that child lives. Not everything in life comes down to economics, but a great number of human lives here and elsewhere in the world end or continue due to economic choices made within our nation.
Many choices in life should probably not be left up to the harsh science of accounting, but due to limited resources they often are. We cannot provide AIDS drugs for the whole African continent; although we can help alleviate the suffering if we fund and spend the 15 billion dollars that our President promised to make available. That a President who extends the right to life to sperm cells by dropping condom programs supported by tax dollars can’t find the funds for aid to AIDS victims is ironic, but not surprising. In spite of those who assert that we can continue to create debt equivalent to the total growth in our economy including inflation our resources are limited.
Trading debt in our society and the world today consists of buying one piece of paper with another. The buyers of our government bonds in Europe two years ago have lost value by holding those bonds because they are denominated in dollars. The EURO is worth around a dollar and a quarter today. If they had bought Euro denominated bonds two years ago instead they would have avoided the decline in their assets due to the relative decline of the value of the dollar versus the EURO. Our currency buys less food and clothes in Europe by around forty percent than it did two years ago.
Fortunately our economy has bonded with those of China and Japan and not the European Economy. We depend on the debt purchasing power of the Japanese and Chinese to keep our trade imbalances possible. Somehow in our brave new world the Godless Chinese Communists have become our friends and our Democratic European allies have become our critics. China is exporting a great deal of their production in order to obtain dollars then it is recycling those dollars back to us by buying our government bonds and our intellectual property. It is also using those dollars to buy oil and other resources to feed its growing economy.
Right now China needs our markets and those of Europe to feed its growth engine. The Chinese people are discovering consumerism and they like having goods and services available to them. They will become the greatest consumer society on earth in the next hundred years if the course they are on continues for that long. Communism will probably fail sometime during that period and be replaced by some other form of government. It already has been replaced in the minds and hearts of the Chinese people by consumerism, Chairman Mao would be astonished at what he has wrought.
It is folly to assume that we can consume more than we produce on an ever inclining scale. It is even more foolish to assume that we can fund that consumption with paper dollars not backed with production of something of value to the takers of those dollars. Right now we are exporting technology and intellectual capital to China at a stupendous rate. Within fifty years they will have the capacity to generate their own new technology at a more rapid pace than we will, if they continue to grow as rapidly as they are today. Then what will we have to sell them? Paper money is only useful when it buys something of value. We are buying much of our clothing and many of our other consumer items from China today. What will happen when we no longer have anything to sell them that they need in order to support their markets? Those answers are missing from the world view of those who pose the theory of infinitely increasing debt as a practical economic fact.
Simply because you ignore uncomfortable questions they do not disappear in the real world. The interest on our national debt could easily reach one trillion dollars by the year 2012. If long term interest rates climb above ten percent again it will reach that level. Don’t bet against that happening, your money will be needed to fund that interest payment. If we are still consuming fifty billion dollars more than we are producing each month, a number that is still rising, that will leave us in very tight pants with a really thin wallet to buy new ones. What level of debt is sustainable for our economy is a real question, not some bitter fantasy concocted to embarrass those who think that tomorrow always takes care of itself and can prove it to their own satisfaction.
As for the issue of abortion, if for the sake of argument I allow you to install a soul into each fetus at the second of conception the debate then comes down to how much our society values that soul over the rights of the woman involved. Dehumanizing that woman or ignoring her presence in the process is not going to work in the long term. Nor will dehumanizing the fetus work. We have to decide how much we are willing to suppress the rights of women in order to support the rights of fetuses, that is our inescapable dilemma. Thus far the answer to that since Roe V Wade has been that we are not as a society willing to impose those draconian suppressions proposed by some on women generally.
In point of fact we are moving toward restrictions on our civil liberties that I would not have believed we would accept twenty years ago. Perhaps we will soon have a society ready to suppress the rights of women to control their own bodies once again. Then the issue will be how much force we will bring to bear on that suppression. No matter what happens I suspect it will be as ineffectual as it had become before Roe V Wade. Laws that violate the private intimacy of the mother fetus relationship have a way of being honored in the breach. That is true even when they wind up being enforced on some unlucky women with great fanfare and much publicity. God bless and keep you safe from the harsh economic realities of the world; economics is not God’s tool, it is mans. ©Henri Reynard/GoldenBrush Interactive
Posted by Henri Reynard at November 18, 2004 10:04 AMI’m not an economist (nor do I play one on TV), but nevertheless the idea of indefinite deficit spending makes no sense to me. Someday debt comes due no matter how fast you juggle, and the folks who are telling me otherwise (usually as if I’m a fool for not grasping such a “simple” concept) are unfailingly Bush supporters.
Same goes for environment: The sky hasn’t fallen yet, therefore it never will. Terrible, terrible logic. You don’t have to read the Sierra Club newsletter to know species are disappearing rapidly, water is becoming unsafe to drink, and more children suffer from asthma and other respiratory problems than ever. So what if the end isn’t nigh? Why wait until it is before doing something about it? (No, the Clear Skies Initiative doesn’t count.)
I always thought the Republicans were supposed to be the pragmatists of us, while the Democrats were the dreamers, but it sure looks like the rose-colored glasses are on the other eyes now.
Posted by: Alejo at November 18, 2004 12:46 PMVery good article, Henri.
There is a definite link between abortion and the economy. Abortion rates fell during Clinton’s tenure of Prosperity and have risen during Bush’s Hard Times.
Henri -
While economic decisions are obviously inextricably linked with social and moral decisions on a personal level (as Adrienne points out in her comment), it frightens me that a self-proclaimed liberal would consider making moral decisions based on economic considerations. There are some non-negotiables, and human life should be the foremost of these. If you go down the road of claiming that abortion is an economic necessity, you will find yourself shortly face to face with Thomas Malthus; hardly a liberal bedfellow.
Secondly, I take issue with the idea that children in the U.S. are not living to adulthood because of economic decisions. That is assuredly true in Africa, but infant/child deaths in the U.S. are extremely low, and are generally related to accidents and difficult diseases, not lack of basic necessities. Mortal poverty is a straw man argument within the borders of the USA, and this is something that should make us proud of our success as socialists and our success as capitalists.
Lastly, your arguments on balancing the fetus’ dignity with its mother’s sound oddly reminiscent of anti-women’s-rights arguments. The logic went that a wife belonged to her husband, thus any right given her that would infringe upon her husband’s rights was unconstitutional. Your argument is similar: a fetus should only have rights insofar as they do not trespass upon those of the mother.
Personally, I believe that human dignity is equal and unmitigated by circumstance. That means that everyone has the same right to life whether they are unborn, infant, adult, terminally ill, a felon, male, female, Jewish, German, Hutu, Tutsi, etc. No one, regardless of relationship or empowered status, has the right to kill another person. If we do not recognize the universality and sanctity of life, we are no better than the Nazis, the Rwandese Hutu leadership, or the American slave traders.
Posted by: Chops at November 18, 2004 02:29 PMAdrienne
Re increased abortion rates.
The CDC and the Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI) are the most widely used sources for academic research on abortion rates. Neither has reported data beyond 2000. Some reports have incorrectly extrapolated based on incomplete and incorrect data. Your numbers are probably based on Glen Stassen from Fuller. Find more on this at http://www.heritage.org/Research/Family/wm598.cfm
Besides, the Clinton presidency coincided with pro-life laws passed in many states. By the end of the Clinton term 27 states had informed consent laws (up from essentially zero enforced laws in 1992), 12 had enacted curbs on partial birth abortions and 32 were enforcing parental notification laws. These, more than any Clinton policies, were probably the cause.
Jack,
I don’t agree with your conclusions because abortion rates were also much higher during the Reagan and Bush I years, as well. Women deciding to have their babies rather than choosing to have an abortion seems to be directly tied, among the middle and lower classes anyway, on how well that segment of country is doing economically.
But the new laws didn’t come into effect until the 1990s. The years from 1982 to 1990 were times of economic growth and prosperity. Comparable to the 1990s except for the bubble years of 1998/9. Beyond that, the unemployment rate today is better than it was from 1992-1996. So if women had abortions primarily for economic reasons, they effect would be evident in the 1980s and now.
Posted by: jack at November 18, 2004 05:30 PMChops, your definition of human life appears to be implied by your comment as a fertilized egg. That definition does not wash with liberals, and many others. Human life is not defined by cells containing human DNA. Think about it.
Posted by: David R. Remer at November 18, 2004 07:44 PMI don’t know, whenever I contemplate the liberal view of humanity I get a little scared. Are you sure abortion isn’t more of a sacrament than it is a human right? I mean why else would we need to seek out new and inventive rationalizations as to why it is not only right but preferable to an economic and environmental apocolypse?
This seems to be where all liberal arguments are headed. The world is ending unless you adopt the progressive ideology.
As for the impending economic catastrophe:
“It is folly to assume that we can consume more than we produce on an ever inclining scale.”
Really? As if what we consume is atomized and removed from the universe?
With such logic you might as well ask how it can keep raining. There’s only so much water in the clouds after all. It can’t last forever, one day it will no longer rain.
Posted by: ericsimonson at November 18, 2004 08:38 PMEric.
When it rains the sky is not falling. Entropy is an interesting fact of life when it comes to nonrenewable fuel which is the primary energy input to our consumer society. Try burning oil twice, the products of combustion don’t yield energy like the input fuels.
I don’t think abortion is a right or the right solution for unwanted pregnancies for that matter. I just prefer it to the supression of women that inevitably occurs when it is outlawed.
Society has many means of disaproval other than outlawing behavior. Disapproving of abortion is different than accepting or denying that it is a good solution to unwanted children.
I disapprove of abortion but I disapprove of an unlimited right to supress women’s right to manage their own body by the government even more.
Cheap oil is getting harder to find as is cheap natural gas. The volume used is climbing substantially faster than the volume being found is increasing. This fact taken together with our increasing debt levels presages problems, not necessarily disasters. It is our current unwillingness to examine this problem that will create disasters if they occur.
Rain is inextricably connected to the volume of water that is available from the absorbtion of water into the atmosphere from the oceans. No one knows what will happen to rainfall patterns when the Carbon Dioxide levels of the atmosphere double again in the next one hundred years or less. if they change materially it will bring famines to some nations and serious problems with economic models we live by today in others.
Henri Reynard
Really? As if what we consume is atomized and removed from the universe?
LOL!!! So you’re suggesting we hold a garage sale?!!
Excellent article, Henri. I too find it interesting that we’re in such deep debt to the Democratic People’s Republic of China.
I’ve heard some economists talk about China flooding the market with dollars as a means of economic warfare. Everytime the Bush administration smacks down democratic Taiwan’s attempt at freedom and independence from communist China, I think about that.
Eric:
Really? As if what we consume is atomized and removed from the universe?With such logic you might as well ask how it can keep raining. There’s only so much water in the clouds after all. It can’t last forever, one day it will no longer rain.
And you say liberal thinking is scary. Tell you what, Eric: Points for understanding the concept of conservation of mass, but if you can find a way to glean energy and food from mercury, PCB’s, dioxin, and carbon monoxide you deserve to be crowned King of the World.
Posted by: Alejo at November 19, 2004 08:12 AMDavid -
You said:
Your definition of human life appears to be implied by your comment as a fertilized egg.
My opinion is beside the point. I was following Henri’s logic, which he began by saying:
If for the sake of argument I allow you to install a soul into each fetus at the second of conception the debate then comes down to how much our society values that soul over the rights of the woman involved.
My argument is that IF you make this assumption, as he has, then abortion is intolerable and murderous. To me, the issue of when life begins is the fundamental issue at stake. If human life is present in a fetus at a given stage of development, then that fetus is constitutionally protected, and the fetus’ right to life trumps his or her mother’s right to privacy.
Deciding when life begins is, no doubt, a thorny ethical-cum-scientific argument. However, in a few cases, such as partial-birth and third-trimester abortion, it is clear that the only difference between the unborn and born baby is location, which is a dubious distinction. Liberals lose credibility when they defend every kind of abortion at every stage. Such defense makes it clear that this is an ideological, and not an ethical or scientific issue for them, putting them at the same status as religious opponents to abortion.
Posted by: Chops at November 19, 2004 09:42 AMi am wondering where the womans right to her body is when she decides not to take PREVENTIVE measures against pregnancy. oh sure, there are the rapes, and the incests, and the failed birth control. the numbers aren’t matching up yet.there aren’t as many rapes, incests, and failed birth controls as there are abortions. oh, i think that there should be legal abortions, because some women just shouldn’t be mothers. i just think that the arguments for them are rather stupid. a womans right to her body, my right to my body, dictates that i am not going to get pregnant in the first place. even if it means that i am going to occasionally deny my carnal urges with the opposite sex.
Posted by: dayzee at November 19, 2004 10:41 AMChops,
Good job sticking with premises. I love it when people often forget some of the premises they begin with. I would absolutely agree with you. Our problem here is a dissention among the masses about when a fetus becomes a human. I have written on this in previous posts. I emplore you to read my comments about half way down on the blog as they relate almost EXACTLY to this topic.
Liberals lose credibility when they defend every kind of abortion at every stage
Now Chops, I’m a liberal and I don’t advocate reckless abortions at every stage of development. I don’t think I would be presumptuous in saying that most people think there are certainly extenuating circumstances (like where the life of the mother is jeopardy) to advocate late term abortions. However, I doubt most people, except the fringe socialist extremeists (and they do exist), think it is acceptable for a person to make a rash decision to abort a fetus once it becomes a viable human being (and I even advocate this position in areas of rape and incest; meaning if someone is raped or is forced to commit incest they should abort the child BEFORE the third trimester).
I guess I just don’t understand why we can’t just let the woman decide what she wants to do with the “pre life” (as I see it) being growing inside her body. If a woman is morally opposed to abortion, there are other options. However, if there is a God, than the woman’s choice to abort a fetus that she does not view as being a living creature is something that only she will have to answer to on that day of reckoning (boy, never thought I’d be iterating THOSE sentiments as a point for argument…he he).
Posted by: Nick at November 19, 2004 01:55 PMNick -
Thanks for the compliment, and for keeping the debate civil.
I agree that “most people” don’t like partial-birth and third-term abortions. However, when the partial-birth abortion ban came up in the national debate last year, the self-proclaimed advocates and defenders of abortion flocked to the cause and fought for every inch of ground. Now, part of this may simply be that they fear a “slippery slope”. But there is a definite sense that any infringement whatsoever on abortion is heretical and unconstitutional.
If the pro-abortion left (Naral, Emily’s List, etc.) wants their opponents to consider them rational and worth negotiating with, they need to moderate their views with respect to the dignity of the fetus. Personally, I don’t think this is possible. Unfortunate, perhaps, but admitting that a fetus may have dignity is the most dangerous “slippery slope” in existence for the pro-abortion left, because the premise of fetus dignity, however limited, leads inexorably toward its equal protection under law.
Finally, you said:
I just don’t understand why we can’t just let the woman decide what she wants to do with the “pre life” (as I see it) being growing inside her body.
Given our assumption (that a fetus has a soul, or is in some other measure human), this statement is tantamount to saying that murder is between the murderer and God. Certainly, the murderer will have to account to his Maker when he meets him, but for our own safety and conscience we punish crime temporally. If we accept humanity of a fetus at any stage, we are obliged - ethically and constitutionally - to extend protection to that pre-born human. Posted by: Chops at November 19, 2004 02:28 PM
Henri,
My point is that Malthus and every wannabe Malthus has gotten it wrong for the last two hundred years.
We are not being faced with the danger of over consumption via overpopulation. It is a sad sad myth. Tying abortion to overconsumption borders on a tacit endorsement of euthanasia. There is a lineage of ideas here that I am not sure everyone is aware of—eugenics, darwinism, abortion, euthanasia.
Malthus was a political economist who was concerned about, what he saw as, the decline of living conditions in nineteenth century England. He blamed this decline on three elements: The overproduction of young; the inability of resources to keep up with the rising human population; and the irresponsibility of the lower classes. To combat this, Malthus suggested the family size of the lower class ought to be regulated such that poor families do not produce more children than they can support. Does this sound familiar? China has implemented a policy of one child per family (though this applies to all families, not just those of the lower class). malthus
The major error here is that we cannot find new sources of energy or more efficient uses as we have in farming. Malthus made predictions about how many human beings could exist at any one time based on how much food was produced in his time. Obviously, we have improved farm production to the point that less than 1% of our population feeds the 99%+, whereas in Malthus’ time 99% of the population struggled to feed 100%.
Excellent article Henri.
I am not an economist, but I wonder: as Chinese consumers begin to out consume us, and there is a huge potential market there, will American consumers/workers become irrelevant. (I am not proposing that we all “go shopping” btw.)
On abortion:
“pro-abortion left”
I think it is safe to say that no one is “pro-abortion.” It is actually a women’s choice/some choice/no choice debate—hateful labels are unproductive.
Viability is probably the dividing line for many. Yet, banning late-term medical procedures without regard for the mother’s life or health is deciding that no matter what the unborn outweighs the living. The mother is expendable?
From reading the above posts, it is clear to me that there are different viewpoints on when a fetus becomes a life, but no one disputes that it happens at some point in the womb. That’s to say that no one would support a mother’s choice to abort a healthy 8 mth/ 30 day old fetus. There can be times when the health of the mother comes into play, and in these situations the question becomes WHICH life to risk—this is really a different moral/ethical decision.
As Chops put it, when that fetus becomes a life (you decide when that is for you), then ending that life is tantamount to killing a child.
What amazes me, in context of this thread, is the position John Kerry has taken on abortion. His position is that the fetus has life at conception, yet he accepts a woman who kills that life. This is illogical to me. It would be similar to standing idly by watching someone kill another person, while maintaining that its none of your business.
Are there people out there, who support the freedom of choice in abortion, who want the mother to have FULLY free choice at ALL times during the pregnancy? If so, I’d be interested in how they justify the later term abortions outside of health issues.
Posted by: joebagodonuts at November 20, 2004 07:58 AMI think most liberals would agree that late term abortions must be restricted to issues of a mother’s health. Let’s be rational here, if the issue is a mother’s health, it is a heart wretching decision that the government should not be in the midst of. After carrying a child that long, a mother is not usually looking to heartlessly abort the child. There is usually a lot that goes into that decision. I don’t know the statistics, but I just can’t see women being that heartless! This may be the area where we can show Americans we aren’t murderers, but compassionate people that care about both the mothers and their pre-born viable babies by restricting third term abortions to cases where a mother’s life is at risk.
Before the viable point, how can anyone force a woman to give birth to a child they do not want? Although I agree there are ways to prevent pregnancies, the means to accomplish this are not always available to the groups that choose abortions the most. Let’s say for instance abortions are banned. It is the very group without the proper education and means to prevent pregnancies that will suffer the most. Those with means will find ways of obtaining their abortions (heaven forbid their Ivy League friends find out they have a child). The rest will simply perpetuate the cycle of poverty. Raising unwanted and probably unloved children, that will grow into problems for the very society that protected their birth.
Maybe what needs to happen is a limit on the number of abortions before you are by law “fixed”. Talk about pissing people off! But for the sake of life, don’t punish a child to a life with a mother who never wanted them in the first place.
Posted by: Odaly at November 20, 2004 08:56 PMChops:
Secondly, I take issue with the idea that children in the U.S. are not living to adulthood because of economic decisions. … Mortal poverty is a straw man argument within the borders of the USA, and this is something that should make us proud of our success as socialists and our success as capitalists.
What rose colored glasses are you wearing? You must not live in an urban area or one in the Rust Belt for that matter. Newsflash to you, Sir, children die of starvation in the US every day.
The argument of mortal poverty as a straw man…
You obviously don’t know any better.
Ha, the republicans should have reconsidered the MORAL Poverty of their own. They can’t kill a fetus but they can murder 15,000 people. They bear false witness throughout the campaign, yet called Kerry a liar. And let’s not even get into the “Least of These” argument…where a fetus is more important than the hundreds of thousands of children who go to bed hungry, who are homeless, who are in foster care because nobody wanted them.
That, Sir, is the MORAL Poverty of this country.
Half of my neighborhood’s houses are abandoned. 800 more jobs will be outsourced from our area before January. When two families have to live in a house that’s made for one because they can’t afford otherwise, that Sir, is the reality of the Rust Belt. Sure, those of us in Blue states take opposition to Red Rural states when a fetus matters more than those who are living.
Bush doesn’t want to do anything about Abortion. He had a chance to overturn Roe V. Wade, but chose to go to war to vicariously relive the one his daddy got him out of in Vietnam. He had a Republican Senate, House and Court, he could have staged a coup on abortion, but he didn’t. Why? Because the truth is, politicians don’t care about abortion, just all the votes it generates. If Roe V. Wade was overturned today, although I’m a Pro-Choice woman, I would be glad that at least the Right wouldn’t have the dumpsters full of dead fetuses left to stand on!
Posted by: Mae at November 21, 2004 07:50 PMMae -
I challenge you to show me one example of a child dying of starvation in the last year in the United States. I’m not saying there’s no poverty, but empty houses - and even empty bellies - does not mean *mortal* poverty.
Mae and Chops
Statistics of children dying of hunger or improper health care may be hard to come by. For one thing, this isn’t truely a problem of the very poor, for they do have public assistance. It is instead a problem of the illegal aliens who can not get the assistance (say what you want, but they do the sh*t work we don’t want to do!) and the lower middle class who (on paper) make too much sometimes for the assistance.
It is a real problem that I think is impossible to measure—right here in our own backyard.
First of all, I’m not sure if any of you have had any experience with abortion but it is not a “simple operation” as Hemingway writes in his poem, “Hills Like White Elephants.” Does anyone ever consider what the woman has to go through for the rest of her life after having an abortion? It doesn’t matter what any of us think, the “truth” is that a life was lost. A life that, no matter how miserable a childhood, could have been wonderful.
Mar
Posted by: Mar at November 23, 2004 12:19 AM
