Nutjobs Ranting About Politics.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Critics charge, not without reason, that this policy (such as it is) is really an electoral formula, grounded neither in science nor in theology.

So, it's the Right's version of global warming?

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Since you apparently were out when we had this debate, it's a bit more complex than that.

You get stem cells only from unused embryos. There are plenty of those lying around in freezers because someone had the kids the first time around, and doesn't have a use for a fertilized embryo.

The apparent objection of the religious right is a) those embryos are people, and therefore should spend the rest of eternity (or until the power goes off) in a state of extreme cold, rather than being harvested for use in fixing wonk's heart and b) if you take those embryos, lots and lots of sluts will start fucking to create more embryos for stem cell research, which is also a bad thing.

It's a fairly tenuous position, but (club perhaps) did explain that at least it's morally consistent with a position that human life should be protected from conception. Protection in a freezer is better than nothing, apparently.

Or it would be if it weren't for health laws that allow for the disposal of the embryos after a certain period of time. Better to throw potential life into the dumpster than use it to save life extant.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by sgtclub
If you go back to the article, the Williams is not arguing for zero taxes. Many of the items you cite (military hardware, roads, etc.) I would bet he would say are proper uses for taxes. What he is arguing against redistribution (i.e., taking from one and giving to another) of wealth because he believes it is legalized stealing.



I've head this argument made many times before. Frankly, I'd rather have the money go to more police to protect me from these folks than give in to blackmail.

Actually, his article is arguing for zero taxes. He says that all redistribution through governmental coercion is morally the equivalent of slavery. He makes no distinction or allowance for taxes for one versus another. His argument is in blak or white and holds together with all the logical force of a five-year old.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by taxwonk
Or it would be if it weren't for health laws that allow for the disposal of the embryos after a certain period of time. Better to throw potential life into the dumpster than use it to save life extant.

Making the position all the more tenuous--the assumption that the religious right's argument necessarily makes on this one is that the embryos will forever be preserved as potential lives.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by taxwonk
On the basis of the stem cell issue alone, I think Bush is evil epitomized, and [that any man who is willing to put my life and the lives of millions of people at risk in order to curry favor with a small but vocal voting bloc deserves to find himself the victim of the sort of poetic justice that would result from him being in the position one day of having his life dependent upon a cure that won't be found in his lifetime for a disease that could have been treated with the appropriate measure of stem cell research.]

edited by RT to reflect amendment

I suddenly find that this is no longer the place to discuss politics.

Hasta.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by taxwonk


edited by RT to reflect amendment

Is this serious? WTF?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by taxwonk

In either case, someone, either Bush or me, is making a choice of one life over another. Except that we already know I'm a living breathing human being, and these eggs will never be a living breathing human.

It's not a matter of me selfishly choosing my life over another's any more than the decsion not to allow stem cell production is a choice to sacrifice my life to prevent the loss of a cystoblast which might under other circumstances become a person. Either way, people are choosing who will live and who will die. Nobody can claim the moral ground on that question.

Actually, you just did, and your moral argument is irrefutable. That you are alive, breathing and may benefit from the use of a technology which will harm no one but a frozen piece of tissue which will never be alive makes the decision to preclude such research immoral.* To allow the living to suffer to placate the religious views of some cedes the moral ground. Its repulsive.

I have said it before and I reiterate - the stupidest man in the room, or the man with the least valid opinion, is always the first to use the "slippery slope" argument. The stem cell debate is no debate at all. You are morally obligated to help the living. To value future moral concerns of people who should be minding their own business over a living person is indefensible.

*Its also illogical and practically absurd, but those have never been bases for the govt doing or not doing anything in the past.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I have said it before and I reiterate - the stupidest man in the room, or the man with the least valid opinion, is always the first to use the "slippery slope" argument.

Sure, but the principal reason--you're "killing" potential humans--isn't a slippery slope. You're already at that moral position, and simply defending it in new ways.

So, I think the homily you're looking for is
"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds".

[Aloha Mr. Learned Hand]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Is this serious? WTF?

Discussing politics is one thing. Posting comments which can be interpreted as personally threatening to the POTUS (a federal offense) is quite another. We have to have some rules here, don't we?

[sgtclub]

Originally posted by taxwonk
Actually, his article is arguing for zero taxes. He says that all redistribution through governmental coercion is morally the equivalent of slavery. He makes no distinction or allowance for taxes for one versus another. His argument is in blak or white and holds together with all the logical force of a five-year old.

Sorry, this was in part II, which I didn't post:

Several letters of disagreement interpreted my argument as being against taxation. They used the sleight-of-hand approach saying that we need taxation for national defense, the courts and other constitutionally authorized purposes as if that observation meant that taxation for any other purpose was just as legitimate. Let me be explicit. Taxes to finance certain federal activities are indeed legitimate as well as constitutional.

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/w...20040817.shtml

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by sgtclub
If you go back to the article, the Williams is not arguing for zero taxes. Many of the items you cite (military hardware, roads, etc.) I would bet he would say are proper uses for taxes. What he is arguing against redistribution (i.e., taking from one and giving to another) of wealth because he believes it is legalized stealing.

OK, I went back to the article. The best argument I think you could muster for Williams' grudging support of taking a dollar from his cold, dead hands to build a road or raise an army is that he doesn't call those things out in particular for his wrath.

All else in his article speaks with the fervor of the converted, and I see his reasoning and his rhetoric creating precious little daylight for any justification for government's "theft."

I've head this argument made many times before. Frankly, I'd rather have the money go to more police to protect me from these folks than give in to blackmail.

I do remember those arguments. I still think you'd be happiest in your secured mountain villa.

Personally, I think you should try out this one. It's remote, so you're relatively insulated from the proletariat, and the best part is that the tastefully placed surrounding foliage obscures the guardhouse and helipad!

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by bilmore

Obviously, if you are not among that anti-abortion crowd, this argument resonates not at all. But, to make the statements that you made without even acknowledging the basis for their anti-stem-cell position is sort of simplistic, I think, and pretty much guarantees that there will never be productive discussion.

I have heard this said before and I don't agree. Just because 100,000 people believe something does not mean it is a valid viewpoint which may be used as rebuttal against science.

The embryos at issue will never be alive. The people who can benefit from research are very much alive. The notion that stem cell research will lead to more abortions or a more casual attitude toward abortion is a non-starter.

I really don't understand when it religion rose to the level of scientific proof. This debate is not unlike the people who argue that creation science, despite its utter lack of supporting data, is a valid alternative to evolution. Its not. I'm certain there are just as many people who believe in UFOs as believe in Creationsim in any given year, but we don't argue that weather pattersn are caused by UFOs or that secret alien invders are running among us. If a viewpoint has no science or logic behind it (and faith is not logic), it should not be considered a valid counterpoint. Stem cells might save someone. Embryos remaining frozen or thrown away never will. The debate should end there, unless someone has a crystal ball and can show us in High Def exactly how the slippery slope of stem cell research will hurt us more than help us.

This is one of the very few real black and white issues out there.

[bilmore]

Originally posted by sgtclub
Sorry, this was in part II, which I didn't post:

Several letters of disagreement interpreted my argument as being against taxation. They used the sleight-of-hand approach saying that we need taxation for national defense, the courts and other constitutionally authorized purposes as if that observation meant that taxation for any other purpose was just as legitimate. Let me be explicit. Taxes to finance certain federal activities are indeed legitimate as well as constitutional.

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/w...20040817.shtml

Problem is, I don't think you can present this as a moral question while acknowledging that you find some point along the continuum away from the zero-point to be acceptable. He's left with an "it's immoral if you want to spend more than I want to spend" position. If he wants to declaim that taxation with the explicit goal of taking from one to simply give to another in order to equalize resources is immoral, that's fine, but that's not the argument that I saw. He's still then left with the "we choose to spend on a common-good basis" argument, and all he can argue is that he has a better idea of what constitutes "common good".

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by bilmore
However, we can disagree on how much of our own resources we wish to pay for the common weal - we can disagree about building a new Lawrence Welk museum, or paying megabucks for rapid transit of limited use - without being stoopid. What you consider a valid use of my money may not make me nearly as happy as it does you. You might wish to see a $1000-per-person tax just to cover, say, medical research. I might want to see that same amount spent on research on kayak design. The consensus - or, more accurately, the average amount seen as appropriate by all voters - is where we end up, and that amount crawls back and forth across the continuum as political leanings sway.

• There's a story that Winston Churchill once asked a woman if she'd sleep with him for a million dollars. She replied, "of course". He then asked her is she'd sleep with him for a hundred dollars and she replied, "Sir, what kind of woman do you think I am?"
  "We've already established that," Churchill retorted, "Now, we're just haggling about price."

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Aloha Mr. Learned Hand
Discussing politics is one thing. Posting comments which can be interpreted as personally threatening to the POTUS (a federal offense) is quite another. We have to have some rules here, don't we?

Are you SockfortheMan?

While I can't, apparently, ask what was typed, and I don't remember, it certainly was nothing I took to be an actual threat as opposed to hyperbole, which we all use around here.

Are we genuinely fearful that NSA or the WH is trolling here, looking to question Wonk? Where's club to defend the Patriot Act now?

[ETA:] And we do need rules here. I thought one of them was don't edit each other's posts, except for style codes. We didn't create a new set of boards because it would be cheaper and easier than staying at infirm.