Philosophical Detection: Rand Paul rewrites the constitution with religious legislation
Rand Paul has re-introduced his "Life at Conception Act" abolishing all abortion rights by decreeing that cells are "human persons" at conception.
The 'novel legal theory' on behalf of the anti-abortion rights agenda seeks to overthrow Roe v Wade and the lack of constitutional authority to prohibit abortions by arbitrarily asserting that cells are "persons" under 14th amendment "equal protection" of "the right to life of each born and unborn [sic] human".
He claims that his redefinition, which crushes the rights of actual human beings, "does not amend or interpret the Constitution, but simply relies on the 14th Amendment, which specifically authorizes Congress to enforce its provisions".
Paul's legislation would impose what he claims "most Americans believe and what science has long known - that human life begins at the moment of conception, and therefore, is entitled to legal protection". He does not cite what "science" has endorsed the claim that a cell is "entitled to legal protection" or what "science" endorses his equivocation between human persons and cells with human genes in a package-deal labeled "human life", foisted in the name of "most Americans". (A current conservative fad is to change the subject to "giraffes" and laugh at their victims.)
Moral concepts, including 'rights', apply to rational beings, i.e., human persons who must make choices, which are the facts which give rise to morality. They do not apply to cells and embryos. The notion that they do is religious mysticism attributing intrinsic characteristics as reified floating abstractions to be taken on faith. But Paul doesn't need to justify it in a world of anti-concepts and statism in which the illogic is intended to be enforced by the power of Congress out of an alleged "duty" to follow down a verbal rabbit hole (a.k.a. theocracy). Faith and force are corollaries.
Having wiped out the rights of real human persons with this change that isn't a change, Paul claims that "the right to life is guaranteed to all Americans [now meaning cells and embryos displacing actual Americans] in the Declaration of Independence[!], and it is the constitutional duty [sic] of all members of Congress to ensure this belief is upheld.
Conservatives who persistently claim to be "originalists" on the meaning of the Constitution have no qualms over changing the Constitution to impose religious duties that are not in the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence, and which played no philosophical or historical role in the founding of the country and our form of government. Human cells and fetuses were not discussed, let alone included under the Enlightenment "reason and the rights of man" or any discussion of constitutional authority. Entitlements to 'life' of cells at "conception" are a 19th century dogma of the Catholic Church. Perhaps they will next try to read it into the 1st Amendment under "the right of the people peaceably to assemble".
The contorted "logic" of these arguments employed in slippery political demagoguery proclaiming "constitutional duties" to violate the rights of people in the name of "the rights of all Americans" and "science" is a prime example of rationalism: It illustrates how rationalism verbally manipulates words as floating abstractions without regard for the meaning of concepts in reality, shifting meanings in passing from one end of a sentence to the other. It counts on a lack of understanding of concepts and objectivity for cognition.
The sales pitch for the "Life at Conception Act" illustrates how the verbal game, however serious and "sincere" in intention, is exploited in political maneuvers carefully crafted to manipulate people through rationalizing contradictory, religious mysticism in the name of logic and science to buttress a preconceived, religious political agenda -- taking us back to the medieval subordination of reason as a handmaiden to faith.
Most people can see through the sophistry behind the "Life at Conception Act" even if they don't see all the conceptual fallacies and grasp only that "something is fishy". It illustrates how Rand Paul's quirky arguments based on the cultural anti-conceptual mentality undermine support for his otherwise good policies, and discredit anything called "tea party" or "libertarian" in any sense of that word through a religious package-deal-coming-home-to-roost. It's an inevitable consequence of the philosophical and intellectual bankruptcy of the modern conservative movement undermining civilization and destroying the originally secular "tea party", no matter how much conservatives appeal to the rhetoric of "constitutional scholarship" and "proven traditions".
Press release: https://www.paul.senate.gov/news/pres...
Bill: http://www.paul.senate.gov/imo/media/...
The 'novel legal theory' on behalf of the anti-abortion rights agenda seeks to overthrow Roe v Wade and the lack of constitutional authority to prohibit abortions by arbitrarily asserting that cells are "persons" under 14th amendment "equal protection" of "the right to life of each born and unborn [sic] human".
He claims that his redefinition, which crushes the rights of actual human beings, "does not amend or interpret the Constitution, but simply relies on the 14th Amendment, which specifically authorizes Congress to enforce its provisions".
Paul's legislation would impose what he claims "most Americans believe and what science has long known - that human life begins at the moment of conception, and therefore, is entitled to legal protection". He does not cite what "science" has endorsed the claim that a cell is "entitled to legal protection" or what "science" endorses his equivocation between human persons and cells with human genes in a package-deal labeled "human life", foisted in the name of "most Americans". (A current conservative fad is to change the subject to "giraffes" and laugh at their victims.)
Moral concepts, including 'rights', apply to rational beings, i.e., human persons who must make choices, which are the facts which give rise to morality. They do not apply to cells and embryos. The notion that they do is religious mysticism attributing intrinsic characteristics as reified floating abstractions to be taken on faith. But Paul doesn't need to justify it in a world of anti-concepts and statism in which the illogic is intended to be enforced by the power of Congress out of an alleged "duty" to follow down a verbal rabbit hole (a.k.a. theocracy). Faith and force are corollaries.
Having wiped out the rights of real human persons with this change that isn't a change, Paul claims that "the right to life is guaranteed to all Americans [now meaning cells and embryos displacing actual Americans] in the Declaration of Independence[!], and it is the constitutional duty [sic] of all members of Congress to ensure this belief is upheld.
Conservatives who persistently claim to be "originalists" on the meaning of the Constitution have no qualms over changing the Constitution to impose religious duties that are not in the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence, and which played no philosophical or historical role in the founding of the country and our form of government. Human cells and fetuses were not discussed, let alone included under the Enlightenment "reason and the rights of man" or any discussion of constitutional authority. Entitlements to 'life' of cells at "conception" are a 19th century dogma of the Catholic Church. Perhaps they will next try to read it into the 1st Amendment under "the right of the people peaceably to assemble".
The contorted "logic" of these arguments employed in slippery political demagoguery proclaiming "constitutional duties" to violate the rights of people in the name of "the rights of all Americans" and "science" is a prime example of rationalism: It illustrates how rationalism verbally manipulates words as floating abstractions without regard for the meaning of concepts in reality, shifting meanings in passing from one end of a sentence to the other. It counts on a lack of understanding of concepts and objectivity for cognition.
The sales pitch for the "Life at Conception Act" illustrates how the verbal game, however serious and "sincere" in intention, is exploited in political maneuvers carefully crafted to manipulate people through rationalizing contradictory, religious mysticism in the name of logic and science to buttress a preconceived, religious political agenda -- taking us back to the medieval subordination of reason as a handmaiden to faith.
Most people can see through the sophistry behind the "Life at Conception Act" even if they don't see all the conceptual fallacies and grasp only that "something is fishy". It illustrates how Rand Paul's quirky arguments based on the cultural anti-conceptual mentality undermine support for his otherwise good policies, and discredit anything called "tea party" or "libertarian" in any sense of that word through a religious package-deal-coming-home-to-roost. It's an inevitable consequence of the philosophical and intellectual bankruptcy of the modern conservative movement undermining civilization and destroying the originally secular "tea party", no matter how much conservatives appeal to the rhetoric of "constitutional scholarship" and "proven traditions".
Press release: https://www.paul.senate.gov/news/pres...
Bill: http://www.paul.senate.gov/imo/media/...
The government should not force a doctor to perform murder or prevent a woman from getting a murder done. That should be between three people, the woman, the guy who is the dad and the doctor. If all three want to commit murder, its there choice to do so.
I am also in favor of murder in the case of assisted suicide. Same thing Doctor and the target of the murder both want it to happen, its OK but it does not change the fact that its still murder.
When I was in law school taking a course on constitutional law I finally ran into a string of supreme ct. decisions I agreed with. They were all written in the 1920 and 1930s before the court was packed by Roosevelt. My Professor explained that both Liberal and Conservative justices and scholars had repudiated these decisions and their approach to interpreted the constitution.
2. I like Paul for a lot of other reasons, so, I still support him, because I don't see a better option.
There are all kinds of interesting scientific questions about the nature of the growth (both before and after birth), but no grounds for ascribing moral rights to a potential just because cells have human genes, or by some even more mystical accounts a "soul". The "rights of the unborn beginning at conception" religionists have no concept of the objective nature of moral concepts and rights and cannot even begin to discuss the questions. They have a mystical notion of 'rights' arbitrarily assigned to cells, and not much better for real humans. Rights, like all concepts and principles, are based on objective assessment of relevant facts, not a decree of an intrinsic property apart from conceptual understanding.
A fetus does not have a right to support by another person and the fetus' right to life, which it does not have is not violated by an abortion.
Rand's argument misunderstands rights and is not science.
"Judge and be prepared to be judged "
:-)
The closest you come to this is the use of the word "choices", but even white blood cells make "choices" on what to attack so there must be specific types of choices that count.
The problem is, that there is a continuum in existence between a clump of cells and an adult human being. At some point, which you really are avoiding specifying, this 'thing' acquires the right to life.
Rand makes the distinction between the rights of a child and those of an adult, with the child having the minimal right to life. Obviously at some point this right comes into existence. When is this?
https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...
https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...
Our current legal situation is based roughly around the age when the organism can live independently but that's a hazy and moving target. I corresponded with a woman who had been born prior to the commonly used current date and while she had some health issues she was certainly a rational human being.
The other problem we face is that protecting this 'life' imposes a rather strong burden upon a woman who is most definitely a human being with rights. It's one thing to say you can't kill 'it' another to say you must carry it.
If we could imagine technology that would remove those 'cells' at whatever point they were and grow them independently with minimal inconvenience to the mother, I wonder how that would affect our philosophical decisions?
In other words are we talking philosophy or pragmatism.
A baby born before expected does not mean that before anyone was born it had rights for a similar time frame, or the expectant mother loses her rights to her own body for some time period. Nor does it mean that the baby doesn't have rights until the time it was expected to be born.
Whatever new technologies imagined to avoid carrying to term have nothing to do with the rights of the woman to her own body and do not give rights to the unborn. It is still a potential, not an actual, human being, regardless of additional means to actualize the potential. Such technologies might or might not become routine recommended practice for all kinds of reasons. The woman has a right to decide what procedures to subject herself to and whether or not she does not want the child at all versus having an unknown child out there someplace who was adopted.
But those considerations can at least be discussed in rational terms. They are not relevant to the demands for the "Life at Conception Act" with it's mystical cell's rights (or the ongoing religious attacks on contraception).
Human consciousness begins before birth, only limited by the environment. A fetus reacts, not always with simple reflex, to stimuli that it can detect, so a simplistic determination of what constitutes life by a declaration of departing the womb is as insufficient and lacking in intelligence as declaring a fertilized egg human.
The abortion without limits crowd includes such unsavory characters as the British feminist who declared a woman should have the right to terminate her child's life up to a year after birth. Her argument was that the mother had the right to decide if that child's quality of life was too degraded, and should be mercifully ended. Do you find that argument specious, or worthy of consideration?
We often hear that American child survival rates rank very low among industrialized countries. However, closer inspection reveals that countries like France do not count a child's death before a year of life, because they know that most serious birth problems happen in that first year. The U.S. counts the death of any born alive fetus in its statistics. Do we hold life more dear than our cohorts in other countries?
There have been rational attempts to reach a common understanding of the point at which a developing human life deserves the chance to survive. Limits on late term abortion, denial of abortion beyond the point that a fetus is likely to feel pain, abortion when the risk to the mother's life is at stake, are an effort to find a rational ground without a complete disregard for morality. I tend to think those who make these efforts at sanity over ideology are on the most credible ground.
I will admit my own thoughts on this are somewhat confused. I clearly am uncomfortable with killing an infant a week before it is ready to be born. On the other side of the equation it seems to be absurd to be protecting the cluster of cells against the will of the woman.
Is it true that the creature has no right to life or is it simply that we believe that it does but that right is inferior to the right of an individual woman to control her own body? We do allow situations, such as self-defense, where one individual's rights supersede another's.
The current legal situation is based in pragmatism rather than philosophy
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Being "uncomfortable" with any late abortion is a feeling based on non-essential similarities in the continuum of development. Feelings are not a basis for rights. Focusing on those similarities drops the context of the full conditions under which it is surviving at all. The abrupt change in environment is an essential difference.
This is not a matter of a "balance" of rights. There are no rights to balance against the woman's rights. Rights do not conflict. There is much more to this than framing it as "self defense" by the woman choosing not to give birth. It requires understanding the conceptual basis for morality and rights: the facts that give rise to them and what they apply to.
Comparisons in the latest stages of development before birth is at least something to discuss, but Rand Paul's "Life at Conception" bill and its promotion criminalizing doctors and women as murderers for interfering with cells, which is what this thread is about, doesn't even get that far. It is complete mysticism at the most primitive and barbaric level.
If the current legal situation is pragmatism rather then based objectively on philosophical principle it is because today everything is, which is why we have the constant pressure group warfare on this issue and everything else. The attempt to counter Pragmatism with religion and its mystical notion of 'intrinsic rights' is only bringing the whole controversy to a lower, more primitive level of irrationalism.
A lack of understanding of why a newborn baby must be born to have a right to life, and why before that is only a potential human being literally parasitically dependent on an expectant mother with rights as a human being, is not an argument for "cell's rights". Arguing from "continuity" to the absurd conclusion of "cell rights" is just as logically fallacious as Zeno's paradoxes. It is a reductio ad absurdum refuting a false premise. The religionists want us to invert the logic and believe the absurdity instead of rejecting the rationalistic fallacious reasoning.
Do you still have rights if you are capable of reason, but don't practice it?
Are you made up of a group of cells?
Cells and groups of cells do not have rights. People do. Every entity is made of something. That does not mean that the pieces have rights, and it doesn't mean that the constituents of an entity or a different kind of entity with the same constituents have the same identity or character as the first kind of entity.
You now seem to admit that humans are made of cells, I think.
WilliamShipley got it pretty quickly, what is so difficult to understand?
Rand Paul thinks that cells have rights "from conception" and sees no difference between that and human rights as understood since the Enlightenment. That is why he is trying to legally redefine cells as "persons" to subvert hundreds of years of understanding with the stroke of a pen in a brief bill.
That human beings first have a right to life when born and why was explained in the initial post. You would have to read it to know that.
Do you believe the Supreme Court is infallible? Do you believe the government should manage the healthcare system also? The Supreme Court decided it could and should.
Quit being so panicky and whiney, and start thinking for yourself. If you can't answer a question, just say so. If you are an authority on the subject, you shouldn't have any problem answering simple questions.
You assumed that I was defending Ron Paul, which I wasn't and you assumed that I was anti-abortion.
There are bans on abortion to some extent in every state. Are all of the states breaking the law?
Thanks
I have a few more questions on the subject that have me perplexed, but crawling comes before walking.
If I had all of the answers, I wouldn't have to ask any questions, I could just sit back and pontificate on any subject.
A fetus, especially a 1st trimester fetus is not remotely capable of such. However there is no question of the rights of the woman carrying it. Thus the question would seem open and shut at least early in pregnancy.
For a government to simply decree rights accrue to any all fertilized eggs is an affront to actual rights.
It is a shame. On many issues I like and support Rand Paul more than any other candidate in this season. But he keeps dynamiting my respect.
The key fallacy appears really soon...
"most Americans believe and what science has long known - that human life begins at the moment of conception, and therefore, is entitled to legal protection". He does not cite what "science" has endorsed the claim that a cell is "entitled to legal protection" or what "science" endorses his equivocation between human persons and cells with human genes in a package-deal labeled "human life", ..."
"When Life Begins" can NOT be 'rationally defined.' Paul, as a doctor/scientist, should ruminate on that for a while before taking pen in hand...
It can ONLY be Agreed Upon by Consensus and neither Consensus nor Agreement should Ever be used to determine 'Truth.'
That's exactly why I believe so many "libertarians".. so-called.. are just retreaded Conservatives, justifying their beliefs, actions and Laws based on Biblical "Teachings" at their root.
But NOBODY ever calls them on that shit... they get into the fruitless and futile argument/"discussion" over WHEN Does "Life" Begin, rather than admit nobody can Prove It, they can only Agree On It.
There is NO scientific way to measure or prove it.
So, again, that's why I can't vote for Rand OR Ron Paul and why it's so hard for me to bring myself to vote for any Conservatives/Republicans, even in the face of Socialists like Bernie and Hillary.
Although I Will Promise You... I will Never, Ever support or vote for Bernie or Hillary.
Good luck to us all...
Some libertarians are religious and some not, but the common thread is that the libertarian movement has always plunged into the middle of politics with no philosophical basis. It's not surprising that they so often indulge in such embarrassing spectacles based on being naively susceptible to religious arguments.
I would argue that a little clump of cells is not self aware, has no experience and is not viable on its own. Therefore the sadness in its passing is less than my dog, a sparrow or a cow for food.
Even assuming this little clump of cells is an actual human being. Then we are saying we would compel the mother (and maybe the father...the act is silent on this) to slavery for nine months, and then slavery for 20-ish more years to support and rear this human. Really? Ok, well then fellow socialists and communists, what then of all the other needy people in the world that we can "save" by just applying a little of our resources. We can save all those starving children and other people in Africa if we just compel a few people to pay. Of course there will then be another million or so in a flash. Are these lives any less valuable than a little clump of cells, and is compelling a mother to full-term and then caring for a child more or less of a burden than Sally Struthers "...just a few cents a day"?
This is a ridiculous pile of religious (fantasy-inspired morals) communist crap. Thank goodness it will go nowhere, but as an indicator than Ron didn't raise his son to pick the right fights.
While I find the destruction of a healthy baby abhorrent, it must be a personal-medical decision. It is not the purview of any governance.
A lovely, slippery, warm , 100% religiously inspired slope to complete socialism, even communism. So we can compel a woman to go through 9 months of pregnancy and then (presumably) raise a little pile of cells? Clearly, this is a law compelling one person to support another. What then about people who can not support themselves? Are we then compelled to take care of these people, even against our wishes? I mean these are real, actual people, not 2^n cells with no brain or experience. Clearly these walking, talking people have souls. Therefore, we must save them. It only takes a little of what you have...What about all the starving people in Africa? They have souls, right? Are we compelled to save all them too?
"No" you say? Oh, yes, because we simply seek through fear or jealousy to punish people for engaging in carnal sin, not saving human beings. This is the worst 100% religiously motivated law for slavery in modern society.
Separately, you really believe that killing 8, 64 even 10,000 cells is the murder of a human on a non-religious basis? This is technically absurd. More relevant human life is killed in during brain surgery.
It's not lives that are important it's your opinion that is important. Should those lives continue ....I'll put this a different way. At what age are these my way or the highway advocates willing to continue supporting the death of children. Same question for the victims of later term and partial birth abortions.
At what age are their lives worth saving AFTER they are born?
I used to go to a church that routinely collected for children related projects literally around the world except...for the three families that lived within two blocks of the church. Yet they were anti abortion at any point. They did not mind the child dying after they were born. They did not want to hear about it.
For the record viability of fifty percent or greater by competent medical authority is where I draw the line. It's close to the line drawn by current laws. Partial Birth abortion an unspeakable form of butchery is now rare statistically and usually due to other medical complications. It's not just to fit in a prom dress.
I'm raising four of the results of that which I support myself. I hate being hypocritical. But I also recognize myopic tunnel vision exists. I want to sure those who practice that particular unacceptable behavior understand they are no less reponsible and have nothing to celebrate.
One should support their goals but not at the price of abandoning those who were saved to a different sort of death.
Not directed at anyone in particular but a re-definition of the big picture the whole picture to include the full extent of the issue. At what age prior to birth and at what age after birth.
I'm thinking of the enactment and the later cancellation of prohibition, for example.
The hoped for dumping of Obamacare (Harry Reid's happily harped "It's the law of the land") would be another.
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The New Deal Supreme Court rewrote large parts of the Constitution. All that needs to be restored, and I don't consider anyone conservative who doesn't want that to happen.
The black minority not be afraid.
Jim Crow is history.
"Do no harm" should be a motto for a national reboot.
Oh, well, my dear departed dad called me a dreamer.
And there's the national debt . . .
While I wish I had time to read every book put out here by Gulchers, there simply isn't enough time.
(1) the woman is under legally marriageable age (17 years old) or over 40; (2) the pregnancy is the result of prohibited relations or relations outside the framework of marriage; (3) the child is likely to have a physical or a mental defect; (4) continuance of the pregnancy is likely to endanger the woman's life or cause her physical or mental harm;
According to Halachic authority late term abortion may also be permitted in certain cases until the head emerges and even after if the woman does it herself.
A mother who self inflicts an abortion is not liable. Hence the morning after pill is fine.
An important factor in deciding whether or not an abortion should be permitted is the stage of the pregnancy: the shorter this period, the stronger are the considerations in favor of permitting abortion (Ḥavvat Ya'ir and She'elat Yaveẓ, loc. cit.; Beit Shelomo, ḤM 132).
In the holocaust abortion was permitted for any pregnancy because the Nazis were going to kill the mother who became pregnant.
Some strict sects of Judaism do not permit abortion but they are extremists and unreasonably masochistic in their interpretation of all Law. They should probably convert to Islam, which is more in line with their heresy. In fact some sects oppose Israel and work with the Iranians to end it.
By their fruits you shall know them.
Here is a link to all the salient points
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/...
What I do find interesting, however, is how this differs significantly from Levitical proclamations. I guess they've changed things a bit in the last several millenia.
quirky ideas leaves voters with an uneasiness that he lacks common sense, including in foreign policy.
His premise is: When a "person" is declared to not have rights, then he/she becomes a commodity.
I propose that "life" begins at being sentient which science has found to be about 12-weeks gestation. That is plenty of time for the potential mother to decide her future.
Incidentally, the RU 486 pill is correct for such measures as it was designed for and all forms of contraception are morally correct.
Not only is the mind the important factor to determine the genesis of "life" but should also be the factor that determines when a person is done living.
End of life issues should be both an individual choice of a thinking person AND the determining factor to pull the plug when brain activity has ended.
Late term abortions are very difficult psychologically for the mother and should be approached with the utmost depth of thought. Unless the unborn is a sub-normal (!) I use Ayn's phrase)
What is psychologically difficult and its degree depend on one's underlying values and rationality. All important choices should be approached with "depth of thought", but whatever difficulty someone may have in choosing anything, it does not imply "rights" for a fetus, let alone cells, and does not justify coercive intervention by government responding to religious pressure groups.
This is the one single example that points up the need for 50 states 50 different majority viewpoints versus a choice of one forcibly applied. Personally I prefer the protection of an unborn citizen when the fetus is a 50% plus viable citizen. Some prefer murder of the infant as it's emerging from the birth canal. Some go to the other extremist view of conception.
happily the murder on demand with no other life threatening issues of mother or child involved was the viewpoint of the Court. For the rest of the nine month conception to breathe on your own period of time consult the miracle of fifty states fifty chances for one that suits your personal peculiarities.
The dividing line betwen viable citizen and fetus protoplasm has already been settled. I cannot imagine where Rand gets this from unless he's catering to a home town crowd for re-election to Congress votes. He is a very disappointing candidate.
Regardless of political strategy for re-election, he seems to sincerely believe it as a consequence of the combination of not understanding the nature and source of man's rights in accordance with his nature as a rational being, and his own uncritical acceptance of conservative 'narrative' based on religious intrinsicism (as described in the initial post above).
Not understanding the nature and source of rights is dangerous in a country that depends on them. Many people have no idea where morality and rights come from, and they think in terms of "human rights" as a sloganized floating abstraction regardless of any overt religious beliefs they may hold. This makes them susceptible to the kinds of rationalistic equivocation and sophistry described in the initial post, as well as the lefts' demands for government entitlements and "protected classes" in the name of "rights".
Religious conservative strategists and lawyers cook up campaign arguments and 'novel legal theories' like the one's in Paul's press release just like the left does for its own constant stream of propaganda and strategy to manipulate people for power. The antidote is proper conceptual understanding.
Insofar as the main issue of the thread is concerned and after seeing the results which brought partial birth abortion done to less than double digits and then required other medical conditions to ensure the life of the mother I'll support the SCOTUS finding of viability brings citizen status and protections the approximate dividing line in the third trimester but it takes competent medical authority. This was covered half a year ago in great detail and is available in the archives. No one except those with the unprotected citizens rights viewpoint came away happy but half a loaf etc.... is all you are oging to get. The rest, on eith side, is for diehards and fanatics and the fifty separate jurisdictions.
There's also the philosophical part: When is "personhood" obtained? Those who argue that life begins at conception take the safest course by saying that even though they aren't sure, they'd rather give the benefit of the doubt than risk engaging in murder. Those who argue that life isn't really life until it is "personhood" struggle to draw a line of objective measure. If one argues that it involves self-sufficiency, then personhood doesn't happen until late childhood at best. If it revolves around fitness for life, then one brings in eugenics and the subjectivity of the rulers.
The concept of rights does not apply to cells and fetuses. This has nothing to do with "self sufficiency" and "eugenics". Those with no understanding of the nature and source of rights and their status as objective principles, not mystic 'intrinsic' essences and confused and arbitrary rationalism, have no business pretending to defend human rights and freedom at all.
The "settled" legal implementation is Roe v Wade preventing bans on women's rights of abortion when they choose to not have child.
Please define 50%+ viable citizen.
If the father is married to the mother, should he have any say in the matter? And is he responsible for for support if the little bundle of cells survives?
Rand Paul is much stronger than most of them on property rights, but doesn't seem to have the practical knowledge of Washington politics to do much as a leader. It's always disappointing and discouraging to see someone like that mess up with quirky arguments like the cells' rights theme.
Agreed that its frustrating to see side issues distract attention from much more critical concerns (often for political reasons.)
I don't recall Ron Paul ever introducing anti-abortion bills in Congress either, and he may not have. But in his presidential campaign appearances and interviews over several years he certainly emphasized opposition to abortion in a confused notion of 'human rights'. If he didn't intend to do something about it politically if he could, why bring it up and emphasize it in a political campaign for high office with real powers? He may not have ever expected to be elected president at all, but he was advocating it as an issue of government policy for someone to impose. Rand Paul may not expect his latest bill to go anywhere either, just like it hasn't in the past. But he's obviously arguing for it.
This is related to Mark Levin's attempt to convince people to vote for religious conservative Ken Cuccinelli for governor of Virginia. Levin claimed that political opposition to abortion doesn't make any difference because Cuccinelli wouldn't have the power to impose it under Roe v Wade. But they obviously want to impose it and would do everything they could, incrementally or not, to do so.
With that kind of thinking you have to ask what else would they do to impose religion under the extraordinary powers of high office, just like Bush did. Overall, Cuccinelli probably would have been less destructive than the current progressive who was elected, and may have done some relative good in some other areas. But it's no argument on behalf of a candidate to demand that we ignore his goals and anti-constitutional advocacy on the grounds that he couldn't yet get away with the worst of it. It's deceptive package-dealing to promote a very bad agenda and expecting people who know better to pretend it doesn't matter. They want us to ignore it while they make inroads.
Conservative demands for "state's rights" are just as bad as unlimited national government. Only individuals have rights. No government official or agency at any level under a proper system of limited government can act by "right" in choosing to inflict power.
The attempts by some conservatives to oppose Roe v Wade by claiming "state's rights" is a corrupt power struggle and a religious statist side show. And in fact, religion in government has no bounds once unleashed and would not stop at state authority; they currently invoke the anti-concept of 'state's rights' because they are currently on the defensive and trying to regroup their statism in certain states.
The timing with the Iowa evangelicals is probably no coincidence, but he has done this before, including trying to include it in an irrelevant 2012 flood insurance bill, where he managed to make even Harry Reid seem plausible in comparison. http://thehill.com/video/senate/23474...
Which is not my stance but just as ridiculous a statement isntead
Just imagine a world where impregnating 12 year old are considered an acceptable rite of passage and one where the notion of women having any rights at all as to the use of their bodies is foreign concept. That would be no more acceptable but it is accepted
The dividing line is and remains protection of a citizen unable to protect themselves against being murdered. That happens when viability is reached. It's strictly a civil rights question since treating it any other way, as morals or as a medical issue have been set aside
The only question is when a viable citizen is murdered without benefit of judge, jury, defense attorney and murdered by one of it's own family members how are we any deifferent than an Islamic.
We aren't but we adopt a holier than though attitude as if we weren't EXACTLY the same and just as barbaric as if we were invoking Allah instead of Jesus.
Hypocritical sanctimonious clap trap mean nothing to a murdered child and nothing to a government who has set aside the concept of civil rights and protection from violence for a special class of it's own culture.
We treat our dogs better than we treat our children and have the guts to point fingers at Islamics? Viability means the ability to live and survive outside the womb. There is no question murder is wrong at that point. the only question in which direction and to what extent we are willing to extend that special right. After all if you wish to kill the child why not the mother? Why not the father?
And if you wish to ban the practice while it is lump of protoplasm and demand full gestation are willing to help pay for the all that folows? Even uinto age 21 an full adulthood or 23 if in a school?
Shame on you.
Who appointed you judge, jury, and executioner and what makes you difference that any other run of the mill sex deviate? Or who appointed you the giver of life and sentenced society to pay for your beliefs?
A pox on both of your extremist selfish, goTistical views.
And you bitch about soldiers learining to break things and kill. Killing is state sanctioned. Minus that sanction it is not killing but murder. There is a six month window even for legitimate pregnancies. Where a 12 or so year old child is involved shoot onsight is fine with me. That involves only animal control
My position on abortion is much more complex, from the fact of knowing women who've done it for mere convenience, to experiencing the difficulty in obtaining simple sterilization procedures because of church mandates.
Thankfully, this time, my stance and that of SCOTUS coincide. I was taking a position and I was stating facts.
I was also indicting a good portion of the population. It went like this...
"A pox on both of your extremist selfish, egotistical views."
That should have been a major tip off it wasn't personal. Apparently it was too subtle.
Good description.When Libertarianism corresponds to Objectivism it seems like it might be a good political arm of the Objectivist philosophy until it goes off on those "quirkiness" tangents, which makes it sort of an impractical utopian theory.
Whether or not any particular advocate of the 'rights of cells' nonsense adheres to any specific religious dogma or variation on a supernatural god, the general approach of ascribing intrinsic essences, in place of objective principles based on relevant facts, is religious thinking. It is mystical by nature and dates back to Plato's systematic formulations of such thinking.
Lifeless objects don't grow.
No matter what terminology is used, abortion and abortifacients stop life. That is their sole purpose. If a woman does not have an abortion (assuming all else goes well,) she has a baby. Abortions are performed to stop this event.
This, to me, has nothing to do with faith or the constitution. It just is.
Rights are a moral concept pertaining to human persons in recognition of our nature as rational beings who must think, choose and act in order to live. Rights are principles, not mystic intrinsic essences. The concept of "rights" does not pertain to cells or anything else on any planet just because it is some form of "life" without regard to what it is.
but then we live in a country that treats dogs better than it treats children. One of Heinleins great moral truths and never been proved wrong.