Politics: A new beginning - Page 181

ltl/fb · 12-10-2003, 05:17 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by sgtclub
You are getting into the metaphysical question of what (and when) is human, which neither you, nor I, nor the courts are equipped to answer. That is why it should be decided by the people locally.

How locally can we go? Can my neighborhood have a rule of its own, or does the state as a whole get to decide?

bilmore · 12-10-2003, 05:17 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by ltl/fb
If the . . . item? whatever . . . whose life is being terminated has no brain, how is it murder? I mean, even my cat has a brain, and if I kill it it's not considered murder.

It's a common-sense exception that should have been made. Problem is, the prolifers will tell you about how health exceptions were being stretched to subsume the issue. (I.e., the right doc can characterize any case as involving health issues.) Whether true, or a made up anecdotal thing, this perception made them so distrust the other side that they refused to put this common-sense exception in.

Who to blame? The people who wouldn't let in the exception? The people who (maybe - I can't cite to anything) started calling trivial things "health issues" such that they justified invoking health exceptions to anti-abortion laws?

ltl/fb · 12-10-2003, 05:17 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by sgtclub
You are getting into the metaphysical question of what (and when) is human, which neither you, nor I, nor the courts are equipped to answer. That is why it should be decided by the people locally.

Whoa, and if you and I are not equipped to answer this question, who's deciding it locally?

bilmore · 12-10-2003, 05:19 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Whoa, and if you and I are not equipped to answer this question, who's deciding it locally?

This is the difference between a question susceptible to logical solution, and simple voting of preference. A state can't solve an equation to decide its state bird, but it can vote on it.

Tyrone Slothrop · 12-10-2003, 05:20 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by bilmore
Who to blame? The people who wouldn't let in the exception? The people who (maybe - I can't cite to anything) started calling trivial things "health issues" such that they justified invoking health exceptions to anti-abortion laws?

Maybe everyone was hypoglycemic and no one's to blame.

bilmore · 12-10-2003, 05:23 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Maybe everyone was hypoglycemic and no one's to blame.

Probably truer than you know.

ltl/fb · 12-10-2003, 05:28 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by bilmore
This is the difference between a question susceptible to logical solution, and simple voting of preference. A state can't solve an equation to decide its state bird, but it can vote on it.

So I'm not equipped to make a decision as to what I think the state bird should be? Crappy analogy. Try harder.

I knew what he meant, it was just said very badly and I wanted to give him the chance to fix it so he wouldn't be on record as having said XYZ in case he ever runs for office. Or, I was poking fun.

Hank Chinaski · 12-10-2003, 05:38 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Maybe everyone was hypoglycemic and no one's to blame.

lot's of people have quit trying to have sex, they just gave up! I think this keeps these abortion stats skewed low.

sgtclub · 12-10-2003, 05:40 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
If you believe that life begins at conception, you also have to have the government enact this belief into law and tell everyone else that they must believe it too. Your dodge (on abortion) is like saying libertarianism is completely consistent with the New Deal if you believe that most people want to pay higher taxes for jobs programs, etc.

I.e.,

[y]ou are getting into the metaphysical question of what (and when) [the proper level of taxes should be], which neither you, nor I, nor the courts are equipped to answer. That is why it should be decided by the people locally.

I think my position is consistent on both issues. I am not saying that the law should be libertarian based if 99% of the people think otherwise, unless a fundamental right is implicated. (In the tax scenario, if the tax rate were to be increased to 99%, I would say a fundamental right was implicated). But that begs the question in the abortion context as to whether a fundamental right is implicated (i.e., is it a human life that should not be murdered) and that is the question that we are not presently capable of answering.

Atticus Grinch · 12-10-2003, 05:40 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by bilmore
(But, the question that I think you keep ignoring is: you include in your parade of horribles this line - "Telling a woman she's torturing and killing an unborn child". You throw it out as if we should all chuckle, as if it's akin to "telling kids the earth is flat". You continually gloss the question, the ultimate question of this whole subject. Should we ignore that fairly widely-held belief because you don't share it? I can't. I see too many people who hold to that belief. In that light, as sad as your anecdotes are, they pale.

In our system of government, they don't pale. You spend so much time railing against the Coasts that try to tell you they're smarter than you are, and tell you what to do. (In truth, we're bemused by this argument, because the red states also spend a lot of time telling other people what to do, but it seems so obvious to them that everyone should live that way that they --- i.e., you --- don't really notice that it's didactic and paternalistic.) Why doesn't this anti-paternalism principle apply to individuals?

No one's asking anyone to "ignore that fairly widely-held belief." Everyone is free to say what they feel must be said --- except doctors in Minnesota and other states with this policy. I just don't think government power should be used to favor it over the alternative beliefs. Note that this became law when it was appended to a law allowing circuses during the state fair. How poetic!

BTW, your use of "belief" is telling. Are there any other matters of theology that the state should have scripts for?

Quote:

And, of course, in your world, that's the only pain involved in the abortion debate, right?

Not the only pain. Just the only avoidable pain. The Constitution affords people a zone of privacy. It does not protect person A from the psychological "pain" em feels when em hears that person B did something to person/fetus C. That you hold otherwise is a thunderingly large gap in the integrity of the personal philosophy you claim to espouse on these boards, and a good indication that you would rather defend all things Minnesotan or GOPan than anything else.

Quote:

Again, you refuse to see another choice, one that doesn't involve abortion being available in some states. You come to this entire issue with such moral, self-satisfied blinders.

Oh, I see the other choice. However, I am not disqualified from stating that Roe v. Wade is very good policy that actually fairly treats both sides of that choice --- indeed, the only policy that prevents a second Civil War over personhood --- because I disagree with you and Minnesota.

As for blinders, you have no idea what choices I've made in my own life vis-a-vis this issue.

Anyone care to address my doomsday scenario when Roe is overturned and the issue devolves to the states?

Quote:

(Hint: There are some - many - who would openly laugh at your characterization of emotional pain - from, what, having to carry to term? - as "the most horrifying experience imaginable" - in light of what you want to give her the freedom to do to what they consider to be a human being.

Yes, there's a word for those people. That word, at least in the context of anacephalic pregnancies, is "asshole." Okay, wingnut. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to. I don't want to live in a state, or a nation, or a world, in which I decide that a woman should carry a dead child to term so that some number of others can feel better at night.

Besides, I didn't give her the freedom to do it. Medical science and the Supreme Court did. I'm just trying to point out that neither you nor the boys in St. Paul should be spitting in her face while she does it, out of spite for your powerlessness to stop her. The God you don't believe in has already punished her enough for sins she didn't commit.

Tyrone Slothrop · 12-10-2003, 05:41 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
lot's of people have quit trying to have sex, they just gave up! I think this keeps these abortion stats skewed low.

I think it's because they got calls from the Saudis.

sgtclub · 12-10-2003, 05:41 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by ltl/fb
How locally can we go? Can my neighborhood have a rule of its own, or does the state as a whole get to decide?

Under our present system, the State of course. Under a theoretical system, the level of government closest to the people.

Tyrone Slothrop · 12-10-2003, 05:45 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by sgtclub
I think my position is consistent on both issues. I am not saying that the law should be libertarian based if 99% of the people think otherwise, unless a fundamental right is implicated. (In the tax scenario, if the tax rate were to be increased to 99%, I would say a fundamental right was implicated). But that begs the question in the abortion context as to whether a fundamental right is implicated (i.e., is it a human life that should not be murdered) and that is the question that we are not presently capable of answering.

It seems to me that you are a libertarian up to the point when you say the government should adopt a position on the (moral) question of whether a fetus is "a human life."* Why doesn't a libertarian say, I'm pro-life, but I respect my neighbor's autonomy to decide otherwise?

* Not really the question, since everyone agrees that fetuses are human.

ltl/fb · 12-10-2003, 05:47 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by sgtclub
Under our present system, the State of course. Under a theoretical system, the level of government closest to the people.

But my local government gets to control all kinds of things.

Atticus Grinch · 12-10-2003, 05:51 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by ltl/fb
How locally can we go? Can my neighborhood have a rule of its own, or does the state as a whole get to decide?

A neo-con view of the world:

"My world's interests in this instance are superior to my nation's." = VILLAIN
"My nation's interests in this instance are superior to my state's." = VILLAIN
"My state's interests in this instance are superior to my community's." = VILLAIN
"My community's interests in this instance are superior to my neighborhood's." = VILLAIN
"My neighbor's interests in this instance are superior to my family's." = VILLAIN
"My family's interests in this instance are superior to my own." = HERO

There's only one kind of altruism that is seen as altruistic to a neo-con. With the exception of the last level of altruism, anything other than self-interest is treason. The marketplace takes care of the rest.