Breaking: Santorum drops presidential bid
He’s making the announcement now, mentioning daughter Bella and the Duggar family, the need for strong families. From the Associated Press, a few minutes ago:
Rick Santorum is suspending his campaign for the GOP presidential nomination, clearing a path for Mitt Romney to become the nominee.
I’m particularly sorry to see Santorum go, given his passion for the sanctity of human life.
And now, as the AP indicates, Romney is the presumptive nominee, who I will support.
Apr.10, 2012 2:37 pm |
Campaign |
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
I would like to congratulate Santourum for bringing so much attention to prolife issues in a year bound to be dominated the economy. I beleive he had an impact, even if he was not likely to be the nominee. I wish him and his family the best. Now we must focua our attention on beating Obama.
:(
I wasn’t a Santorum fan by any means, but I am extremely disappointed that our political system is such that the establishment picks a candidate and that person, regardless of what people want and choose, is the nominee. This is ridiculous!
Jill, you shouldn’t feel that you have to vote for Romney only because he is the Republican pick. He has supported abortion in the past and that makes him un-electable in my book. You chose your man and the establishment has ignored it, pressuring Santorum and others (read: any competition) to leave. In my opinion, that’s wrong and disgusting. Will be casting my vote in the primaries and then sitting out in November because my so-called party “leaders” have ignored the people’s choice in favor of a non-committal, middle-of-the-road flake.
So we’re essentially stuck with the white Obama. My state hasn’t even had their primaries yet and I was SO looking forward to casting my vote for Santorum. I didn’t like Romney in the last election and I like him even less now. If Newt drops out, we’re really screwed. (And no, Ron Paul is too much of an idiot, so he doesn’t have my vote either).
Who picks up the delegates from Santorum then? Does he choose who they go to?
So sad to hear about this. If only Paul and Gingrich had dropped out earlier and supported Santorum.
I will also support Romney. Anyone is better than an abortion-obsessed tyrant.
I am disappointed, but relieved in a way. As much as I wish it was not true, I do not believe the country is truly ready for a truly Pro-Life, Pro-Family, Pro-Marriage real Christian man as president right now. And I have had lingering concerns that a head-to-head cage match with Obama this year would have done more damage to Rick and the cause than it was worth. In a nutshell, better live to fight another day. Still, it’s a bummer.
Now, I strongly feel like we must line up behind Romney. Because no matter what anyone wants to say, he will be far far better for the cause of Life than Obama could ever be. I have been a major Santorum supporter for a long time, both financially and “in the public square.” I can name at least 20 people who I personally convinced to support him in the Ohio primary. So switching horses at this point is something I wish I did not have to do. But you can bet I will do it because I must. And LibertyBelle, if you are going to “sit it out,” you may as well go vote for Barack. I am sorry to be mean, but every one of us, whether we like Romney or not, needs to put our hurt feelings aside and get behind him. He may not be our first choice, but thousands of unborn lives are at risk and will be lost if Obama gets another term. So suck it up and do what is best for them, not what you “feel” like doing.
ROMNEY 2012
LibertyBelle, I hope you reconsider before November. This election is too important to sit out. Obama must be defeated. I may not be able to cast a vote for a candidate, but I sure as heck will cast a vote against Obama.
Liberty Belle and Dirtdartwife: Romney is a pro-life convert. His going against the tide and vetoing taxpayer funded embryonic stem cell research while governor of a liberal state is strong evidence. He has stated he wants to defund Planned Parenthood. Sitting this election out only ensures the infanticide president returns for four more years of overtly doing all he can to enable abortion.
@LibertyBelle, a vote not cast is a vote for Obama. The fall election will be just like every other election, indeed just like the primaries. People vote for the best candidate available. This fall, that will be Romney.
It’d be nice to see Santorum as the veep. He’d take them to task over their pro-abortion tyranny during the campaign. Lord knows the media won’t make the Obama death squad answer for it.
Jill – time for a new poll – predict the VP candidate!
Liberty Belle,
I’m no fan of Romney, trust me on that. It’s like McCain part II in some aspects.
But when I see what the past four years have wrought, I shudder at the thought of another four years under this current prez. So there is NO WAY I’m going to pout and be “sitting out”, no freaking way.
Want higher deficits?
Higher gas prices?
Higher unemployment?
More national debt?
More pandering to Russia and the Muslim Brotherhood?
Lower the country’s credit rating even further?
More racial division?
Oh, and more children destroyed by abortion through Obamacare?
Then go ahead, sit this one out.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to help save the country and work to defeat this current Reign of Incompetence.
Sorry to hear this news, but I do hope Santorum can be the veep. Hes one of a handful of Rs with the guts to call out the pres on his violent obsession with abortion.
Oh don’t get me wrong Jill, I always vote. I don’t subscribe to the group that doesn’t cast a vote just because someone doesn’t fit their perfect description of a candidate. My vote is just as powerful as the gun I used to carry when I was on active duty. There is just something about Romney that I don’t trust. I didn’t trust him in ’08 and it just seems more profound now. If he’s the GOP selection, I’ll still vote for him. I just pray he picks a strong VP that makes voting for him more palatable and believe me… as much as I just don’t really care for Romney, I’ll take Romney ANY DAY over Obama.
@carder +1
I’ll admit up front that I don’t know much about Romney for two main reasons:
1) I really liked what I saw in Santorum (and leaving for the sake of his daughter only strengthens that).
2) I don’t live in the U.S., so I didn’t bother to look too deeply into the other candidates.
I’ve heard that Romney flip-flops on abortion and other important issues. I honestly don’t know whether or not they’re true but, quite frankly, given the circumstances, it’s less relevent due to one very simple fact that we all know for certain, and you must all keep this in mind this November:
If elected, Obama WILL continue to support abortion and its vanguards.
If elected, Romney MIGHT support abortion and its vanguard.
I agree with many of you that it’s hardly the ideal situation, but to me, the situation is very simple; Obama has proven to be the single most destructive president to ever occupy the Oval Office. I may not be a fan of Romney, but everything I’ve heard and read tells me that he would, at the very least, be far less damaging than Obama.
I’d rather take my chances in the fog than head straight for the rocks (or allow someone else to steer me towards them).
Senator Santorum set a positive vision for the US, hopefully Mr. Romney will be able to incorporate that into his platform. He showed that personal convictions and, more importantly, that being open with the American Public about those personal convictions invigorates a positive concern for the moral and economic health of a nation in citizens. Hopefully, his honest approach to politics will be an example to all politicians no matter what party they are in (and although I do not agree with Ron Paul’s positions he acts with a similar degree of honesty). For a brief moment, we all got a chance to see what politics could be.
Now, hopefully, the braintrust of the GOP will emphasize the positive contributions that this primary season has done for the GOP nominee.
LibertyBelle has raised some serious issues that need to be addressed by the GOP brass.
It irks me to have to vote for Romney, a man so steeped in the cult of Mormonism. He talks a good talk; however, since he doesn’t confess to be accountable to the true Higher Authority, he’ll have a conscience that is accountable to the will of man, instead of the will of God. I’ve never voted for a cult member before; it will take some prayin’ for me to do that. I know, I know, it’s a vote against Obama. Does that justify voting against my conscience?
So proud of him for fighting to the last. A pro-life warrior in every sense of the word.
Romney has as much firm conviction as a bowl of Jello. Santorum on the other hand, was our Lebanon cedar. As crushed as I am that he’s left the race, I’m certain he did it for all the reasons that made him my candidate in the first place. He’s genuinely honorable, faithful, and courageous and he has his priorities straight and his heart open to God’s will.
The nation desperately needs a man of his caliber, and if 2012 wasn’t Rick’s time, then I’m praying his time will yet come.
Rick Santorum is a class act, putting his daughter and family before his personal ambitions. What a great example of what a real man is and does. It would have been nice to have a Christian in the White House again, but we know from prophecy that’s not gonna happen. Take heart-everything happening now and to come must be, just as Christ said, so that He can return. The real shift in government that we are hoping and waiting for is coming, and it will never end. Presidents come and go, but there’s only one King of Kings. All the political machinations of men will come to naught in that hour. Keep looking up :)
Maestro,
Where do you live?
Carder,
I live in Canada. Alberta, to be a little more specific. We’ve got an interesting political situation brewing ourselves, though not on the same scale as that on which Santorum was operating and from which Obama must be removed.
I may not be able to vote in your elections, but I still try to help people to see that, unfortunately, Obama fulfills one of my favorite demotivational posters: it may be that the purpose of your life is merely to serve as a warning to others.
Don’t get me wrong; he’s a man with inherent dignity and is due respect as such, but he has supplied us with a bitterly real taste of how much damage a morally deficient president can do in the space of four years. I and many others north of the 49th pray that he doesn’t get a chance to beat his current record.
I’m excited that the race is finally on…though I don’t know if there is much to attack on Romney. He’s held every side of every position over the last 20 years…so can I attack him on anything? Or do I have to attack him on everything?
“So proud of him for fighting to the last. A pro-life warrior in every sense of the word.”
Dropping out two weeks before his home state holds its primary is “fighting to the last”?
” It would have been nice to have a Christian in the White House again, but we know from prophecy that’s not gonna happen”
Is Obama not a Christian?
Black liberation theology, which is what Obama believes in, is a far worse heresy than LDS. It’s absurd that we’re talking about whether or not Romney is “really” Christian when we have the guy in the White House whose spiritual mentor preaches that “salvation” means punishing rich white people.
Romney or bust…
How many spiritual advisors are the GOP pushing on Obama these days?
Come on folks,
Didn’t Obama insist he had no clue what Rev. Wright had been saying for 20 years so what’s the problem? Certainly we all believe him, right?
I know, he described his pastor and mentor as that embarassing uncle that every family has, but what the heck, we can all understand political expediency.
What is it with all the comments “I hate to HAVE to vote for Romney…” Who says you HAVE to vote for him? Isn’t your vote your own? If you settle for a candidate you do not believe in then you have caved to the establishment and what they want. My vote is my own. I am voting for Ron Paul no matter what. I am flipping the bird, so to speak, at the GOP and the ridiculous neo-cons they consistently serve up election after election. I am not voting for the liberal in a sheep’s costume that they have dictated all conservatives must vote for. I am not going to roll over and die. I am sick of the way politics operates in this country and I decided I am not going to fall in line. I can’t change how other people vote but I am going to vote my conscience and leave the rest up to God. If you don’t like Romney, don’t vote for him!!!! He is more of the same and Roe v. Wade will not be overturned during a Romney presidency. He is no different than Obama. He really isn’t.
As far as has been my experience, you are sometimes obligated to attend family functions at a relative’s house, even though you might not want to be there because you share little in common with your relative besides blood or marital ties.
I was not aware this same obligation existed in regards to religious establishments and those who preside over them. As far as I knew, if i you didn’t agree with a pastor, priest, deacon, etc., you were perfectly welcome to get right up from the pew and find a new religious establishment with different doctrine and personnel.
What I’m trying to say is…Obama is full of it, with a capital “sh”.
Split the republican vote this year, and politics might not exist in 2016.
Sieg Hope!
You are soooooo dramatic x…we survived 8 years of W Bush…we can survive 8 years of Obama.
A liberal, a moderate and a conservative walk into a bar.
The bartender says, “Hi, Mitt!”
Hal says: April 10, 2012 at 7:40 pm
“Is Obama not a Christian?”
=============================================================
‘It is as you have said’ to paraphrase Jesus the Christ.
You’re right, Sydney.
I don’t HAVE to vote for Romney, free will and all that.
But if I value liberty and national security, then I HAVE to vote against Obama by voting for the candidate that has the most realistic chance of defeating him.
So if voting for Uncle Paul floats your boat, then knock yourself out. It would make Obama a very happy golfer.
What I’m trying to say is…Obama is full of it, with a capital “sh”.
==============================================================
Are you implying that the o’bama is a SHiite sympathizer?
Carder,
At least in my home state I can vote for anybody but the ‘0’, or nobody, and it won’t affect the outcome.
The only way b o could ever carry Texas is if his challenger enrolled his son at the Uninversity of Oklahoma and spit on Sam Houston’s grave.
Hopefully, all the first time voters who thought it would be ‘cool’ to elect our first Kenyan as president have sobered up and in this next presidential election will judge the candidates by the content of his/her chararcter.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
I agree with Sydney. I am sick of the way the Republican party dishes up a faux conservative to us every election cycle, defends this by hiding behind “electability,” and then whines when people call their candidates compromisers and RINOs. I am tired of voting for the least bad option. And that doesn’t mean less in an election where the stakes are so high, it means more. Now, because Obama is so awful, the GOP should be looking to put a real conservative against him, not a liberal just pretending. We should not be kid ourselves: Romney is going the same direction as Obama. just more slowly. And yes, brakes are good. But turning around is better. We should not let liberals run under the guise of conservatism. If Obama wins this election because the GOP failed to run a real conservative, that is not the fault of those who refuse to vote for pretenders like Romney. It’s the fault of the GOP for banking on pretenders in the first place.
I love how the logic has become that no matter how much Obama sucks, we can survive 8 years of him.
Dittos for abortion then. Seriously. It’s true. WE can survive how many years of it remain ahead.
What are we to make of someone who doubles down in their support for abortion in an election year? I can’t imagine anyone spitting in the face of Life more with the attitude of “Hell YEAH you can survive eight years of me, B|TCH! And here I come with a billion dollars of the 1%ers money to make it happen.”
But enough about Jarrett. Let’s talk about Obama for a bit…
Yes. I will vote for Ron Paul, Carder. You go ahead and vote for the “lesser of two evils” which, btw, is still evil. And then wonder to yourself why we are no closer to reversing Roe v. Wade or why our country is still going to hell in a hand basket even with a “conservative” president. We’ve had many “conservative” presidents through the years. We still overspent, overtaxed, rushed headlong into socialism and had our rights stripped away through the Patriot act etc… and 1.2 million abortions a year still occurred. I’m ready to really try something new. An actual patriot who actually wants to follow the Constitution. The neo-cons who are members of the CFR just like the liberals don’t like it. They want us to think only neo-con puppets like Mitt have “electability”. They want you to fear “four more years of Obama” so much that you are willing to abandon your ideals and vote for their little puppet. Well I’m not drinking the kool aid. Sorry.
Alice says:
We should not kid ourselves: Romney is going the same direction as Obama, just more slowly.
Even if that were true, it would still be preferable to the utter destruction that Barack “after the election I will have more flexibility” Obama would usher in if he were to have four more years.
We can look on it this way: Romney will be a caretaker president that will be able to straighten out a few things economically because he will also have both houses of congress. We should not discount the dramatic difference this alone will make between a Romney presidency and an Obama second term. It is HUGE. It will go a long way to preventing us from becoming another Greece and experiencing an European debt crisis. It will give our kids and grandkids a fighting chance not be burdened by an Obama debt explosion.
Another very important difference is that Romney is nobody’s fool and in that respect he will uplift our image in the world after the pathetically weak Obama. But at the same time he is not a true conservative so we will have to rely upon congress to steer him in the right direction on the social issues. Don’t look to him to lead on the social issues (except perhaps for real marriage) but if presented a piece of legislation in our favor he will sign it.
And then following Romney’s term as caretaker we can finally elect one of the great conservatives that are waiting in the wings. One of the following come to mind at this time: Santorum, Ryan, Rubio or Jindal, but we can be sure others will emerge. By this time the corrupt legacy media will implode and new forms of conservative media will continue their ascendancy thus eliminating what advantage the liberals currently enjoy.
The main problem with these assumptions is that with the continued debasement of culture and morality in our country the politics that emerges is fraught with contentiousness, anger, and corruption. Virtue is word that we do not hear much of but when laying the foundations of our democracy the founding fathers recognized it and belief in God as keys to a healthy and thriving Republic.
Rick’s wife won’t get to be first lady now either :(
Sydney: “Yes. I will vote for Ron Paul, Carder. You go ahead and vote for the “lesser of two evils” which, btw, is still evil.”
You are mistaking a figure of speech we commonly use to explain electoral dynamics for a real existent thing. Paul is evil too. He’s not perfect. Voting for him is still voting for evil (unless you’re a bizarre cultist like many “name one thing wrong with him!” Obama voters were). The lesser one, in fact, on your view.
Seriously, since when has the figure of speech “lesser of two evils” morphed into a way of validating a tertium quid as holy and above reproach?
If you think you can vote and not hold your nose at all, you’re little different than “American Prayer” cultists.
I’m voting Ron Paul in the primary out of principle (I really do feel he’s the only principled candidate, and overturning Roe v. Wade is a huge victory that he supports)…but when it comes to November, I’ll throw my vote to whoever is the GOP candidate. ANYBODY BUT OBAMA, 2012.
Thank you Rick Santorum for standing up and bringing faith and values back to the political scene! I am very sorry you decided to leave the race, but the country is a better place because of your courage and your testimony.
You and yuor family, especially Bella, are in my prayers.
As for all of us, we cannot afford to sit out on the sidelines this coming November. We all need to get out and vote! Freedom has been paid too dearly to throw away!
I like the way Maestro put it “I’d rather take my chances in the fog than head straight for the rocks”.
At this point in history, if Obama is re-elected we’ll head straight for the rocks (remember he said he will have MORE FLEXIBILITY after the elections) and sure death!
I will vote for the GOP nominee, whoever he will be, since I hope I can have a chance to influence the journey through the fog.
So, please stand up, dust off and get out and VOTE this November!
As much as I can’t stand Obama I thank God he was elected as the prolife movement was fired up like never before!! There is no stopping the work that has been done in opposition to the most proabortion president we have ever had!
But I will do whatever I can to see to it that he is unemployed in November 2012!
Carla, I understand your point of view, but I don’t think we can “thank God Obama was elected”.
I think we can thank God that after Obama was elected people have stood up and recognized the Truth and have decided to mobilize and fight.
I was shocked reading on Lifenews this morning that a group in California called “Clergy for Choice” has organized a 40 day of prayer campiagn to support Planned Parenthood and abortion and has prayer intentions like
* “Day 40: Today we give thanks and celebrate that abortion is still safe and legal.”
There’s no limit to evil and deception in the abortion industry!
How many more generations of unborn should be wiped out? How many more million of women should be harmed beyond imagination? How many thousand of families destroyed?
We all need to stand up now and speak out the Truth.
The Truth will set us free!
No need to tell me what you think I can or cannot do Richard.
I can.
And I do.
I am to praise Him in ALL things. He does what pleases Him. It was God’s will that Obama is president.
Carla, my intention was not to tell you what to do. I was just sharing my opinion.
I praise God with you in everything!
I recognize this is a very difficult topic for some of us and it has been for a long time, but personally I think that we all had a choice three years ago and the majority voted to put in charge a President whose views are not in line with God’s views on Life (since is Obama is pro-abortion).
Can I honestly say God willed it? Maybe…
Maybe , the majority chose to look the other way and maybe God just permitted it. HE didn’t stop the majority from voting for Obama. I guess we need to learn the hard way!
However, Carla, I agree with you, God can bring the greatest Good out of the worst kind of Evil!
Happy Easter!
Richard – it was not exactly a group called “Clergy for Choice” that started the “40 Days of Prayer” campaign. It was Planned Parenthood, specifically Six Rivers Planned Parenthood (SRPP). As a part of SRPP’s various “advisory groups” (i.e. groups complicit in the Killing Machine that is PP who sign on to provide political cover), there is a group they call “Clergy for Choice.” In my area, they have a similar group they refer to as their “clergy” advisory group.
http://www.plannedparenthood.org/srpp/clergy-choice-32630.htm
Richard,
:) I didn’t mean to be so snarky. Forgive me for that.
This blog can be so disheartening at times and all I can do is cling to His promises and praise Him that He is in control. I will trust Him.
Happy Resurrection Sunday to you too!!
Bryan said “it was not exactly a group called “Clergy for Choice” ”
Bryan you are absolutely right! It’s a group affiliated with PP.
However, as the Lifenews story reports
“Some of the local “churches” participating in the pro-abortion prayer event include: Temple Beth El in Eureka, Humboldt Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Bayside, St. Francis in Fortuna, Old Town Gazebo in Eureka, and Arcata United Methodist.”
So, there are “churches” involved in this campaign.
I guess there are “churches” out there that see abortion as “good”.
To give you an example, at the PP clinic in my area, I often see a PP escort who, while pro-lifers are quitely praying on the sidewalk, he stands close by them inside the fence and sings at the top of his lungs beautiful prayer-songs like “On eagle’s wings” which talks about how we are in God’s hands and others.
I must tell you that I find that very distrubing!
I think that either this person is seriously confused and misled and believes God loves abortion or that he’s trying his best to annoy pro-lifers and push them away.
Carla said:
Richard, I didn’t mean to be so snarky. Forgive me for that.
Carla, absolutely no problem!
We are in this all together!
“Hopefully, all the first time voters who thought it would be ‘cool’ to elect our first Kenyan as president have sobered up and in this next presidential election will judge the candidates by the content of his/her chararcter.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”
Once again, you add nothing to the conversation except to remind us all that Obama’s father was from Kenya. Aren’t there some white supremacist blogs you could visit?
Hal said “you add nothing to the conversation”
Hal you missed the point of the comment.
Did you look for it or are you just trying to argue?
Here’s the great point of the comment:
Hopefully…in this next presidential election (voters) will judge the candidates by the content of his/her chararcter.
The “content of the character” is a direct reference to “the color of his skin” from the Dr. King speech. Ken likes to talk about the fact that President Obama is black.
Hal, I know several people who voted for Obama “just because he’s black,” which is exactly what Dr. King and Richard were talking about. It’s just as racist.
I think the main issue is that the decision to elect one candidate vs. another should be based on the “content of the character”.
It was not done so for Obama.
Many of the votes where based on race (black in Obama’s case), therefore, by definition, based on “racism”.
Hopefully many of those people will this time not cast a ballot on the basis of racism.
Well, yes, Hal. Ken may be gratuitously inflammatory, but one of the funnest ways a gadfly like Ken toys with folks is by getting them to reject particular truths by expressing them in exaggerated form. Then you look like an idiot for rejecting the particular truth.
It’s a common ploy, used by Limbaugh and Coulter as well.
The color of Obama’s skin mattered dramatically in the 2008 election. If he hadn’t’ve been black, no one would have taken his credentials seriously — or, to the extent they had, they’d’ve pointed out that he’s been manufactured by Axelrod and Jarrett since before he became an Illinois state senator.
Then he can doubly chuckle as you imply that he’s a white supremacist. Whether he is or not, he’s given no more evidence that he is than any of a number of famous and respected black activists have given that they’re black supremacists, for all their race-centered talk.
Just a thought.
Richard: I wouldn’t say “racism.” “Racialism,” yes. Certainly. There’s a huge difference. All racists are racialist, but not all racialists are racist.
Unitarians pray? I thought they did some sort of earthmother ritual or sacrificed a goat or something.
ken,
That is exactly what I am saying. Familiar with the saying, “You’re so full of it, your eyes are brown.”? Obama’s eyes are as brown as they come. He’s also 6’1″, which really impresses me with his parents’ it-stacking ability, as I wasn’t aware anyone was able to stack it so high.
Drudge was noting how sickly Obama’s been looking. I’ve always referred to him as the “hat-rack-in-chief” or the “gaunt president and severe first lady”.
I’m just so done with him. I may camp out at the polling place as if a Star Wars movie were opening.
Looking for George Lucas to egg? I’m so confused . . . ;)
Richard – it is sad to see churches involved in the Machinery of Death. I guess I should not be surprised to see a Univ Unit, Episcopal or UMC church involved since they all support abortion. I am unclear on Temple Beth El and could not find “Old Town Gazebo.” During one of our 40 Days campaigns, there was a local “pastor” who came frequently as a deathscort to “support” the clients in the face of our “harassment.” Pardon me if I seemed argumentative. My point was just that it was Planned Parenthood that organized the 40 Days of Death to support their own evildoing as opposed to some independent third party that was all-so-concerned about women.
Bryan, that’s exactly what this campaign is “40 Days of (more) Death” courtesy of Planned Parenthood & Friends!
Our game against the “culture of death” is still “on”.
Well, it should be an interesting race. Early on, it feels like Bush vs Kerry…you’ve got a vulnerable President, but the guy chosen to face him is an east coast, snobbish flip flopper.
John Kerry = Mitt Romney
I’m excited though – after three years, the right are finally going to have to stand behind somebody and do something other than criticize and cut down.
Hans: Drudge was noting how sickly Obama’s been looking. I’ve always referred to him as the “hat-rack-in-chief” or the “gaunt president and severe first lady”.
You ever see pictures of Abe Lincoln, as he began his Presidency, and then after he’d been in a few years? ;)
And hey – we – those of us who voted in the one poll that Santorum would be next out – were right!
Doug – you are right about the poll – I thought it would be Gingrich – apparently I underestimated what an egotistical @$$ he is – I liked Santorum but knew he was a long shot – Gingrich, on the other hand, did not have as much chance as the proverbial snowball – apparently he has more time and money on his hands than sense
Sigh….
Jill…I spoke with you back in 2006 shortly after seeing an interview of you and feeling energized once again about my pro-life stance…particularly as an adopted person.
Back then I, with a lot of dismay, explained with reason and evidence why your position of support for Rick Santorum was not only misplaced but would end in bitter dissapointment. I could not understand why you would support someone even with pro-life credentials such as Santorum’s, a person who would lend his enthusiastic support to that Liberal Arlen Specter who was a MAJOR abortion supporter only because Santorum thought it would be better to have Specter in place to help George W. Bush push through a conservative to the Supreme Court which did happen with Samuel Alito. However, in the process, Santorum passed the opportunity to support Pat Toomey who was MUCH more conservative than Specter ever was and was pro-life to boot.
And I told you exactly what was going to happen, especially taking into account the mood of the country against Bush and the conservatives vis a vis the War on Terror. Santorum, I said, was going to lose and lose big and he did. And all that hope that somehow if Santorum could just get reelected we would have a better shot at taking down Roe vs Wade was flushed down the toilet with Santorum.
Now that I heard the news of Santorum pulling out right before he was going to lose Pennsylvania again….AND TRUST ME HE WOULD HAVE….I see that you still pine away for him and…worst of all….you are giving your support to Mitt “I WAS FOR ABORTION BEFORE I WAS AGAINST IT” Romney.
Before addressing this….let’s look back one more time at Rick “I”LL SAY ANYTHING TO HELP THE REPUBLICAN PARTY” Santorum. Here is his actual press release during the 2008 presidential election when he threw his support behind Romney over John McCain……
“In a few short days, Republicans from across this country will decide more than their party’s nominee. They will decide the very future of our party and the conservative coalition that Ronald Reagan built. Conservatives can no longer afford to stand on the sidelines in this election, and Governor Romney is the candidate who will stand up for the conservative principles that we hold dear,” said Senator Santorum. “Governor Romney has a deep understanding of the important issues confronting our country today, and he is the clear conservative candidate that can go into the general election with a united Republican party.”
Contrast that to what Rick was saying just recently before pulling out of the 2012 race….
Santorum said Tuesday that former Godfather’s Pizza CEO Herman Cain and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney were both lacking the conservative principles voters were looking for.
“I don’t think either of them have great conservative credentials,” Cain said on CNN’s “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.”
“Look at Herman Cain. He’s putting forward a brand new tax for the American public. A national sales tax. At the same time that we’re going to have an income tax and value added tax. That’s not a conservative proposal in my opinion.”
Santorum had a similar assessment of Romney, saying the candidate’s record as governor of Massachusetts was littered with non-conservative decisions.
“I think Mitt Romney is someone who raised taxes, instituted gay marriage in Massachusetts when he didn’t have to,” Santorum said. “You look at Romneycare, it’s is a huge government takeover.”
So how could you, Jill, ever support someone, even with bona-fide pro-life convictions, who is either A: a horrible judge of character…or …B: will say and do anything to remain in public office on your tax dollars AND is not effective against the abortion hoard in Washington D.C.?
Now to Romney….other than he is neither Democrat and/or Obama…..just why as a pro-lifer…as I am…supporting Romney? Do you honestly…deep down in your soul….convinced that this man….who at one time believed and fought for the right for a woman to murder her unborn child…will ever do one thing to over turn Roe vs. Wade?
Even if he does win…..abortion will be the least thing on his mind…as he will have his hands full staving off the second wave of the Great Depression 2.0 (which by the way in neither Bush’s or Obama’s fault…..just a natural thing that was a long time coming).
It saddens me greatly to see someone of such conviction for the unborn and a devout Christian so embroiled in the notion that through the corrupt means of politics you could ever affect a change in people’s hearts and thus change the law. You need to come to the realization that I have….You…I…am not citizens of America…..we are citizens of the Kingdom of God. It is just as the Jews of old in occupied Israel and Jerusalem during the reign of the Romans. Jesus did not come to be a political messiah….he came to give men the opportunity to change their corrupt hearts. And he was crucified in part for being a so called “false Messiah”. Part of Jesus’s gospel was that no matter who rules over you even if you are a slave…if your heart is corrupt and your relationship with Father God is not right….it does not matter who rules over you…Roman….native Jew…..Republican or Democrat….it will all fail and end in tears of dissapointment and the death of innocents.
Here is my latest prediction to you….Romney will narrowly win…..and at the end of his 4 year term….America will be in the throes or on the cusp of the throes of the second wave of the Great Depression 2.0….and millions more babies will have been slaughtered in America’s abortion death camps.
And you will probably be supporting Rick Santorum again in 2016 and will be just as dissapointed when he drops out of the primary again. And you will continue to uselessly give your support to a politician with a Republican stamp who will be able to do nothing or unwilling to do anything about America’s Holocaust.
For you see Jill…..America was not developed for us by God to give humanity and for us American’s our last best hope for the Utopian idea of Freedom since the Fall of Adam and Eve…..America was allowed to develop to break our hearts at how useless our attempts at Freedom and Liberty and Justice for All could be apart from God. And that doesn’t mean supporting the Constitution more…..it means realizing you and me and everyone called Americans who are also Christians are simply Kingdom citizens who are occupied by a group of people called Americans….who have a sacred secular document called the Constitution that allows us to delude ourselves into thinking we have Freedoms and Liberty and Justice.
Ask any of the 50 or so million babies slaughtered since Roe vs. Wade what they think of the Constitution….of America….of the Political Process…..of Republicans. Of any man’s capability to stop their slaughter.
I don’t think they would think any more highly of it than I do.
Doug,
Only we’d be the ones voting for Lincoln, considering the abolition and everything.
Bryan: Doug – you are right about the poll – I thought it would be Gingrich – apparently I underestimated what an egotistical @$$ he is – I liked Santorum but knew he was a long shot – Gingrich, on the other hand, did not have as much chance as the proverbial snowball – apparently he has more time and money on his hands than sense.
Bryan, I don’t think Newt ever really wanted to be President, nor thought he had a true good chance. He wanted his name “out there,” and he has his agendas – including his own business pursuits. Newt’s no dummy.
I do think he got fired up at Mitt Romney 2 or 3 months ago, and basically said, “The heck with it, I’m gonna keep on…”
As for Santorum (UGH) – I realize you disagree, but I’m very grateful he’s gone – that kind of a candidate has no place in a public forum. My opinion.
X: Doug, Only we’d be the ones voting for Lincoln, considering the abolition and everything.
So, the slaveowners didn’t have a good enough reason to trump the will of the slaves, eh?
I don’t think pro-lifers have a good enough reason to trump the will of pregnant women.
Danny S:
What are you suggesting we do in 2012 now that the nomination is virtually certain to go to Romney? Will you throw away your vote by sitting it out or by voting for someone that has no chance?
Politics is the art of the possible…we do the best we can with the candidate that is more likely to support our issues. It is quite clear that Obama cannot, must not, be given four more years to wreak havoc on our country. His is a truly failed presidency with zero accomplishments and a legacy of divisiveness. His efforts to introduce class warfare as the centerpiece of his campaign will be his undoing as people will, and already are, tiring of his negativity.
We cannot put all our hopes into one basket in a system with three branches of government. We have a real chance to get both houses of congress and even with a less than ideal President Romney we at least have the art of the possible in getting some really positive things done.
We have a choice to be grateful that Obama’s presidency is about to come to an end, or we can be glum about all of the misdirection plays and lies his campaign will certainly use to try to defeat Romney. We must choose the former and press onward confidently and aggressively.
Your analogy is lacking, Doug. Unless you’re trying to say that the slaves voluntarily engaged in acts that had the purpose of leading to their slavery, then their comparison to pregnant women is pretty weak. Last I looked, if you were going to make that comparison, then you’d naturally have to say that slavers were the historical counterpart to rapists, and that they only accounted for 1% of slavery cases. Furthermore, that would mean that 99% of slaves engaged in voluntary acts that had the natural ends and purpose of leading to slavery. Therefore, the slavery analogy is much more applicable to the pregnant woman/prenatal child analogy, since 1) women willingly engage in acts that they know to cause pregnancy in 99% of the cases (much like slavers willingly chose to engage in acts of slavery for the purposes of reducing other humans to the level of chattel to dispose of as they saw fit) and 2) prenatal humans do not ask or engage in acts voluntarily to place themselves in their positions of lesser standing at the mercy of others who seek to relegate them to positions of disposable chattel (much like the slaves were reduced to).
I don’t think pregnant women have a good enough reason to trump the life of their offspring that they in 99% of cases PUT IN THAT POSITION OF DEPENDENCE BY THEIR OWN VOLUNTARY ACTIONS WHICH HAVE THE KNOWN BIOLOGICAL PURPOSE OF PUTTING OFFSPRING IN THAT POSITION. Parents are legally obligated in every single other context to provide for and nurture their offspring, even to the exclusion of bodily autonomy (if there is no other option, women are REQUIRED to breastfeed their children by law). The obligation is even more compelling under the law if your own voluntary actions put your children in a state of peril/dependence…you must do whatever you can to safeguard your child until an adequate substitute for their care is available. In the case of a pregnant woman until viability, there is only one option. Just as the mother who is expected by law to breastfeed until an adequate substitute becomes available, a woman who cuts off nourishment and adequate care for her prenatal offspring should be held equally accountable or even moreso, due to the likelihood that her own voluntary actions placed her prenatal offspring in that position of dependence/peril. It is a logical inconsistency and legal idiocy that this widely-held principle isn’t applied to the prenatal offspring context. Pregnancy isn’t a patriarchal plot designed to throw women back into the kitchen. It sometimes happens when we make a decision to engage in the very act of sex that has only ONE biological purpose for its existence: pregnancy.
Doug,
I don’t think pro-lifers have a good enough reason to trump the will of pregnant women.
I can think of at least one famous case where “The Triumph of the Will” was not a good thing. That and at least 50 million more.
“So, the slaveowners didn’t have a good enough reason to trump the will of the slaves, eh?
I don’t think pro-lifers have a good enough reason to trump the will of pregnant women.”
Lyssie: Your analogy is lacking, Doug. Unless you’re trying to say that the slaves voluntarily engaged in acts that had the purpose of leading to their slavery, then their comparison to pregnant women is pretty weak.
Lyssie, what, necessarily, does that have to do with it? It is the case that slaveowners thought their ‘druthers should trump those of the slaves. It is the case that pro-lifers think their ‘druthers should trump those of the pregnant woman. Regardless of the circumstances leading to the given status, the above remains true.
___
you’d naturally have to say that slavers were the historical counterpart to rapists, and that they only accounted for 1% of slavery cases.
That doesn’t make sense, and I don’t think that’s actually what you meant. How could the “1%” be anything close to true, there?
“I don’t think pro-lifers have a good enough reason to trump the will of pregnant women.”
Hans: I can think of at least one famous case where “The Triumph of the Will” was not a good thing. That and at least 50 million more.
Hans, yeah – your will is something different. It’s a given that not everybody agrees about this stuff.
Doug: then your analogy is a shallow one indeed. It has nothing to do with “druthers.” If you’re trying to be intellectually honest about the victimized class here, it ain’t the women. The abolitionists’ intentions had nothing to do with their “druthers” or what they PREFERRED about the people treated as slaves, it had everything to do with the fact that the slaves were HUMAN BEINGS. The preference of the abolitionists had nothing to do with their basic arguments for freedom; you have an extremely shallow viewpoint of the actions of the abolitionists if you believe that their actions were based solely on their “druthers”. They spoke for human beings that had no voice to opine their “druthers”. As do today’s modern pro-lifers. It has nothing to do with what we would PREFER… it has everything to do with injustice and the recognition of humanity in the prenatal child. Just as it had to do with the humanity of the slave.
What an immensely shallow viewpoint of abolitionism…as if it was all about “personal preference.” That is an insult to the memory of all the abolitionists who fought and cared and gave a damn about the slaves who had no “druthers” of which to speak. Humanity, Doug. Not “preference”.
Doug,
Of course we all have different “wills” or “druthers”. But if we just allow anyone to do whatever they want it’s called anarchy. We are a society. Some wills must outweigh others for the benefit of all and that of the individual.
Thank you Jerry for your reply.
What am I suggesting? Not being snarky, mind you, I thought I was perfectly plain. There is not nor will there ever be a political answer to the dilemma of the human heart. Jerimiah 17:9 “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?
You and Jill may wish to continue to try the “art of the possible”, but since 1776, are we any more “free”, do we have more “liberty”, is there more “Justice” and particularly for those 50+ million babies slaughtered in the abortion camps…do we have more “Life” than the Founding Fathers and Brothers did at the inception of our country? I think you and Jill know the answer to this….it is just hard to let go of such an ingrained secular religion that has been indoctrinated into us….much of it from our very own churches…..as this thing we call being American.
My rather lengthy post above was not suggesting anything other than my own withdrawal from a system that was doomed from the beginning because of what I stated above….the concepts of human liberty and freedom as espoused by the Founding Fathers in the Declaration of Independence, The Articles of Confederation first and then The Constitution and later the Amendments were born in sin from the heart of sinful men. Mind you,,,men of great and good intent…..but none the less….from the heart and minds of sinful men. Lest we forget…..The Founding Documents are sacred only in the secular sense….not the ETERNAL, TRUTHFUL sense of Jesus Christ and His Eternal Word.
I am sure you and Jill can and will certainly continue to play the game of politics. That’s your right. It is also my right not to. You may say that I then do not have the right to complain. You are right….which is why I do not and have not since the election of 2000 (which I voted for George W. by the way). But I also abrogate any guilt in what happens either way….since I neither voted for someone who actively tries to destroy America’s founding principles and allows legalized infanticide, or simply through benign neglect or cowardice does nothing about seriously tackling the issue…..(every Republican president since Roe vs. Wade).
Let me leave you with some more evidence that the “art of the possible” is entirely a useless act. It is from the Bible and it matters not whether you are a believer or not…..just some ammunition to back up my evolving worldview that is something akin to how the Amish see the world and their role in America….similar to what the Bible tells us to do…namely….be in the world but not a part of it. I am in America by birth….but I am no longer a part of it. Just an exile or an occupied citizen of a Kingdom yet to be revealed.
Here is a passage from Revelation. The End Times have come and gone…Satan is bound and thrown into the Abyss for 1000 years and Jesus Christ reigns alone in Jerusalem for that same 1000 year period. There will be no democracies…no republics…no Soviet Socialist States…..just a Monarchy (didn’t we go to war a couple hundred years ago to throw away that system…ironic don’t you think?) and not only a Monarchy but a Theocracy…but not the evil Satanic Islamic Caliphate type. A true Monarchical Theocratic State of World Peace ruled by the King of Kings for 1000 years….the buck always stopping with Him and Him alone.
Until…….
I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. They[a] had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years. 5 (The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection. 6 Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years.
The Judgment of Satan
7 When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison 8 and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth—Gog and Magog—and to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. 9 They marched across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of God’s people, the city he loves. But fire came down from heaven and devoured them. 10 And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.
So….I hope you see where I am coming from. If the physical presence and earthly reign of Jesus Christ for 1000 years is not enough to quell the latent evil in all men’s hearts….evil that jumps at the chance to unleash itself when Satan is let loose from his prison after 1000 years (remember this is before THE FINAL WHITE THRONE JUDGEMENT AND THE RENEWAL OF THE EARTH AND THE HEAVENS)…..if that is impossible….then what on Earth is your evidence that the Constitution of the United States of America and your right to vote will fair any better than Jesus Christ himself after 1000 years of Just and Peaceful Rule?
This not a snarky question…..it is earnest and honest. I would certainly like you or Jill or anyone else on this forum to come up with ANY evidence in the last 250 years of American history and world history where the slaughter of innocents was stopped by a Constitutional vote and not through the bloodshed of war. I am not advocating armed violence to stop abortion….you can’t change the human heart through violence. But then again….the very act of you voting was won through bloodshed and the freedom of black people was won through bloodshed and Jesus Christ won all or us ETERNAL FREEDOM….through bloodshed….his own of course.
Abortion in particular, but voting and the idea of Freedom in general….do not have solutions….which is why I am not providing any…..they are simply dilemmas. They will only be solved at the Final Judgement….and only after the last failure of all time to bring Peace and Justice to the world in which evil still remains in the human heart….namely the Millineum Reign of Christ.
Of course we all have different “wills” or “druthers”. But if we just allow anyone to do whatever they want it’s called anarchy. We are a society. Some wills must outweigh others for the benefit of all and that of the individual.
Hans, there are so many people on both sides of the abortion debate that it’s hardly “anarchy” we’re talking about. You’re right – a society – and the idea of not restricting the freedom of the individual without a good enough reason is a profound one.
then your analogy is a shallow one indeed. It has nothing to do with “druthers.” If you’re trying to be intellectually honest about the victimized class here, it ain’t the women. The abolitionists’ intentions had nothing to do with their “druthers” or what they PREFERRED about the people treated as slaves, it had everything to do with the fact that the slaves were HUMAN BEINGS.
Lyssie, I had not said anything about the abolitionists. As far as pregnant women – potentially denied legal abortions while wanting them – well yes, they would be the victims if pro-lifers get their way. I realize you think there is a greater good involved in trying to ensure that all pregnancies are continued.
Okay, as far as the abolitionists – hey, if we’re trying for “intellectual honesty,” then oh yes indeed it’s about their ‘druthers.
Yes, the slaves were “human beings,” and more than that – they were thinking, feeling people with consciousness and desires of their own, the ability to suffer, etc. Should the desires of the slaveowners trump their desires? I say no just as I say the wills of pregnant women shouldn’t be trumped by pro-lifers.
In this case I agree with the abolitionists. But while you, me, (and the abolitionists themselves, as far as I know) would agree on “human being,” we have not even gotten to the argument, if any, over slavery. “Human beings” is an external reality to the discussion, it’s a separate, physical, objective thing. Any and all the “shoulds” and “should nots” come from opinions.
You and Jill may wish to continue to try the D“art of the possible”, but since 1776, are we any more “free”, do we have more “liberty”, is there more “Justice” and particularly for those 50+ million babies slaughtered in the abortion camps
Danny, Maybe there is more ‘Justice’ now then back in 1776 when there were no laws at all restricting abortion. Can you define what you meant by ‘Justice’? Were you referring to ‘political’ justice or the true and eternal (other-worldly) justice brought to us through Jesus Christ? You wouldn’t presume to judge Santorum through the other-worldly lens would you?
Thanks for your reply truthseeker. I suppose I meant the temporal and secular justice as framed by the Founders in the various Founding Documents.
I understand there were no explicit laws back at the inception of the Country concerning abortion. However, there was no implicit nor explicit Constitutional right as recognized by the Founders to the issue of abortion. I’m sure that was the case because such would have been the heinous nature of it that the Founders would have blanched at the thought of it. And certainly, although I have no evidence yet, that if there was a case of willing abortions being done by doctors at the time either through mechanical means or through the use of herbal medicines that charges of criminality would have been brought forth.
Even if that were not the case…with today’s legality of infanticide how could you possibly believe that amongst the things that the Founders were trying to bring forth in this new Utopia of “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness”, and a “More Perfect Union” namely a more Just society than the tyrannical one they overthrew, that we have more Justice in today’s version of America as opposed to the yesteryear of the Founders?
Once again, the screaming voices of 50 million plus dead babies say otherwise.
Allow me to tighten up my meaning of justice vis a vis the unborn and the concern of abortion with this. The concept of the Unalienable Rights of man as expressed with the statement from the Constitution…..“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” came from in part from the philospher and bishop of Peterborough Richard Cumberland who wrote in 1672 that promoting the well being of our fellow humans is essential to “the pursuit of happiness”. Add to this thought the writings of John Locke who stated “Civil interest I call life, liberty, health, and indolency of body; and the possession of outward things…” indolency in this case meaning a body that is free from pain or at rest for weariness.
Every baby conceived in this Nation to American citizens is by right of Law an American citizen. However, we have made it legal and have a Biblical generation of time elapsed (come 2013, 40 years) in which we deny and forcibly take away those infants’ Constitutional Rights every time we hacked them apart, chemically melt them or at worst pull them out and shove a pair of scissors into the back of their little skulls. It’s hard to have Life, and Liberty or to pursue Happiness….in other words….it’s hard to exercise your God Given, Constitutionally protected, Unalienable Rights….that just so happen to be SELF EVIDENT (meaning one DOES NOT NEED A WRITTEN DOCUMENT SUCH AS THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE FOR THESE RIGHTS TO BE TRUE)…it’s kind of hard to pursue these when you are brutally killed at your most vulnerable time, namely in your mother’s womb….in which such Constitutional protections should be even more enforced for the sake of the most vulnerable citizens of us all.
Yet we will go to war to win our own Unalienable Rights, we will go to war to win those rights for people of another skin color and we will even go to war in foreign lands to give others those rights……yet for those of us most vulnerable….Citizens in our own Land….Citizens hidden, supposedly protected in the Womb…..the best we can do is punch a card, or click a button on a touch screen and “HOPE” for the best every 4 years.
Where…may I ask again…is the increased amount of Justice today since 1973 as opposed to 1776? And every time you say the Pledge of Allegiance….particularly when you get to the part “…..and Justice For All !” how can you not hang your head in shame at sound of that coming from your lips?
Whoops….sorry….I stated that the Unalienable Rights statement was found in the Constitution….it was not of course….it was the Declaration of Independence. I knew that….lots of thought swirling around the old noggin’ this late at night.
As far as judging Rick Santorum…his own words judge him. He supported the Arch Abortion Supporter Arlen Specter over another Republican who was pro-life. He supported Mitt Romney in 2008 when he invoked Reagan in the sense that he believed Mitt was of the same cloth as Reagan….yet when Rick was running he suddenly dissed Mitt for being a supporter of Gay Marriage and Socialized Medicine in the state of Massachusetts.
He is either a VERY BAD judge of character or is simply a crass political animal who just happens to hold pro-life beliefs. Either way….regardless of his stance on Pro-Life….he is someone NOT TO BE TRUSTED…particularly in being successful in overturning Roe v Wade or even laying down some solid groundwork in order to do so.
And as far as my seemingly hopeless stance concerning the politcal process and America as a whole….where do these politicians come from?
Not from some alien space invasion or some military junta devised take-over.
They were born, raised, christened or baptized, educated, trained, employed and ultimately elected by us…..
We The (CORRUPT) People…..
And truth be told…..if you want a change in this country you had better demand it from the pulpit before you even step into a voting booth. And their lies the TRUEST tragedy of them all…….truth comes from the Churches, it must be not only ESPOUSED but LIVED….BOLDLY AND OUT IN THE OPEN.
If your culture is rotten…..don’t blame George W. or Barack Obama…or any politcian and certainly do not go chasing a solution in politics
Look at yourself and look at your pastor. In other words……where’s the salt that cures the meat?
Anything else is a complete waste of time.
Okay, as far as the abolitionists – hey, if we’re trying for “intellectual honesty,” then oh yes indeed it’s about their ‘druthers.
Yeah. Doug wants to absolutely ignore and write out the fact that we are talking about other human beings here, and that Pro-Lifers speak not for ourselves, but for other human beings-REAL, LIVE, THINKING, FEELING HUMAN BEINGS (need I remind you, I am only here because of my daughter-a real, live, thinking, feeling human being who would’ve been aborted had the genders between her father and I been switched). They don’t matter. To him, the only human beings involved are the pregnant women seeking abortions vs. us bad, mean ‘ol Pro-Lifers who want to take the HappyFunTime Abortions away that aren’t hurting anyone, ever.
Danny,
It’s odd, hearing you write as you do… since I not only agree with most of your sentiments (and your outrage at the current political morass in which we find ourselves), but I agree with most of your sentiments with a ferocity which I rarely allow to become explicit in my words! I’m heart and soul with you in the spirit of all that (especially in the sense of crying out “Maranatha! Come, Lord Jesus, and come quickly!”).
My one hesitation in all of this is (and I need to be cautious, lest I loose yet another horse of the apocalypse by agreeing again with EGV!) is this: we are not morally free to “sit out the current decisions” while waiting for (or, better yet, “working toward”) better decisions and situations; we are not free to wash our hands of the whole mess and watch the process go by (since a sort of entropy will make rather short work of it, otherwise… both physically and morally). As such: we’re often faced with choosing (what is somewhat inaccurately named) the “lesser of two evils”.
Case in point: Rick Santorum was far from perfect, even in the “macro” sense of being consistent with his pro-life actions (cf. Arlen Specter, etc.); but, given the four people in the running for the Republican nomination in the last few weeks/months (Gingrich, Paul, Santorum, Romney), Santorum struck me as the best chance to get a pro-active candidate who was (at least now) willing to suffer a great deal of media-led abuse for his moral convictions, especially with regard to life issues and sexual morality. Had someone superior to him in those areas been an option, I would gladly have voted for him/her. (In the interest of full disclosure: I was all poised to vote for Michelle Bachmann, were she to have made it this far.) But “refusing to choose” is, in fact, a choice… and that choice has consequences which I, at least, think would be disastrous in our current situation.
That being said: I fully empathise with the angst that many pro-lifers will experience when faced with the “choice” (such as it is) of voting for Mitt Romney (who’s so very much like John McCain in this situation–nominally pro-life, but many reasons to be very wary and/or incredulous, in addition to being luke-warm about the topic, at very best). I think it’d be morally acceptable to do so, but it would be painful; I fully support (and understand) any other pro-lifer’s decision to vote for someone else.
When we face our final judgment, Our Lord will not ask, “Who was deemed the most electable?” or “Who was the most politcally savvy?”, or even “Who had the best plan for health care, social security, etc.?” He will ask, “Did your actions stem first from your desire to save these, the least of My brethren?” If someone cannot honestly answer “yes” (to the latter) regarding a potential vote for Romney, then they are fully justified in taking their vote elsewhere.
(End of soap-box speech. :) )
“yet for those of us most vulnerable….Citizens in our own Land….Citizens hidden, supposedly protected in the Womb…..the best we can do is punch a card, or click a button on a touch screen and “HOPE” for the best every 4 years.”
Danny S.
You write as if Jill (and perhaps every other pro-lifer here) is just focused on the political process as the solution to abortion. I can’t speak for everyone, but in my case that is not correct! Yes, I pay attention to politics and work to get pro-life leaders elected. But that’s not ALL I do. I also work within the Church to help others grow in their respect for life, pray and bring others to prayer, assist mothers in crisis pregnancies, and support organizations that provide solutions to some of the reasons women seek abortions. I’m raising pro-life children and have personally converted some pro-choicers to pro-lifers through my witness.
I am offended by your suggestion that this is just a waste of time. Every LIFE that has been saved because of the efforts of pro-lifers is infinitely valuable. And many, many lives have been saved through the efforts of pro-lifers. I believe that everything I do for LIFE has been at the prompting of the Holy Spirit. And I thank God that I live in a country where I have the ability to campaign and vote for pro-life leaders, urge my elected leaders to champion pro-life legislation, protest injustice openly and in large groups, and have the freedom to worship God and live according to His Word.
And if we all just sit back and wring our hands about how hopeless and evil our government is we won’t have the freedom to live according to His Word much longer. Get out there and protest the religious freedom trampling HHS Mandate.
Good comments. Preach it, brethren!
and also sisteren. :3
First of all to both Paladin and Lrning, you are both the better examples of “iron sharpening iron” I have run across on any forum of any topic in quite some time. Thank you for your candid words.
Let me try to clarify a bit further. I am 48 years of age. An adopted child in 1964. I have 5 beautiful children from the ages of 14 to 6. All but the first one are bonafide miracles as I was supposed to be sterile for life after a brutal year long chemo regimen to battle cancer in 1998. I have also been politically aware since at least the second grade in which in a Citizenship course (that’s right…the school I attended actually had a seperate class apart from History dealing with just the aspects of being a good American Citizen) I participated in a mock vote for the upcoming 1972 Presidential election…( which BTW, I voted for Nixon).
I voted Republican/Conservative in every election, local, state, and Federal, every year afterwards that I was legal to do so. Most of my friends did as well. Growing up as a Southern Baptist in Mississippi in the 60′. 70’s and even 80’s you were kind of looked at funny if you didn’t (and the ones who didn’t vote Republican were DixieCrats in the 60’s & 70’s. )
I’ve heard countless politically tinged sermons and have been handed these Voter Education cards showing the stances each candidate takes. Each of these done in a way in which that particular church would not run afoul of the IRS rules governing political speech from the pulpit. Both of these devices used by the pastors over the years have educated, nurtured and cajoled me in the “right” direction politically speaking for decades.
But the more I explore the Scriptures over the years, and have done so since a child, the more I am convinced that the world we live in and this country in particular, is sort of the like the world inhabited by the Israelites during the reign of the Romans. When Jesus came upon the scene, with just a word, could have destroyed the entire Roman Legion, all the while Father God could have been raining fiery hailstones on Rome itself. He could have at any moment melted the entrails of King Herod and taken over the throne as King of Judea and ushered in the Millenium Reign and beyond.
But He did not. Jesus never had one bad thing (at least in Scripture) to say about the ruling politcal class of the day, namely the Romans. In fact, he even performed a miracle for a Roman commander and did not raise his voice even against Pilate. Nor did he besmirch Caesar when asked who should the Jews give allegiance to. He never even had anything to say against the puppet political class of the Jews, King Herod being the head of it. Jesus never preached one sermon on Freedom as it pertains to human political freedom.
However, Jesus CONSTANTLY RAILED against THE PREACHERS ! Why?
For they were supposed to have known what the teachings of the Law were all about, what the sacrifice of all those untold MILLIONS of innocent animals, their innocent blood being shed over the course of MILLINIA,
They should have already, long ago, prepared the people for the ultimate meaning behind all the laws and rituals, and even the Temple…..
That it was all for NOTHING ! No matter how many laws you had….if you broke JUST ONE of the original TEN, you broke them all….EVEN IF YOU ONLY THOUGHT ABOUT BREAKING ANY ONE OF THEM. NO matter how many lambs and bulls’ throats you slit to pour their blood out on the alter, you could not wash away the scarlet stain of your own bloody sin.
This ULTIMATE TEACHING….THIS ULTIMATE MEANING SHOULD HAVE ALREADY BEEN CONVEYED TO THE PEOPLE BY THE TIME CHRIST ARRIVED ON THE SCENE. Then we would not have to wait for that awful scene as foretold in Zechariah 12:10….when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep . The people would have already had a broken and a contrite heart and open to accept Jesus as the only acceptable sacrifice and True Messiah….not simply a political one.
And yet….every 4 years (two for Congress) we raise “HIGH AND LIFTED UP” a man or a woman to be the savior of America. The Left had Obama last time….The Right this year has Romney. Neither of which espouse TRUE Christian teaching or beliefs. Yet both sides delude themselves that this election either everything is going to change or we are going down that Yellow Brick Road this time for sure to the Land of Oz.
I have just decided to wake up from the Technicolor Dream and realize I am really back in Kansas, life is hard and dirty and will always be that way, and that the Land of Oz (America) was simply a dream, with no real reality or substance to it, other than the delusions of another generation’s dream of Utopia….the secular version of “The Shiny City Upon the Hill”.
This does not mean I do not pray, fervently, for many issues or people, particularly the unborn. It is simple redirection of my time, efforts and most important my heart. It stays in a perpetual state of broken heartedness. That was not the case for years, decades really. That is not to say I am going soft, or liberal. On the contrary…I remain a staunch fundlementalist and literalist even though I am no longer a Southern Baptist but a conservative Anglican who fled the Episcople Cult in 2003. However, I reject many of the solutions of not only the Left (both in terms of Religion and Political) but the Right.
Here’s something many of you need to understand…..just because something is Conservative does not mean it is Christian…even though both words start with the Letter C. And just because you have Republicans ruling from the Presidency on down does not gaurantee you anything in the long run….just look at the Bush Presidency from 2000-2006..,..or to a lesser degree the Republican Revolution in Congress during Clinton.
I simply have had enough after 48 years of slow but steady decline, when more Republicans have sat at the seat of the President for more years than all the Democrats combined (Carter, Clinton, Obama) and we have had majorities in Congress during that time and a sweep as mentioned above during the W. administration, to ever believe any more in a politcal solution….even the issue of abortion. I am handing it over to God and will focus on my own walk with the Lord (which is difficult enough) and raising up my children in His teachings as best as possible. And any work I do for the unborn, will come about as all my interactions do, person by person, individual by individual, meeting needs as best I can and showing forth Christ to them the best way I know how….by simply being Christ to them and not advocating a poltical change. Only after the heart changes will the politcs change. Voting will not accomplish that. Show me proof over the last 250 years that voting has reversed the cultural and moral rot of America. The best you can do is show some feeble proof that it may have slowed it down.
And then you have to ask yourself, could my time and energy be better directed elseswhere. That…only you can answer. But as for me……..
And for those of you angry at me for tuning out and perhaps influencing others to do the same which you may think would endanger our so called “Freedom” in the future…..I say this….it matters not to me who sits in power over this Country….for their is a Dark Principality who already does. And he will not be unseated until the End. My belief in Christ, my ability to worship Him will never be in jeopardy just as it is not in jeopardy in China or Saudi Arabia. I may have to go undergound….I may be jailed or even killed. So what. Not being cavalier….just stating a hard fact….no evil power can chain the human heart when it is full of the love and worship of Christ….nor can they shackle the mind when it is focused on Christ. My blessed hope is not in a Pretribulation Rapture nor in a member of a cult such as Mitt Romney nor a Liberation Theology acolyte such as Obama…..it is in the Risen King and my real Country is His Kingdom.
And I will work as if I were in that Kingdom under His actual reign whether we are a Constitutional Republic or something far different in the future.
xalisae: “and also sisteren. :3″
Well, you’ve used your annual quota of excellent posts in just the past couple weeks, so you should take a break. ;)
My my my. Some viciousness out here in the internet today. Carder, please. Do not insult my love of country or commitment to liberty and freedom. I’m not pouting either. Sorry if you took it that way. But I stand my decision, as you stand by yours.
There are bigger issues and forces out there than President. Do I think Obama is a radical, pro-abortion, pro-death man? Absolutely. But the economy is *not* the President’s fault! You’re giving the man way more power and credit than he deserves. His policies do not help, no, but there’s bigger issues here than just one man sitting in the White House. Thankfully, the Founding Fathers implemented checks and balances. And the government is not a one-man show – there’s a Senate, House, and Supreme Court. Just throwing that out there. Also your assertion that Obama is somehow going to cause more abortions is wrong. The abortion battle is bigger than the President.
Andrew: actually, I do not think that Romney is a better a candidate. The lesser of two evils is still evil, brother. Keep that in mind.
It disgusts me that you all would insinuate that I would vote for Obama, a man who voted against protecting infants who survived abortions. What y’all don’t understand is that I don’t view Romney as any better.
You all see it as sitting out; I see it as refusing to be a part of this system. Maybe it’s semantics. Maybe I’m wrong. But before y’all go for the jugular, maybe think about what I (and others like me) are saying, okay? I used to hold your opinion, which is why I cast my vote last time for McCain. But I’ve also been inside political groups and politics and elections and trust me, there’s more to it than meets the eye.
Jill: No harm done. Vote for whom you will and I understand your reasons. I don’t want to vote for him based on more than the pro-life issue, though even then, I’m not totally convinced of his conversion.
Doug: “Yes, the slaves were “human beings,” and more than that – they were thinking, feeling people with consciousness and desires of their own, the ability to suffer, etc.So? From a secular standpoint, who cares? Why should that matter, other than social conventions that give a rip? We’re just evolutionary results of impersonal, unthinking, unfeeling, unconscious processes. If anything, these features alienate us from an impersonal cosmos. We’re not nature’s zenith, we’re its freaks. I’m more consistent with nature itself if I disregard the importance of these things, than you would be for deeming them so vital.
Of pro-lifers are in part responsible for changing social views about who’s the victim and whose live has value, then I take it you’ll appreciate that yourself, since the social norms are all we have, as freaks of nature. Surely you’re not positing some transcendent set of principles that should guide society, rather than merely be the result of its internal negotiations and power struggles…
LibertyBelle: “Andrew: actually, I do not think that Romney is a better a candidate. The lesser of two evils is still evil, brother. Keep that in mind.”
Special pleading. You’re choosing what you deem the “least evil” course of action yourself. Everyone does. Pretending that you alone are choosing the “best good” is just silly.
“Lesser of two evils” is a figure of speech, not a description of moral reality. It describes particular scenarios. It’s not passing moral judgment on actors in those scenarios — nor positing holiness of those deemed tertium quids.
It’s a bogus justification of one’s actions to berate others for voting for evil, as if one’s own candidate’s rump is shiny and smells like daisies.
Fine, rasqual. I’ll just take a break and start “liking” all your posts. ;P
So Danny, you’re disillusioned and want to check out of the political system. That’s your choice. I’ve never shared your delusion:
“And yet….every 4 years (two for Congress) we raise “HIGH AND LIFTED UP” a man or a woman to be the savior of America. The Left had Obama last time….The Right this year has Romney. Neither of which espouse TRUE Christian teaching or beliefs. Yet both sides delude themselves that this election either everything is going to change or we are going down that Yellow Brick Road this time for sure to the Land of Oz.“
The President isn’t my savior. But I do know that even earthly authority comes from God. (Romans 13:1, Proverbs 8:15-16, Wisdom 6:3, John 19:11, 1 Peter 2:13-17, Titus 3:1)
I will continue to do my best to follow the will of God. And God does not want me to sit idly by while babies are being killed in the womb.
The Lord saw this, and was aggrieved that there was no justice. He saw that there was no one, was appalled that there was none to intervene; (Isaiah 59:15-16)
Thanks, Lrning. Let me be clear…I am not wanting to check out….I have checked out for a decade now. My mind is a lot clearer now and freer to focus better on other things such as family, friends, church and my own walk with the Lord.
Second, I understand that you and others don’t ACTUALLY view any man or woman as savior of America. However, as someone who lived, ate and breathed this stuff for decades, I am well aware that you and Jill and others who take offense at my stand probably spend a fair amount of your time listening to Conservative Talk Radio and even in Jill”s case are invited to their shows. You are part of a MULTI-BILLION dollar political process that now NEVER ENDS, for once these elections are over money will continue to pour in over the next 4 years to prep the new political class that will run and the pundits are already talking about Rick Santorum for 2016 for crying out loud. I think you would be amazed at how much head and heart space you devote to something that has not and will never have lasting meaning and can never change people’s hearts.
Third, I am not idly sitting by. The time I do not spend keeping up witht the politcal Jones is time spent helping my wife home-school our 5 kids, raise livestock on our property that we are slowly turning into a farm. I have more head and heart space to devote to other people in need…..AND THE BIGGEST OF ALL….REAL EFFECTIVE PRAYER WHICH AVAILITH MUCH !
Also, be careful what scripture you throw around….be aware of the context. That passage in Isaiah 59 was the prophet’s lament or more precisely the prophet’s relaying the lament of God over the state of moral and civic decay in the land of Israel. God ended that in the short term by allowing Israel to be overrun by her enemies and ultimately paved the way for their salvation as well as all of us who believe in the sending of His Son Jesus…not to be elected to Congress or the Presidency or to be appointed head of the Supreme Court, but to die.
Let me ask you this….if the Founding Fathers were willing to die for our Freedom, if men were willing to die for the rights of the slaves and to save the Union, if we were willing to fight and die in the cause of Freedom in Europe and Jesus was willing to leave His Kingly Throne and His Glorious Station in Heaven to die for you and me, then why is it so hard to take up the cause of the unborn even unto death?
Once again…as I have stated above…..I am in no way advocating violent action on behalf of the unborn because you cannot change a nation’s heart over this matter with violence….look at race relations after 150 years since the Civil War and even with the Civil Rights movement from 50 years ago. HOWEVER, one must confront the question…..if we celebrate the bloody victory of the Revolution every 4th of July, if we honor those who sacrificed their lives during the Civil War for slaves who were considered 3/5ths of a human being and the heroic sacrifice of our miltary personel who have shed blood for the freedom and liberty of peoples in other countries…..why do we NOT feel the need to sacrifice even our lives for the unborn….that we turn to the ballet in this case….instead of the bullet? Is the Abortion Holocaust any less heinous than the Jewish Holocaust? At last count, by my reckoning, @ 10 TIMES more babies have been slaughtered in the abortion mills than Hitler ground up Jews in the concentration camps. In fact you would have to add up the entire amount of people who have died in EVERY GENOCIDE OF THE 20TH CENTURY to come close to the amount of babies who have been slaughtered. And although every genocide was not met with military force……doesn’t the Military have a Constitutional Duty to uphold and defend the Constitution from enemies both foreign and DOMESTIC ? Where are they to defend the usurpation of the Unborn’s Constitutional right to Life (to not be murdered in cold blood)…it’s Constitutional Right to Liberty (to be free from the knife or the suction tube or the pair of scissors) not the mention the Unborn’s Constitutional Right to its Pursuit of Happiness (which it cannot do if it is dead and disposed of in a plastic bag at the bottom of a recepticle?)
So you mean to tell me you are going to vote for a Cult member who believes in a false gospel apart and different from the one revealed by Jesus Christ just because he TALKS a better Pro-Life game than Obama and that somehow, regardless whether your action is effecatious, that God will somehow be pleased with you more than if you sat this election out and did not make a choice between the lesser of two evils, but simply refused to vote for ANY EVIL at all?
Explain to me…again….with historical evidence and Biblical evidence the truth in your position…..I’m not being snarky…..I genuinely want to know.
Even if that were not the case…with today’s legality of infanticide how could you possibly believe that amongst the things that the Founders were trying to bring forth in this new Utopia of “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness”, and a “More Perfect Union” namely a more Just society than the tyrannical one they overthrew, that we have more Justice in today’s version of America as opposed to the yesteryear of the Founders?
Danny,
I say that because laws are ‘supposed’ to be about justice and it was a much more lawless land back then. Think wild west.
Danny: I am 48 years of age. An adopted child in 1964. I have 5 beautiful children from the ages of 14 to 6. All but the first one are bonafide miracles as I was supposed to be sterile for life after a brutal year long chemo regimen to battle cancer in 1998.
Hey Danny. Dude, you’re firing it up! No way I can do justice to your posts – I’ve only seen and/or skimmed a few of them, but I appreciate the energy you’ve put into them. I differ from you, here, being pro-choice, but I’m also only 5 years older, and I totally hear you about political realities, and I’m quite cynical about our political system, overall.
I hope you beat the big C for good, and that it never comes back.
In reality the justice gap between then and now is really due to the fact that people no longer take care of their own. They look to the government/society to provide/decide justice. For example in todays world a person can commit rape and the husband or father or brother of the victim would not take justice into their own hands. In the old days men were expected to protect their women and children from plunder by taking out justice themselves.
“Okay, as far as the abolitionists – hey, if we’re trying for “intellectual honesty,” then oh yes indeed it’s about their ‘druthers.
Yes, the slaves were “human beings,” and more than that – they were thinking, feeling people with consciousness and desires of their own, the ability to suffer, etc. Should the desires of the slaveowners trump their desires? I say no just as I say the wills of pregnant women shouldn’t be trumped by pro-lifers.
In this case I agree with the abolitionists. But while you, me, (and the abolitionists themselves, as far as I know) would agree on “human being,” we have not even gotten to the argument, if any, over slavery. “Human beings” is an external reality to the discussion, it’s a separate, physical, objective thing. Any and all the “shoulds” and “should nots” come from opinions.”
Xalisae: Yeah. Doug wants to absolutely ignore and write out the fact that we are talking about other human beings here,
No, X, never argued that.
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and that Pro-Lifers speak not for ourselves, but for other human beings-REAL, LIVE, THINKING, FEELING HUMAN BEINGS
Not until a point is passed in gestation.
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(need I remind you, I am only here because of my daughter – a real, live, thinking, feeling human being who would’ve been aborted had the genders between her father and I been switched).
I realize this issue is more personal, X, in your feeling, than it can be for me.
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They don’t matter.
Nope, never said nor argued that either.
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To him, the only human beings involved are the pregnant women seeking abortions vs. us bad, mean ‘ol Pro-Lifers who want to take the HappyFunTime Abortions away that aren’t hurting anyone, ever.
This is just another strawman argument from you.
Truthseeker: In the old days men were expected to protect their women and children from plunder by taking out justice themselves.
TS, I feel that way with respect to Congress – I feel that we should be able to get “justice” for the heinous financial improprieties foisted upon us by our legislators of the past 80 or 90 years, and especially of the past 40 or so years. Needless to say, it ain’t gonna happen.
Rasqual, as I said to Danny, very good post – there have been many good posts from both sides of the debate lately, and doubt I can do justice to them all…. Been busy with work, cataloguing my wine collection, driving a lot, my wife and I are buying a house…
Doug: “Yes, the slaves were “human beings,” and more than that – they were thinking, feeling people with consciousness and desires of their own, the ability to suffer, etc.
Rasqual: So? From a secular standpoint, who cares?
Well, we care – we have empathy. I don’t want to see you as a slave; I don’t want to see you suffer.
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Why should that matter, other than social conventions that give a rip?
It *does* matter – that is why we argue about this stuff in the first place. It’s a basic fact that we have feelings in this realm. (If you differ in this assumption, that is a thing we can discuss.) Social conventions vary widely, looking around the world, but the fact that we have empathy, etc., remains.
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We’re just evolutionary results of impersonal, unthinking, unfeeling, unconscious processes. If anything, these features alienate us from an impersonal cosmos. We’re not nature’s zenith, we’re its freaks. I’m more consistent with nature itself if I disregard the importance of these things, than you would be for deeming them so vital.
Yes, we’ve evolved, and we are as we are, as above. “Zenith”? “Freaks”? I don’t think that matters nearly as much as what is true for all of us – and as people some generalizations can be made. In no way am I saying that it’s “unnatural” for us – or for dolphins, whales, chimps, elephants, etc. - to have feelings, empathy, cares, etc. After all, that is the foundation of our process here.
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Of pro-lifers are in part responsible for changing social views about who’s the victim and whose live has value, then I take it you’ll appreciate that yourself, since the social norms are all we have, as freaks of nature. Surely you’re not positing some transcendent set of principles that should guide society, rather than merely be the result of its internal negotiations and power struggles…
You’re misrepresenting my position. We are sentient individuals, social norms or not. First of all, let’s look at what entities we can truly have empathy with. There will be a “societal position,” yes, but as individuals we may agree or disagree with it.
Yeah. Rebutting what is a real, actual Life Vs. Death instance of Pro-Life vs. the abortion alternative with *big dumb guy voice imitation* “Yeah, I know this is personal to you.” does not cut the mustard.
To truthseeker first and then Doug. I gotcha truthseeker. And to a point I would agree that in those embryonic moments of the Republic it was a little wild west compared with today for certain aspects of legal Justice. However, I am sure you would agree that legalized infanticide WAS NOT the law of the land at that wild west time as well…even though I am sure abortions were being carried out as they always have been throughout human history. That was the larger point I was making in asking do we, amongst other measurements, have more Justice now than in 1776.
Now to Doug…..thank you very much for your kind words. Yes, be it God’s will, I am and will continue to be cancer free. As someone who holds pro-choice views, I am oddly enough more concerned with how you view some of my comments than the others who, while on the same side as me concerning the Sanctity of Life of the Unborn, I am challenging them hard to break open some of the “constipated” thinking that is always a danger when you cling to a political ideology too long.
You and I could share a beer…well…I hate beer, so I would buy you one and I would have a Tea while we had a very spirited, but good natured debate. But back to why I am concerned what you would think of some of my more radical comments. I know you have “skimmed” some of my comments so you may have seen or not my comments which on the surface come close to advocating armed violence to rescue the unborn in danger of being aborted. I am using a rhetorical device and vivid language to highlight the hypocrisy that seems to get more evident during the silly season known as the Presidential Election Season. Everyone gets so wrapped up in the Flag and our heritage and the Founders are dug up from the grave and consulted again just to make sure that each side has the backing of Jefferson, Madison, Adams and Washington ….just to name a few. The Constitution gets wheeled out and paraded around like some statue of the Virgin Mary during the Day of the Dead ceremonies and we all become scholars of said document. And inevitably the sacrifices of our military are also remembered for the freedoms we have and the right to peaceably assemble and discuss things political leading up to the right to vote our conscience.
Which I have to shake my head at the absurdity of it all and the hypocrisy when it comes to the most vulnerable and voiceless of all our citizens….namely the child in a mother’s womb. Want to know the nature of a society…..the collective character so to speak….regardless of what piece of paper they based their society on….look to how that society treats their most vulnerable…the ones who have no voice in the larger society.
You, being pro-choice, …forgive me if I am wrong….probably look at the sovereignty of the woman and her rights to be…if not sacrosanct…to be paramount above other concerns. I as a pro-lifer recognize and believe that the least able to voice their concerns and the most vulnerable citizens in our society need as much protection under the Constitution which they are guaranteed. However, because of the unique symbiotic nature of mother and child for nine months (of course longer than that but for the sake of this argument) then between mother and child the child is the more vulnerable and less able to speak for itself concerning the matters of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness which were guaranteed us by force of arms and the shedding of blood. Therefore, the baby’s rights come first. This does not mean that the mother loses any other rights such as Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness….for at the end of her Term when the mother gives birth she still has the choice of keeping the child or putting it up for adoption in some shape or form. She might be inconvenienced for 9 months, her Pursuit of Happiness delayed during those nine months. But at least the smallest, most vulnerable Citizen of us all….the infant….does not die to in service of the mother’s supposed sovereignty.
As I have stated….I have not ever nor do I now advocate armed violence for the unborn. It is curious though what we choose to die for and who and what we are dying for. We are willing to die for an idea…..a dream. But not willing to die to stop the bloody slaughter of the unborn. Is there not a median ground between the two other than just uselessly voting for one corrupt politician of one Party affiliation or the other? Where are the Conservative Christians marching in the street, barricading abortion clinics, causing the Jail Houses to burst at the seams to the point where municipalities are not only losing business due to the lack of employees and customers because so many are now in concentration camps due to extreme overcrowding of the local jails? Where is the Civil Rights style marches but for the unborn….where is the Pro-Life Martin Luther King?
In short….is it only Liberals who have the cahones to put their livelihood and even their lives on the line to support a Just and Right Cause….even if it were to tear the country apart. Or is it peculiar to White, Conservative Christians to simply listen to Talk Radio and get behind whoever speaks the most conservative buzzwords enough for them to punch a card or tap a touchscreen every 4 years only to look forward to the next four years when maybe the unborn will finally get their shot at the American Dream and not the American Holocaust?
Here’s a virtual beer for you Doug and you can tell me what drives you to hold Pro-Choice views as I sip my tea.
Danny says: However, as someone who lived, ate and breathed this stuff for decades, I am well aware that you and Jill and others who take offense at my stand probably spend a fair amount of your time listening to Conservative Talk Radio and even in Jill”s case are invited to their shows. You are part of a MULTI-BILLION dollar political process that now NEVER ENDS, for once these elections are over money will continue to pour in over the next 4 years to prep the new political class that will run and the pundits are already talking about Rick Santorum for 2016 for crying out loud. I think you would be amazed at how much head and heart space you devote to something that has not and will never have lasting meaning and can never change people’s hearts.
No conservative talk radio for me. You make a lot of assumptions and I don’t find that most of your comments pertain to me. I’m not Republican. I view the world through Christian ideology, not political, so there is no political party that represents my views.
I don’t take offense at your stand, I take offense at your insinuation that your stand is the only one that God approves of. You seem to be focusing solely on the aggregate, where I tend to focus on the individual. Do we have more aggregate justice now than in 1776? Probably not. Have individuals experienced justice that they otherwise wouldn’t have due to my efforts and the efforts of other pro-lifers. Absolutely.
I’m not sure where you came up with the idea that politics was supposed to have “lasting meaning” and “change people’s hearts”. And you have no idea how much “head and heart space” I devote to politics. My focus is LIFE, not politics. And where politics can be used to advance the cause of LIFE, I participate. And where politics threaten the cause of LIFE, I participate. And for me, LIFE issues extend beyond abortion.
Danny says: So you mean to tell me you are going to vote for a Cult member who believes in a false gospel apart and different from the one revealed by Jesus Christ just because he TALKS a better Pro-Life game than Obama and that somehow, regardless whether your action is effecatious, that God will somehow be pleased with you more than if you sat this election out and did not make a choice between the lesser of two evils, but simply refused to vote for ANY EVIL at all?
The theology that informs my conscience and voting is too much to get into here. But I will vote for the candidate that is the most dedicated to the common good. And one of my guiding principles is that a society dedicated to the common good should protect its weakest members. I won’t vote “for the lesser of two evils”. I will vote to lessen evil.
And yes, I believe that God holds me responsible to cast a vote to lessen evil, when my failure to do so could result in greater evil.
Danny wrote:
No matter how many laws you had….if you broke JUST ONE of the original TEN, you broke them all
:) Well… there were actually 613 mitzvot (and St. James was referring to these, as well, in James 2:10), not just the 10 “big ones” in the Decalogue… but anyway…
And yet….every 4 years (two for Congress) we raise “HIGH AND LIFTED UP” a man or a woman to be the savior of America.
I think you, personally, may have started with an artificially-inflated view of the USA president, friend; no one in my circle of friends, to my knowledge, has ever viewed the president as anything but a mortal, sinful man (well, “man” so far…) who’s been given a solemn office of high responsibility and authority. (As for the adulation of the Obama-worshipping, Messiah-declaring crowds… well… I can’t speak for them.) Becoming disillusioned with a morbidly inflamed view is not usually a bad thing; one merely needs to be sure not to throw the baby out with the bath-water.
Here’s something many of you need to understand…..just because something is Conservative does not mean it is Christian.
Quite right… but I’d gently suggest to you that most members of this board know that, already. It would be rash to assume that, just because someone is engaged in the political process, they must somehow conflate politics with the Faith. It’s not an “either/or” proposition (i.e. it’s not true that one must either be “purely political” or “purely faith-based”); our Faith, in fact, is supposed to INFORM our political participation, not REPLACE it.
As for your main point (and your despair of any good happening in the political world), perhaps you might heed the wise advice of (Blessed) Mother Teresa of Calcutta: “God does not call us to be successful; He calls us to be faithful.” In other words: we are to do our part in “building the city of man” (cf. St. Augustine), while never losing sight of the fact that our true goal is the City of God.
Think this through, for a moment: isn’t it ALSO true that, no matter how much we try to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, give drink to the thirsty, give alms to the poor, tend the sick, comfort the lonely, etc., there will ALWAYS be more people who are (and who even die from being) hungry, naked, thirsty, poor, sick, lonely, etc.? Jesus assured us that “the poor you will always have with you” (cf. Matthew 26:11, etc.); and no matter what we do, there will be an unguessed number of people who suffer and die from these evils EVERY DAY. Should we despair, then, and stop tending their needs, on the basis that “the problem will never get substantially better, and it seems to be getting worse and worse?” Blessed Mother Teresa doesn’t think so; she kept tending the poor and outcast, even when she saw their numbers increase without limit in her own lifetime. We are called to do the same. God calls us to be faithful (i.e. do what we can), not to be successful (i.e. be victorious). The victory will be God’s, not ours, and it will happen in God’s Own time, not ours. “And let us not grow weary in doing good works, for in due season we shall reap, if we do not lose heart.” (Galatians 6:9)
Let me end with another (somewhat longer) quote from (Blessed) Mother Teresa:
Here’s something many of you need to understand…..just because something is Conservative does not mean it is Christian.
You rang? How may I help you today? :3
But please…don’t call me “something”. XD
Excellent post Paladin!
You so clearly addressed an issue I have with Danny’s posts but couldn’t successfully articulate:
“It would be rash to assume that, just because someone is engaged in the political process, they must somehow conflate politics with the Faith. It’s not an “either/or” proposition (i.e. it’s not true that one must either be “purely political” or “purely faith-based”); our Faith, in fact, is supposed to INFORM our political participation, not REPLACE it.”
X: Yeah. Rebutting what is a real, actual Life Vs. Death instance of Pro-Life vs. the abortion alternative with *big dumb guy voice imitation* “Yeah, I know this is personal to you.” does not cut the mustard.
Once again, you’re mistaken, X. That wasn’t rebutting or trying to.
To lrning and Paladin….thank you once again for your comments and for making me look again at my words. I have not accused either of you of any of the behavior and beliefs of Conservatives I find puzzling. I may have asked you rhetorically if some of the actions I find ineffective or even bordering on hypocritical are your positions….but do I not always state….with the admonition that I am not being snarky by the asking of it….that I genuinely want to know if this or that is what you believe and to state both historical and Biblical evidence to support your thoughts as I have striven, perhaps unsuccessfully to do?
I am not naive enough to believe that the march of human civilization and the evolution of human governance has NOT been overseen and directed by God…..always turning something evil to His Good as time has passed until this very day when we have the best example of human governance the world has ever seen and will ever see until the return of Jesus Christ, namely American Representative Republicanism.
But that is my point….namely the return of Jesus Christ…..the return of Monarchy as the way humans will order their lives in the future. Have you read the back of the Bible…..Democracy….American Republicanism does not survive the return of Jesus Christ, the King of Kings. No government does….no political philosophy does.
So….just as Jesus excoriated the Pharisees and the Sadducees for their lack of knowing the sign of the times….to not know that the time of Messiah’s arrival was at hand….so too I excoriate ALL Americans….but particularly my Conservative/Libertarian Brethren and Sisters….can you not see the sign of the times of the fatal rot and decline of American politics….of the American People…..of American Churches? My frustration I am expressing is that there comes a time when you should recognize that the fig tree is not putting out any more fruit …..in fact it is now dead and no more exertion of work need be done on it apart from cutting it down and burning it.
There are many signposts along the road of American History that have given plain signs of that terminal decline…..but 1973 marks the true death knell of America. When the American public…..but the American Churches……many of whose members had undergone persecution to finally force the nation to recognize the Black Man as a for real human being and citizen of America with full rights and to treat him as such….were noticeably absent after Roe V Wade. But the SILENCE WAS DEAFENING from the Conservative Churches. There were no mass marches…..you did not see Billy Graham or other Evangelical leaders get thrown in jail……their heads bashed in…..J. Edgar Hoover bugging their residences and opening files on them and following them as potential enemies of the state. You did not see the Head of the Republican Party and Commander in Chief and Chief Protector of the Constitution….namely Richard Milhouse Nixon….go on national TV and declare the ruling as null and void because it takes away the Constitutional Rights of the Unborn Citizens of America…not to mention that it’s simply a matter of premeditated murder and as such, the moment the Supreme Court legalized infanticide in America the Federal Court would now be guilty of a Federal Felony punishable by Death.
You did not see any of this…..and have not now for nearly 40 years. There are certain times…..and certain things done……certain things NOT DONE……that mark the time when a culture, society and/or nation are abandoned by God to the Delusion and the only thing next to happen is dissolution and destruction.
WE HAVE REACHED THAT POINT. 50 million plus babies tell you that every day. 100’s every day are added to that chorus. When a nation has become so deprave that it is legal to kill their own citizens….the most helpless of them all……can you not be surprised to see us ruled by the likes of a Barack Hussein Obama…..or a member of a heretical, quasi-Christian cult in the form of Mitt Romney….not to mention the destruction of our currency…..the complete financial scam that is banking and Wall Street…..the electronic sewer pipes of Hollywood TV and Movies…..not to mention internet porn…..and Internet invented by Americans and the American Military to help protect us from Communism during the Cold War?
My friends…..Facts are truly amazing things…..they do not require you to believe them to be true. But I do admire you all in your Don Quixote pursuit of restoring the American Dream and the rebuilding of America’s core values.
But until the change comes forth first from the pulpit which then seeps into the home into the hearts of the parents who will raise up and train the youth who will sacrifice their time, their careers, their reputations, their livelihoods and even their lives, in the most massive move of civil disobedience the world, much less America has ever seen on behalf of the unborn and in the memory of the 50 million slaughtered….you guys are simply charging full steam ahead at windmills.
Oh…BTW Paladin…Mother Teresa was a really bad choice to bolster your argument in support of continuing to fight in the political realm. Although Mother Teresa certainly throughout her life had to interface with a supremely corrupt Indian government, she never ran for nor was elected to any political office during her life.
She was in the world….but was never a part of it. Her good works came from her….not from any vote she cast nor office held.
That’s why the Indian people adored her and helped take care of her and her convent….she was never part of the political solution…..a solution the Indian people knew was never forthcoming from the Indian government. In fact….the contrast between her good work and the government’s complete failure in providing basic human services for the poor she took care of all her life was EVEN MORE STARK AND APPARENT because of the fact she did not stain herself with the filth of government or any of its “solutions”.
Danny,
First: I understand your frustration with the current political system. And let me add: my reason for encouraging you (and others, and myself) to remain engaged in the political process (even though it’s overwhelmingly fouled up) is NOT because I have any confidence that it will “finally fix things” (Our Blessed Lord assured us that such will never happen, cf: Matthew 18:7, Matthew 26:11, etc.). My reason for doing so is for the sake of the souls of those who do so. If we despair and withdraw, sitting on our hands until we die (or until Christ comes again), we become part of the problem.
Mind you: it is possible (and a morally licit option) for an individual, if convinced that it is a personal moral imperative, to refuse to participate in the political process (the Amish, Mennonites, etc., come to mind)… though even in that case, I personally (read: my own opinion) consider that course of action to be unwise. But if you were to seek to claim that your position is “the only good approach” (i.e. you find anyone who doesn’t agree to be wrong, foolish, deceived, or worse), then you’re flatly mistaken. (Mind you, I don’t see you doing that; but the point needs to be made, nonetheless.)
There are at least two main ways to contribute to evil: to commit it yourself, and to refuse to fight it when it happens around you. Remember the aphorism (sometimes attributed to Edmund Burke)? “The All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” The very idea that one is free to fall into despair about working toward justice in EVERY and ANY venue open to an individual (within reason) is, in my opinion, a very dangerous temptation. Let me explain:
Suppose I grant every last point of yours, for the sake of argument (and your position is hauntingly similar to the position of “Ex-GOP Voter”–a frequent contributor, here–though your own response, ironically enough, is [forgive me, EGV] far more reasonable than his [which was to “vote Democratic, since the GOP makes no difference”]). Suppose we assume that the GOP is utterly useless and lack-luster in its efforts to protect the unborn, that all such efforts were merely artifice, and that the GOP has no true and lasting ambition in that direction at all, save perhaps as grist for the mill of up-coming elections. Even in that dour, pessimistic case: do you not see that even a [hypothetical] lack-luster and insincere GOP who maintains the status quo is FAR superior to an energised Democratic party whose zeal for sex-related death is unsurpassed, continues unabated, and seeks nothing less than the utter liberalisation of abortion (and euthanasia, etc., but let us stick to the example at hand), the removal of any and all restrictions from it, and the utter and complete subsidisation of it by tax-payer funds? Every day which blocks such a tidal wave of death is a victory, even if only a “negative” one. You are concerned with the slaughter of 50,000,000+ children in the womb? Good (and so are we). But surely you see that, if Obama and co., and those of like mind, had been in power for the past 40 years, the massacre would have been immeasurably worse?
No one is asking you to look at the situation (or the GOP–heavens, no!) with “rose-coloured glasses”, or to minimise the horrifying situation before us… and I assure you, NO ONE on this board is so naive as to think that the election of even the most God-honouring, pro-life president would cure this situation in a flash! We are not so naive as you suggest, friend. But we also suggest that, even in the horror of a blood-soaked society, our efforts to prevent millions MORE from dying (who would otherwise die, under an accelerated abortion regime such as the Obama administration envisions, and hopes to cement in place) is worth-while.
As food for thought, on two points:
1) What did St. Paul say about those who, when consumed with waiting for Christ to come again, detached from work and the world, and sat about in idleness, waiting for His return? (Cf. 2 Thessalonians 3:10)
2) Re: your comments about Blessed Mother Teresa: I’m afraid you missed my point (on several levels). I was responding to your general premise that “it’s useless, and it won’t work, so let’s throw in the towel!”; Blessed Mother Teresa says, in reply, “Our best efforts may not work, and people may destroy what good they actually achieve, yes; make those efforts, ANYWAY.”
Beyond that, if you’re under the impression that Blessed Mother Teresa was not involved in would have advocated anyone “sitting out” ANY means by which babies could be saved, I’m afraid you haven’t studied her very much. Above and beyond her own writings, sayings, and courageous actions, she was a consummately faithful Catholic, and she knew Catholic teaching in this regard:
Paladin -
Good post. And I take no offense – I summarize my position as this though:
The GOP is going to do very little on abortion, as proven through their history of leading at the federal level, so I’m going to lean to side that I feel is better in regards to other issues – economics, health care, education, treatment of the poor.
Quite frankly, the GOP is (by far in the case of abortion) at its best when they aren’t leading. They are very, very good as the party out of power. When they get in charge, it is a disaster. The pro-life gains this last year? Do you think more than about 10% of them would have happened if McCain was in the White House?
EGV wrote:
Quite frankly, the GOP is (by far in the case of abortion) at its best when they aren’t leading. They are very, very good as the party out of power. When they get in charge, it is a disaster. The pro-life gains this last year? Do you think more than about 10% of them would have happened if McCain was in the White House?
I’m not at all sure what you mean, here, by “out of power”; do you refer exclusively to the White House and the Federal Congress? Because it’s rather bizarre of you to suggest that the “gains” by pro-lifers (in the political sense) could possibly have been gained through “not being in power”. The various efforts to defund Planned Parenthood (despite the efforts of your candidate [Obama] to coerce and undo every last scrap of it–and at the expense of the poor, at that! What do you think of Obama withholding health care funds for women, for the sake of safe-guarding abortion? http://www.lifenews.com/2012/02/24/texas-defunds-planned-parenthood-despite-obama-admin-attacks/), for example, came through states which had a pro-life MAJORITY and usually a sympathetic governor… not a minority. (Did you honestly think that a pro-abortion majority would let such action go through?)
Yes Paladin – the federal level. That’s how the game goes at the federal level, which then affects things at the state level. Somebody gets elected President- the populace finds out their life isn’t infinitely better because of that choice, so they get mad, and in mid-terms, they elect the other party heavily at those mid-term elections – folks that can make a difference at the state level. At some point, a GOP President will come back, and we’ll see it the other way, and we’ll see gains wiped out. It’s what we Americans do.
On the Medicaid funding? I think on any federal level funding program, the feds can set requirements for the states that they have to adhere to to comply. If the money was going to fund abortions, then cut it off. When the money is going to fund cancer screenings at a facility that the legislation doesn’t like because it performs abortions? Not so sure about that.
I think that the Texas legislators don’t like planned parenthood because they donate money to Dems – not because they conduct abortions.
If Texas is serious about cutting abortion numbers, it would be a big step to help the people in their state – their education system is terrible, they have the highest rate of uninsured people in the country, and the majority of Perry’s jobs that he touted were jobs that can’t support a family. Texas can close all the planend parenthood facilities that they want – if a woman gets pregnant and doesn’t have any money to support the kid, she’s going to get an abortion somewhere.
EGV wrote:
Yes Paladin – the federal level. That’s how the game goes at the federal level,
You may need to “unpack” that colourful metaphor for me; I’ve no idea what “that’s how the game goes” means for you, in this context, nor how it helps your point.
which then affects things at the state level.
…and the state level affects the federal level, as well. I don’t see how this supports your thesis, either. You seem to be of a mind which would, even in the case of all 50 states having GOP governors and GOP-dominated legislatures while having a Democratic president and Democratic majority of at least one house of the U.S. Congress, would consider the GOP to be “not in power”. That’s… odd, friend.
At some point, a GOP President will come back, and we’ll see it the other way, and we’ll see gains wiped out.
Do you mean “gains” in the sense of “political gains for the GOP”, or do you mean “gains” in the sense of “all the ‘good things’ which the Democrats finally enacted, mercilessly erased by a callous GOP”? Just curious… :)
On the Medicaid funding? I think on any federal level funding program, the feds can set requirements for the states that they have to adhere to to comply.
Hm. I do hope you notice that you’ve (perhaps unintentionally) completely evaded the main point of my question. Your perennial theme is “I’ll tolerate a pro-abortion Democrat, for the sake of supporting their good and effective work with the poor!” But this is a case where the Democrats show a bit more “true colour”, and show how they are quite willing to sacrifice health care (one of your prized topics) for poor women (one of your prized groups to champion) for the sole sake of defending abortion. I wanted to know how you felt about that, in particular.
If the money was going to fund abortions, then cut it off.
Perhaps you might look up the word “fungible”, if you have a spare moment. Any monies which go to support an abortion facility (even one which ostensibly claims to “multi-task” and do other things, in addition) will, in fact, go to support abortions (the supply of which would be impaired without those monies). Those monies could easily be diverted to other clinics which do NOT supply abortions (and Texas very much wanted the federal government to do so), but the Obama administration found that option unsatisfactory, for some reason which remains obscure to abortion-tolerant folk.
When the money is going to fund cancer screenings at a facility that the legislation doesn’t like because it performs abortions? Not so sure about that.
Nor am I (“sure about that”)! Could you cite examples of these “cancer screenings” which supposedly take place at Planned Parenthood clinics? I’m not aware of them.
I think that the Texas legislators don’t like planned parenthood because they donate money to Dems – not because they conduct abortions.
Your rather baseless conjecture is noted and logged. I do hope you see that this is a “self-sealing argument” (i.e. a fallacy), since no possible evidence (e.g. denials from the Texas legislators, character references from their friends, etc.) could dissuade you from thinking it?
If Texas is serious about cutting abortion numbers, it would be a big step to help the people in their state – their education system is terrible, they have the highest rate of uninsured people in the country, and the majority of Perry’s jobs that he touted were jobs that can’t support a family.
All right: then why, exactly, is the federal government so intensely attached to defending Planned Parenthood, rather than allowing that money to be sent to free (or other) clinics which do NOT provide abortions, so as to help those “uninsured people” who are in such dire need? In short: what does this statement of yours have to do with the main point (i.e. Obama blocking health care money for Texas women, simply because he’s defending Planned Parenthood), at ALL? Why cannot BOTH objectives (fixing the various infrastructure and resources of Texas, AND de-funding abortion facilities) be done at the same time? Your last paragraph really does seem to be a string of irrelevant red herrings, friend… since none of those points affects a decision to de-fund Planned Parenthood, in the least!
Texas can close all the planned parenthood facilities that they want – if a woman gets pregnant and doesn’t have any money to support the kid, she’s going to get an abortion somewhere.
Ah. So this means that it’s quite all right for the Federal Government to demand that health care money MUST go to that very same abortion provider… on the pretext that “the woman would get an abortion anyway, so why not support LOCAL abortionists, at tax-payer expense”? This really makes no sense, dear fellow.
Bravo, Paladin! *standing ovation*
I think that the Texas legislators don’t like planned parenthood because they donate money to Dems – not because they conduct abortions.
Your rather baseless conjecture is noted and logged. I do hope you see that this is a “self-sealing argument” (i.e. a fallacy), since no possible evidence (e.g. denials from the Texas legislators, character references from their friends, etc.) could dissuade you from thinking it?
Wow. I’ve never seen anyone carry a party-line grudge so tightly just because the subject’s prior party refused to give him “free” stuff. Like, even to the point they’ve dropped all concern for the cost in human lives and convinced themselves that the cost would be equal regardless of the party the subject supported (even thought that is demonstrably false), just to rationalize that they GOTTA get their “free stuff”.
Paladin -
I knew that last post would fire you up a little – I thought about going back and putting in a few disclaimers, but thought I’d just leave it as is.
Back to my original thought – the GOP is a much better party when they aren’t in the majority. They do a much better job at the federal level shaping policy through obstruction and protest. When they are in power, they spend like Democrats yet won’t pay for it. Maybe things will change in the future.
The benefit though for the GOP is at the state level, they won a lot of power in mid-terms. This wasn’t because they were the more attractive party (it rarely is about that), but people were sick of Obama and wanted change again. Soon though, states will flip back, as they always do, and the gains for the GOP (their issues they supported) will flip back….and then the cycle will continue.
Now, on Medicaid. On all sorts of federal programs, money is offered to states in exchange for them adhering to certain guidelines. In this case, and in any case like this, it is a matter of principle for the feds to say that if a state isn’t going to abide by the guidelines, they don’t get the funding.
I think the Dems are doing this for two reasons – one, the principle of it – and two, they are a major donor of the Democratic party.
Which gets me back to my baseless accusation that I’ll stand by. Politics these days is about money. Look at how much will be spent here in Wisconsin…look at the fundraising at the Presidential level. It is completely out of control. And now, more and more laws and guidelines are in place to reward or punish the people that fund the parties. If Texas lawmakers have the power and care enough about ending abortion, then let them pass a law – a total ban. Either way, they are going to pay the legal fees – so just pass an outright ban. The skeptic side of me says that both parties like this fight and like abortion to be in place – the Dems raise more money from PP, the GOP keeps the hard right in their pockets. Sure – baseless – I’ll take it. But follow the money and you’ll find the motivation these days.
My last statement was in the total context of the state of Texas. The state of Texas is a trainwreck, and as long as they are going to have millions without insurance and good paying jobs, there are going to be women looking to have abortions. I’m not saying, at all, that this means that money ought to go to PP anyway. I’m saying that Texas can pass all the laws they want – but until they figure out some ways to make it appear that having a baby is the best solution – well, women are going to get abortions.
Paladin -
I apologize – I had the last reply on that thread (posted April 18th), and you had never followed up, so I thought it was sufficient. In future cases, feel free to ask followups on those threads – I think you feel like I dodged the question, and that isn’t accurate. Again, you never posted after I left the last reply.
Regardless, you could easily reframe the question and say “What do you think about the showdown between the feds (Obama) and the state of Texas and their joint willingness to sacrifice health care subsidies to Texas women in the fight over Planned Parenthood”.
Look, this isn’t a new thing – for years, the Fed has had all sorts of funding that is tied to general regulation. For the record, I believe it is a good thing for the feds to set certain standards that the states have to adhere to in receiving the funding.
Now, Texas has said that even though federal law says that medicaid money can’t go to pay for abortions, they don’t think any money should go to those facilities for legally covered services.
I understand, but don’t agree with your stance on fungibility. If you want to debate it further, that’s fine – but I think you’d be hard pressed to find a way to spend $100 in society without getting your hands dirty (heck, the GOP covered abortion in their health care plan up until a couple of years ago).
If the Dems passed a similar law and said federal monies for a legal service couldn’t go to a specific organization that they had targeted, I would fully expect the feds to withhold the money in that case as well. Simply put, I believe it is a good thing for the feds to set certain standards (when it comes to health care), and the states to abide by those standards if they want the federal money.
For the record, I dislike a lot of the things that Obama and the Dems have done:
– I dislike that they didn’t push harder for universal coverage and a single payer system. I think they rolled over.
– I dislike that a lot of the health care reform is a give away to drug companies and the insurance industry. Big business was still a big winner.
– I dislike that the financial reform bill didn’t go far enough in protecting every day citizens.
– I dislike that the government hasn’t come up with solutions in regards to campaign financing. The current system is a joke and needs some accountability.
– I dislike that Obama has further polarized Washington – that I can’t trust politicians to even attempt to work on a solution for the common good.
– I dislike that Obama has given a blank check to unemployment – I think the system needs refining.
– I dislike that Obama has gone from talking about trying to decrease abortion to ignoring it all together.
– I dislike that Obama hasn’t talked more about his faith and how it has shaped his life
Are those enough dislikes for you?
For the record Paladin – I struggle to find a time you’ve ever said you’ve liked a thing Obama has done, or disliked a think the GOP has done. Care to post a few?
No dislike for DoJ lunacy?
The country’s going through a crisis when a half-Latin feller shoots a black youth. What of it when a black who runs the department of justice (lower case for emphasis of meaning) is responsible for the deaths of over 200 Mexicans due to the active arming of drug cartels by the DoJ?
There’s no scandal I can think of in recent memory that comes close to this. Yet Obama’s reaction has been basically “Good job, Brownie!” Michael Brown was at least expected to resign in the wake of his mess. The Obama administration doubles down on the mess that is Eric Holder.
EGV wrote, in reply to my comment:
Paladin – I apologize – I had the last reply on that thread (posted April 18th), and you had never followed up, so I thought it was sufficient.
Whoops! You’re quite right; the apology is mine! I’d checked this thread a few times, but it quickly slipped beyond the “recent threads” list on Jill’s main page.
I think you feel like I dodged the question, and that isn’t accurate. Again, you never posted after I left the last reply.
Two replies to this: (a) I (obviously) do not now think that you left my comment without a reply; (b) I still do think that you’ve dodged several main questions (and the premier quest, in fact) of mine. I’ll explain, below.
Regardless, you could easily reframe the question and say “What do you think about the showdown between the feds (Obama) and the state of Texas and their joint willingness to sacrifice health care subsidies to Texas women in the fight over Planned Parenthood”.
I could easily re-frame it that way, yes… but I’d have to lose my senses in order to do so, since it’d be so inaccurate as to be bizarre. Texas definitely wanted the money; it simply didn’t want it at the cost of murdered babies. Did that small point (which is my main point) escape your notice?
Look, this isn’t a new thing – for years, the Fed has had all sorts of funding that is tied to general regulation.
And I’ll say again, for the umteenth time: this comment of yours is utterly and completely irrelevant, to say nothing of question-begging. It’s hardly a defense of any evil act to say, “Oh, you know it goes on all the time, don’t you? It’s not new!” That’s utterly beside the point, and you know it.
For the record, I believe it is a good thing for the feds to set certain standards that the states have to adhere to in receiving the funding.
You take refuge in the weeds of vagueness, friend… and that won’t do at all. I think you would never make such a comment if, for example, the “feds set certain standards” for state money which included mandatory surcharges for the Wars in the Middle East, or any number of other “requirements” which violated your most favourite liberal passions. Do you seriously not see that “the feds can set whatever standards they like, and that’s a good thing” is utter nonsense, even by your own standards? Did you give even a moments’ thought to this, before you typed it? This is one of the more bizarre things I’ve seen you write… and that’s saying quite a bit.
Let me be utterly clear: I, for one, think that the CONTENT of a federal requirement needs to be examined, before I consider it a “good thing”; if the federal government were, for example, to mandate euthanasia for everyone over 75, in order to be eligible for state monies, I would find that “not good”… and I hope you would, as well. Why you insist on a vague platitude such as “it’s good for the feds to have requirements” is thoughtless, at best.
Now, Texas has said that even though federal law says that medicaid money can’t go to pay for abortions, they don’t think any money should go to those facilities for legally covered services. I understand, but don’t agree with your stance on fungibility.
It’s not a matter of taste or opinion, friend; it’s a simple matter of mathematics.
If you want to debate it further, that’s fine – but I think you’d be hard pressed to find a way to spend $100 in society without getting your hands dirty
(*sigh*) And again, you seem utterly blind to the fact that one can “get one’s hands dirty” in many different ways, with greater or lesser severity! One can “get one’s hands dirty” by brushing some crumbs from a table; or one can get one’s hands dirty by disemboweling a child with one’s bare hands. Any sane person would detect a difference, both in the extent and in the moral quotient, of those two. You, however, do not seem to note any such distinction… which is disturbing, since I’d rather not think of you as insane. There is a vast difference between “sending money directly to Planned Parenthood” and “sending money to the Federal Government, who sends that money to General Motors, who
(heck, the GOP covered abortion in their health care plan up until a couple of years ago).
And you think I’d approve of and/or condone/excuse that… WHY, exactly? Honestly: how many times do I have to say, in all-caps, bold-faced print, italics, or what-have-you, that I am not a supporter of the GOP, per se? I vote GOP in most cases, because the Democratic party has embraced death on a staggering number of levels, and they’ve shown great zeal in spreading and mandating it. Is that quite clear, now (he said, expecting the answer “no”)? The extent to which the health care plan of ANYONE covers abortion is reprehensible.
If the Dems passed a similar law and said federal monies for a legal service couldn’t go to a specific organization that they had targeted, I would fully expect the feds to withhold the money in that case as well.
…and you wouldn’t care about the content/conditions of the prohibition, I suppose? The feds have a legal right to do it, so it must be morally unproblematic and “a good thing” to you?
Simply put, I believe it is a good thing for the feds to set certain standards (when it comes to health care), and the states to abide by those standards if they want the federal money.
Very good! Then, in order for Wisconsin to get state monies, all people in Wisconsin over the age of 75 must immediately report to the newly-founded “Omega Centers for Peaceful Transition to Eternity”… for the sake of lowering Medicare, etc., costs to a level acceptable to the federal government. (One mustn’t be selfish, after all; one must be a death-patriot, rather than a greedy consumer of health care which could better be given to someone younger.)
For the record, I dislike a lot of the things that Obama and the Dems have done:
[list deleted for space]
My dear fellow: would you please note the fact that I asked for your views on THIS PARTICULAR MATTER? I couldn’t possibly care less (no offense) about your various dislikes of Obama’s political policies, per se; you’re quite welcome to approve or disapprove of them as you please, with no angst from me. Rather, I wanted to know why you seemingly continue to “cheer-lead” for Obama ON THIS ISSUE, despite the plain fact that it violates your own (explicitly-stated) reasons for avoiding the GOP and supporting the Democrats. Given the opportunity to say “I don’t like the fact that the Obama administration denied funds to women simply to safeguard abortion [which I hate, as I stated on this blog], and I want him to reverse this decision which violates my whole reason for supporting him in the first place!” But no: you “double-down” on your support for his actions EVEN IN THIS INSTANCE, and you use vague platitudes to try to cover for it.
Care to take up that specific question again (which was my main point)?
Sorry to add more verbiage, but I realise that I forgot to reply to your original “reply in question”, yet again!
EGV wrote:
Paladin – I knew that last post would fire you up a little – I thought about going back and putting in a few disclaimers, but thought I’d just leave it as is.
(*wry look*) Mm-hmm… after all, what value has accuracy, if rhetorical theatre can be served? I do hope you won’t complain if I dissect it for accuracy, given your devil-may-care attitude about it?
Back to my original thought – the GOP is a much better party when they aren’t in the majority.
Please clarify: do you mean “better” in the sense of “serving the true good of man”, or do you mean merely “more skillful at accomplishing something, regardless of moral gradient”?
They do a much better job at the federal level shaping policy through obstruction and protest. When they are in power, they spend like Democrats yet won’t pay for it.
Hold on. Are you objecting to the “spending like Democrats”, or are you not?
Maybe things will change in the future.
I’m not sure whether you WANT things to change in the future; could you clarify?
The benefit though for the GOP is at the state level, they won a lot of power in mid-terms.
In other words: the GOP is more effective at the state level when they’re in power at the state level… right?
This wasn’t because they were the more attractive party (it rarely is about that), but people were sick of Obama and wanted change again.
Ah. So: apparent financial incompetence (remember the vote tally for his proposed budget?), foreign-policy incompetence, arrogance, hypocrisy, the fact that he has declared a de facto war against any pro-lifers (especially Christians) who dare to manifest any faith outside of the tidy confines of a church building (to say nothing of trying to shape policy), and the fact that he rode the waves of race-based emotions (and a sympathetic media) to his present location, and the like, have nothing to do with it? It’s all about “flavour-of-the-month”?
Soon though, states will flip back, as they always do, and the gains for the GOP (their issues they supported) will flip back….and then the cycle will continue.
Ah, yes… and we’ll be expecting all the gains within that pesky “black slavery” issue to be erased in the next few election cycles, as well, as all things “flip” interminably. How silly of me, to refuse to acknowledge that all issues, especially when fighting a supposed majority opinion, must never be settled, ever! Perhaps we might as well cancel the next March for Life… [/sarcasm]
Now, on Medicaid. On all sorts of federal programs, money is offered to states in exchange for them adhering to certain guidelines.
Right.
In this case, and in any case like this, it is a matter of principle for the feds to say that if a state isn’t going to abide by the guidelines, they don’t get the funding.
Right. So in the case of a white supremacist majority and administration, it would be a matter of principle for them to refuse to give financial aid to any clinics which condescend to serve blacks (or Hispanics, or whomever)… and you would find that, in your words, to be “a good thing”, since the system is working as it should.
I think the Dems are doing this for two reasons – one, the principle of it – and two, they are a major donor of the Democratic party.
Surprisingly enough, I agree with you on both points! I would merely add that the Democrat principles in question are evil, and that the second is evidence of a lack of moral character.
Which gets me back to my baseless accusation that I’ll stand by.
…evidence and sane reason notwithstanding…
Politics these days is about money.
And you approve of that, and you think any moral concerns about that are irrelevant fluff.
Look at how much will be spent here in Wisconsin…look at the fundraising at the Presidential level. It is completely out of control.
Right.
And now, more and more laws and guidelines are in place to reward or punish the people that fund the parties.
And this means exactly what, to you?
If Texas lawmakers have the power and care enough about ending abortion, then let them pass a law – a total ban.
Ah. So unless they do that, you think the feds are quite justified in extorting money for Planned Parenthood, on the basis that “Texas must not be serious enough to be sincere in their objections to Planned Parenthood?” My dear fellow, could you possibly be more inconsistent if you tried? Several months ago, you made a moving complaint about how I was “demanding thus-and-so level of outrage from you [against Obama], or else I would consider you insincere [or some such thing… I forget the exact details]”; and now, you do the very same thing against Texas? If Texas doesn’t meet your fastidious personal standards of outrage and action against abortion, the feds are quite entitled to hold hostage any and all monies for the poor (again, you don’t address this at all… your political raison d’être!) so that abortion can be safeguarded and promoted at taxpayer expense. I see. “The fellow was smoking in bed, anyway… so no one should blame me if I whistle past his burning house and family and sneer at his pleas for help, or even throw a bit of petrol on the blaze, if the mood strikes me. He deserves what he gets; the fire department has enough to do with putting out fires NOT caused by recklessness, anyway!”
Either way, they are going to pay the legal fees – so just pass an outright ban.
(*sigh*) Thus does EGV tolerate and/or endorse every last shake-down in the history of mankind. The extortionists will hurt/kill you, anyway… so why not dare them to attack your family, in the process?
The skeptic side of me says that both parties like this fight and like abortion to be in place – the Dems raise more money from PP, the GOP keeps the hard right in their pockets. Sure – baseless – I’ll take it.
That’s a misdirected way of saying, “I don’t care if I make sense, or not.” Interesting.
My last statement was in the total context of the state of Texas. The state of Texas is a trainwreck, and as long as they are going to have millions without insurance and good paying jobs, there are going to be women looking to have abortions.
So, in your mind, until Texas fixes everything to your satisfaction, you will insist that they pay for the very abortions that you hate (on the grounds that the federal government has every right to dictate terms about its monies, and the feds have no obligation to adhere to moral standards when doing so). Noted.
Can you seriously not see that, even if Texas were so devastated that every last person was penniless, homeless, sick and agony-ridden, this is utterly irrelevant to the idea of “the feds immediately and directly subsidising an abortion business”? You might
I’m not saying, at all, that this means that money ought to go to PP anyway.
(*face-palm*) Forgive me… I thought, when you said that such federal extortion for PP was “a good thing” (in that it’s a good thing for the feds to set standards for their “own” money), you meant exactly that. Or perhaps you mean that vocal support for a preventable evil [i.e. money to PP] is quite all right, so long as Texans “should have expected such things to happen, in response to their house being so out-of-order”?
I’m saying that Texas can pass all the laws they want – but until they figure out some ways to make it appear that having a baby is the best solution – well, women are going to get abortions.
I’m still clinging to the (rapidly-disappearing) hope that even you know that statement to be utter, illogical, disingenuous nonsense. Try applying this reasoning to murder of adults, rape, or any other crime (i.e. “unless all the social conditions which lead to [crime in question] are stopped, no one should complain about tax money going to mafia hit-squads [if they promise to use that specific money only for non-murder expenses, and pay for hit-men and ammo on their own], rape-houses, and the like), and I hope you’ll see how puerile (if not diabolical) this idea is. Have at least a modicum of sense, man!
EGV wrote:
For the record Paladin – I struggle to find a time you’ve ever said you’ve liked a thing Obama has done, or disliked a think the GOP has done. Care to post a few?
See my reply on April 24, 2012 at 10:13 am.
Hm. It seems that my text editor “ate” several words (and parts of words) of mine! Apologies…
Forgive me in advance – I see I’ve got about 15,000 words to sort through, so in picking and choosing topics, if I skip past one of great interest to you, feel free to ask for a reply on it. I’m not intentionally dodging things – I have a Bible Study to plan and a little hockey to watch.
I’ve addressed the Texas views on the other thread – but again, Texas very well might pass any law that they want – but they don’t have the right to have their cake and eat it to. The feds and many believe proper protections are in place where abortions aren’t paid for with medicaid money. Now it goes to the same organization that supplies abortions. Have we banned funding from hospitals where abortions are performed in some situations? Do we ban funding or tax breaks to any company that has abortion covered in a health care plan? You seem to try to make the distinction regarding how many hands it goes through – well, then draw the line for me? Or is it just a sniff test – and if it makes you mad, then morally, it fails the Paladin test, and if it doesn’t make you mad, you’re okay with it.
On the federal standards – sure – if the feds had a bizarre standard, I’d have an issue with it. For years, certain services have been covered by medicaid. For years, funds have been barred from going towards abortion services. Now, the line is being blurred and some politicians are saying money can’t even go to the same organization. Maybe the next step is that if a hospital has performed a service, they can’t have the money. If Texas wants to ban abortion, let them ban abortion. But dictating where money can go for legal services? I’m just not sure about that.
As I continue to cherry pick your statements here, I almost laughed out loud in regards to your voting and the GOP. It’s a very convenient place to be – where you’ve pegged yourself. You don’t have to stand for any sort of party or belief – you just sit back and hurl stones. Maybe I should just take the position that I don’t really like Obama that much, but Romney is a train wreck, so Obama will do. If I take that, can we end these little games?
In regards to your question about the feds and a morally reprehensible standard – I simply don’t see that a woman getting health care services, non-abortion services, from a planned parenthood is a terrible thing. I mean, I still shop at Wal Mart even though they sell guns. I still buy my gas at stores that have cigarettes. Maybe I’m too loose with my money – I just don’t see it as the big deal you do.
On to the next post…
I enjoy the Clinton type beginning of the next post…it depends on the meaning of the word “better”.
What I mean is, the GOP does a good job on stopping laws, and taking crazy laws and bringing them to better compromises. When they are in control, they get so power hungry that they can’t control themselves. In regards to spending like a Democrat – they spend like Democrats, but tax like Republicans. At least Democrats are willing to tax to raise revenues for what they pay for. The GOP spends like crazy and then has the balls to tell us that it is terrible to raise taxes. What did Huckabee call the GOP – budget busters I believe. If you are going to spend, pay for what you owe. That is my point.
On the flavor of the month – yes, that is exactly what I mean. Look at the last 50 years of mid-term elections and argue differently if you’d like.
In regards to the white supremacist situation – if the majority of Americans voted in a white supremacist as a leader, and congress passed laws supporting that leader, and in those laws, certain standards were given to the states that if they wanted certain federal monies, they had to adhere to the laws at the federal level – and then a state passed a law and said “well, I’m surprised that you aren’t giving me the money” – while I’d disagree with the feds ultimately on their position, I couldn’t logically blame the feds for polling funding. I stated on the other thread – I don’t have an issue with a woman receiving medicaid covered services from any place that offers them. I don’t see the same moral issues as you do.
I suppose I don’t see the hypocrisy in my argument on Texas banning abortion. They have the numbers at the state level – why don’t you think they just ban abortion ?
Let me take the last statement again, and explain it in full context (after you pulled it apart into numerous sentences and tried to attack it sentence by sentence).
I’m not impressed with the pro-life stance of Texas saying “we’re going to make it harder for you to have an abortion, and we’re also going to dramatically underfund health care, education, and everything else in the state that supports families”. I can see what you’re going to write already – something like “my good friend, surely you can’t link the two – a state’s pro-life credential have nothing to do with…” Texas goes out of their way to make it tough for families with kids to support those lives. I’d like to see Texas pass real pro-life gains, and support the lives that people have brought into their state. Now that would be something I could support!
EGV wrote, in reply to my comment:
Texas very well might pass any law that they want – but they don’t have the right to have their cake and eat it to.
That was never my point (nor anything like it). My point was about your specific views and beliefs, and about the rightness/wrongness of the actions of the Obama administration. To wit: the Obama administration decided to withhold health care monies from Texas, simply because Texas didn’t wish it to be spent on direct, proximate abortion-enabling and abortion-performing companies such as Planned Parenthood. As such, the Obama administration made a free choice to deny funds to the poor, in order to safe-guard a key arm of the abortion industry. You find that to be “a good thing”, on the basis that “the government has every right to tie whatever strings it wishes, on federal aid money”.
Let me back you up, and see if I can get you to see (or at least to stop dodging) the point I’m making, here.
I grant your claim, at least in part: that the federal government is legally free to attach conditions to federal monies (though even that freedom has limits: were the feds to withhold monies specifically from Jews, blacks, etc., it would be flatly illegal; agreed?). I am not contesting that. But (as I’ve said repeatedly), there is another question begged by that statement… which I’ll isolate with carriage-returns and bold-face for you, lest you feel overly burdened with excessive reading:
Why, given your repeated claims that “you hate abortion” and “you vote for Dems only because neither party does anything about abortion, so you might as well cast your vote to help the poor”, do you think it is a “good thing” (and not simply a “legal thing”) for the federal government to deny health care funding to the poor in Texas, simply because of a desire to safeguard abortion?
Do you see, at long last, what I’ve been telling you repeatedly? As it is, your stated position (“I support the Dems to help the poor, since abortion [which I hate and want to abolish] is a non-mover for both parties, and the Dems at least act to help the poor”) seems to be a complete sham. You seem to be exposed as a shameless shill for the Democratic party, no matter whether they support the poor, or not… and whether they promote and further the cause of abortion, or not. Your position, sir, reeks of transparent hypocrisy… and unless you can give a clear, relevant and direct explanation for this sudden “unconditional Obama/Dem apologist-in-chief” activity of yours, I’m afraid you’ll be stuck with that label.
The feds and many believe proper protections are in place where abortions aren’t paid for with medicaid money.
And I’ve explained that this belief is both infantile (re: fungibility) and irrelevant (since easy and plentiful medical alternatives to Planned Parenthood exist).
Now it goes to the same organization that supplies abortions.
…and whose main source of income (aside from tax-payer funds) is abortions, yes.
Have we banned funding from hospitals where abortions are performed in some situations?
“Have we?” No. Should we? Yes. But again: you appeal to “what is currently legal” (which is a rather shallow and puerile standard), rather than “how does EGV’s stated moral paradigm allow for him to cheer-lead/defend/excuse a federal effort to deny health care funds for the poor, simply to safeguard something which EGV claims to want to have abolished?” Had you even said, “I still support Obama and the Democrats, but I think they were wrong to do this,” you would probably have heard nary a peep from me (other than a possible congratulations for teh good comment). But when you stand up and defend that action as “a good thing” (by definition, since the federal government is within its legal rights), you invited criticism for your apparent hypocrisy.
You seem to try to make the distinction regarding how many hands it goes through
…in an effort to show how (in contradiction to your own beliefs), proximity does affect moral culpability, yes. It wasn’t my main point… but I’m not sure why you find this irrelevant, either.
– well, then draw the line for me?
You might look up “slippery slope fallacy”, when you get a moment (i.e. “since it’s difficult to draw a cut-off line, no cutoff line can possibly exist, and there can never be clear examples which cross that line”). Unless you are seriously denying that Planned Parenthood is the largest and most well-known abortion provider in the United States (i.e. no sane and conscious member of any government who has heard of Planned Parenthood at ALL could possibly fail to associate them with abortions), you’re blowing smoke, here.
Given that Planned Parenthood [a direct provider of abortion, and known primarily as the largest abortion provider in the United States] is far from being the only possible dispenser of “health care” (and can you seriously say something like that with a straight face?) in Texas, the federal government had no business denying funds to the poor of Texas solely to safeguard Planned Parenthood. That was utterly wrong… as wrong (or more wrong) as if they’d denied it on the basis that Texas was planning to help poor Jews or blacks.
On the federal standards – sure – if the feds had a bizarre standard, I’d have an issue with it.
“Bizarre standard”… such as defending Planned Parenthood (needlessly, since ready alternatives existed) solely in order to safeguard an abortion provider? Your apparent pretense of “pro-life” is slipping, friend.
As I continue to cherry pick your statements here, I almost laughed out loud in regards to your voting and the GOP.
:) I do not begrudge you your amusement. Now, if only your comprehension and moral compass could keep pace with your sense of humour, we’d be making real progress!
It’s a very convenient place to be – where you’ve pegged yourself. You don’t have to stand for any sort of party or belief – you just sit back and hurl stones.
You know… your normal excuses aside (“I’m busy, I don’t have time to qualify all my statements to death, I have kids [whose lack of death by abortion proves that I’m pro-life], etc.”), this is one of the silliest, most easily-disprovable statements you’ve ever made. You still have the capacity to surprise me, after all this time!
You just claimed (presumably with all seriousness) that I do not stand for “any belief” (your nonsense about “party” notwithstanding… perhaps you’re so far gone as to be unable to see any “belief” apart from “political party”, and they’re indistinguishable to you?). Think about this, and about my clearly-stated stances: (a) against abortion, (b) against [forgive me, everyone] artificial contraception, (c) in favour of the teachings of the Catholic Church, and more. Now, tell me how this wouldn’t set you up to be laughed off the forum by everyone who has ever read even a sentence of mine. Good grief, man!
Maybe I should just take the position that I don’t really like Obama that much, but Romney is a train wreck, so Obama will do. If I take that, can we end these little games?
The “little” games involve your credibility, your integrity, and your logical coherence, friend; you tell me how important these are, to you.
In regards to your question about the feds and a morally reprehensible standard – I simply don’t see that a woman getting health care services, non-abortion services, from a planned parenthood is a terrible thing.
Getting non-abortion services is not a terrible thing. Getting them from an abortion provider, to the extent that it helps keep that abortion provider in existence, is a terrible thing (though an individual may or may not be culpable for that evil, depending on their knowledge, freedom, available options, etc.). The existence of Planned Parenthood AT ALL is a terrible thing (or do you disagree?). I’m not sure how much more clearly to put it to someone who claims to hate abortion.
I mean, I still shop at Wal Mart even though they sell guns.
And guns are intrinsically evil… how? Or are you still under the misapprehension that I (like you) judge moral matters only on my personal whims and tastes? And if you truly think that the sale of guns is a moral crime, why do you not shop elsewhere? There are plentiful stores which do not sell fire-arms…
I still buy my gas at stores that have cigarettes.
Hm. Are there any alternatives (i.e. sources of gas where cigarettes are not sold)? If so, then why do you not go to them? And if not, then how is this parallel to the Planned Parenthood case… unless you’re suggesting that there are no clinics (“gas stations”) in Texas apart from Planned Parenthood (“those who sell cigarettes”)?
Maybe I’m too loose with my money
Well… perhaps, perhaps not. I gently suggest, however, that you are too loose with logic.
I just don’t see it as the big deal you do.
Q.E.D., for my previous statement.
On to the next post…
:) I can hardly wait…
Checkmate.
EGV wrote, in reply to my comment:
I enjoy the Clinton type beginning of the next post…it depends on the meaning of the word “better”.
(*shaking head*) You really are the consummate political creature, aren’t you? What you will do in Heaven, where politics cease to exist, I can’t begin to fathom.
What I mean is, the GOP does a good job on stopping laws, and taking crazy laws and bringing them to better compromises.
All right.
If you are going to spend, pay for what you owe. That is my point.
I agree, completely. I merely suggest (as an aside, distinct from my main point) that “spending” oneself into financial implosion (and are you seriously suggesting that the spending under Obama is the fault of the GOP?) is neither wise nor ethical.
On the flavor of the month – yes, that is exactly what I mean. Look at the last 50 years of mid-term elections and argue differently if you’d like.
My dear fellow, I’ve been arguing differently, all along! You made the (wait for it!) sweeping, broad-brush statement (you really should get royalties when someone else makes a sweeping, broad-brush statement, you know… :) ) that every last election can be explained by a mere “buyer’s fatigue”, where the electorate (that seemingly homogeous mass to which you refer) has grown bored or unenchanted with a new toy. If you don’t believe that a great many people actually vote on principle (rather than merely riding a political pendulum), after all your time on this forum (of all places!), then I really don’t know what to tell you.
In regards to the white supremacist situation – if the majority of Americans voted in a white supremacist as a leader, and congress passed laws supporting that leader, and in those laws, certain standards were given to the states that if they wanted certain federal monies, they had to adhere to the laws at the federal level – and then a state passed a law and said “well, I’m surprised that you aren’t giving me the money” – while I’d disagree with the feds ultimately on their position, I couldn’t logically blame the feds for polling funding.
Ah. Then you retract your indignant comments of the past, whenever someone called you a moral relativist? All political actions are all right, so long as the laws were duly enacted by the democratic [or other valid] process?
I stated on the other thread – I don’t have an issue with a woman receiving medicaid covered services from any place that offers them.
Yes… because, apparently, your prior claims about “disdaining the abortion issue, because neither party does anything substantial about it” was all nonsense, from beginning to end; you will (by all indications, here) support the Democratic party (and those of like mind), whether they spread abortion effectively, or not.
I don’t see the same moral issues as you do.
That, friend, is one of the few statements of yours with which I can agree completely.
I suppose I don’t see the hypocrisy in my argument on Texas banning abortion. They have the numbers at the state level – why don’t you think they just ban abortion?
You’ve yet to explain why that would be at all necessary, re: the medicaid fund issue.
Let me take the last statement again, and explain it in full context (after you pulled it apart into numerous sentences and tried to attack it sentence by sentence).
(*wry look*) Friend, I hate to break this to you, but: your points on this issue make no more sense when clumped together in paragraphs…
I’m not impressed with the pro-life stance of Texas saying “we’re going to make it harder for you to have an abortion, and we’re also going to dramatically underfund health care, education, and everything else in the state that supports families”.
You do have this incessant habit of throwing anything and everything at the wall, in double-hand-fuls, in the hopes that something will stick! How your mind associates health care (which is not at all the same as “health insurance”, though you believe otherwise) and state-sponsored education (which is not at all the same thing as “education, in general”, though you believe otherwise) is beyond me.
As to your point: you are saying, in essence, that “Texas isn’t doing things properly; therefore, I [EGV] will support the federal government’s choice to deny funds to the poor in Texas simply to safe-guard Planned Parenthood; supporting Planned Parenthood is not too great a price for me to pay, so long as my political standards are being violated!”
Perhaps you’re under the impression that I think the feds must give monies to the states, at all; that is not so. I say only that, IF the feds are in the business of doing so, they are not morally free to promote abortion by using those monies as leverage… and you are not free (on pain of hypocrisy) to give the feds a free pass from the very principle by which you claim to vote and live (i.e. “help the poor, since abortion is a non-starter”).
I can see what you’re going to write already – something like “my good friend, surely you can’t link the two – a state’s pro-life credential have nothing to do with…”
:) Nice try. But I go much further than that; even if (for the sake of argument) I granted that Texas were a wasteland of hypocrisy, cruelty and scorn for any and all poor people, this would not affect the immorality of the federal actions (i.e. hold money for the poor hostage, until Planned Parenthood is supported), one jot.
Texas goes out of their way to make it tough for families with kids to support those lives.
Your sweeping, hyperbole-ridden opinion is noted and logged. Perhaps you might supply a quote from any Texas officials who declare that they’ve “gone out of their way to oppress the poor”? I’d also add: your own (liberal) world-view will not allow you to see anything but a “nanny-state, government-controlled entitlement program” as “help for the poor”; and this is really misguided, friend.
I’d like to see Texas pass real pro-life gains, and support the lives that people have brought into their state. Now that would be something I could support!
Very good! Then you will abandon your bizarre support for Planned Parenthood (and their federal “cash cow”), given that the absence of Planned Parenthood from Texas would most certainly be a pro-life gain? (Or is your distaste for suppliers of “evil” only limited to guns and cigarettes?)
Right?
But what’s this talk about Democrats helping the poor? Democrats ingratiate a dependent constituency. And keep them there — on the reservation of dependency. And, I might add, keep them on the reservation through inculcating the virtues of dependency via the public schools.
At least the latter is certainly true in urban blue states like Illinois.
I’ve never understood why some people feel — I say feel because it certainly isn’t something that can be thought — that free market conservative promotion of prosperity is anti-poor, and big-government-as-dole at the expense of prosperity liberalism is compassionate to the poor. It’s mindlessly accepting the rhetorical conventions of liberalism for things themselves — as if the language of ideals constituted the substance of the wishful thinking at the expense of the vehicles that create wealth. I mean, we’re talking about people who think hiring tens of thousands more bureaucrats to centrally manage huge systems doesn’t impair wealth creation among the citizens whose taxes need to be raised to fund such top-heavy government “care” of these teat-worn citizens.
Paladin -
I’m sorry – I read about 1/2 of your post and I’m done with it. This method of taking individual sentences and writing long-winded statements attacking the meaning of specific words, out of context with the rest of the posting – we’re just never going to get anywhere. Furthermore, if you write triple what I write every time, and I respond to every point, we’ll eventually be writing our own novels every time. Again – I offer out – if I skip anything you find massively relevant, repost it.
I believe the crux of the matter is this from you:
“Getting non-abortion services is not a terrible thing. Getting them from an abortion provider, to the extent that it helps keep that abortion provider in existence, is a terrible thing (though an individual may or may not be culpable for that evil, depending on their knowledge, freedom, available options, etc.). The existence of Planned Parenthood AT ALL is a terrible thing (or do you disagree?). I’m not sure how much more clearly to put it to someone who claims to hate abortion.”
I don’t agree that Planned Parenthood is the massive enemy that you do. I’ve never stepped foot in one, never will – but millions of women get non-abortive services yearly from locations that don’t even provide abortions. Now, you simply argue “hey, go get your services elsewhere”. I’ll cycle back to my original statements – if you want to get into a world where the government dictates where a person gets their legal services from, that is your choice. If Texas would like, they should pass a law that Planned Parenthood can’t exist in their state. They can also choose to ban abortion. They can go through the courts and sort things out. In this case, they’ve said that they don’t like this organization, so even though they provide legal services in a legal business setting, they are going to control federal money that goes to those locations.
These women have decided, for whatever reason, that they want to get these legal services from this specific facility. Do I wish planned parenthood didn’t do abortions? Sure. Am I glad federal medicaid money doesn’t go for abortion coverage? Sure. But I can’t make the leap that you do that the entire organization should be shut down simply because they provide abortion – I wouldn’t do that with a hospital either.
Now, in bold, you frame the question like this: Why, given your repeated claims that “you hate abortion” and “you vote for Dems only because neither party does anything about abortion, so you might as well cast your vote to help the poor”, do you think it is a “good thing” (and not simply a “legal thing”) for the federal government to deny health care funding to the poor in Texas, simply because of a desire to safeguard abortion?
This is like a TERRIBLY written survey poll question. Now, you and I both know that this isn’t the only reason the money isn’t going to Texas. Federal highway money, for years, has been tied to the certain guidelines by the state. Do you honestly, ever, think that the feds would let a state completely disregard those guidelines and say “oh well, we were just kidding – here is the money anyway”. Seriously? You think that is what it is about? That the feds would say “oh well, these are legal services these women are getting, but we’ll send the money to you anyway because we were just kidding about those guidelines”.
Texas knew that when passing that law, they were putting their funding out the door – if they didn’t know that, they are idiots . And if you think that the feds should write regulations that are agreed upon and well known, and then let the states, without consequences, ignore those regulations – then what are they there for in the first place?
It just is bizarre to me that you can’t seem to piece this all together.
That so much depends on the federal government that Planned Parenthood’s specific well-being can be shoe-horned into the states with the threat of losing so much more, is part of the problem with big government. If you can’t see that, Ex-GOP, you’re an idiot. And since I know you’re not an idiot, I’m sure glad you do see that. ;-)
EGV wrote:
Paladin – I’m sorry – I read about 1/2 of your post and I’m done with it.
Well… you’re welcome to comment or not, read or not, as you see fit. None of your comments, however, give any indication that you either understand or are willing to address my main issue with you (i.e. your fundamental hypocrisy, with regard to this issue)… and I think that fact is plain to anyone who reads our discussion at all. It would have been a bit more authentic of you to say, “I’m refusing to answer that question”, of course, but… do as you will.
if I skip anything you find massively relevant, repost it.
It would hardly be worth it, I think; what would be the point in re-posting it a dozen more times, only to see it dodged an equal number of times? If you’re this tenacious in dodging the repeated and main question, I can’t attribute your attitude to invincible ignorance, any longer; I have no choice but to conclude that you’re simply being disingenuous, and that any ignorance you *do* have on the issue is willful. I leave it to the reader to confirm this, by reading any of your posts on the subject.
I don’t agree that Planned Parenthood is the massive enemy that you do.
Right… because you are not pro-life in any coherent sense of the term, despite your many assertions to the contrary.
I’ve never stepped foot in one, never will –
(*facepalm*)
The fact that you find such a comment even remotely relevant, much less logical or compelling, is proof that your position is in ruins. I am not happy about that fact, by the way.
but millions of women get non-abortive services yearly from locations that don’t even provide abortions.
And millions of Germans received many non-Jew-killing services from the Nazi government and its associates (sometimes at locations which did not even have gas chambers, dissection rooms, etc.); your argument is leaving the realm of “incoherent” and is starting to explore the realms of “ridiculous” and “delusional”. You seem utterly incapable of grasping the irrelevance of what you’ve written, here.
Now, you simply argue “hey, go get your services elsewhere”. I’ll cycle back to my original statements – if you want to get into a world where the government dictates where a person gets their legal services from, that is your choice.
This is simply a stupid comment, EGV. Allow me to reflect it back to you, using a slightly different topic, and let us see whether you find it compelling:
“If you want to get into a world where the government dictates which clinics get federal monies and which do not, that is your choice.”
So… does this mean that you (in the last 24 hours) have abandoned your thesis statement of “the government has every right to set any standards it pleases for its monies (no matter how morally unjust those standards might be), and that is a good thing”? Or does it mean that you’re simply throwing inconsistent bits of nonsense in various directions, heedless of contradiction? I’m rather convinced that it’s the latter.
Do I wish planned parenthood didn’t do abortions? Sure.
So long as the “wish” remains safely in the abstract, where you need not act in any way upon it, perhaps. That’s rather a convenient (and morally incoherent) type of moral imperative, where it makes no demands on you at all.
Am I glad federal medicaid money doesn’t go for abortion coverage? Sure.
I’m still clinging to the diminishing hope that your math skills and comprehension are not this bad, at least, and that you’re simply cutting-and-pasting boiler-plate from some liberal opinion-source without thinking the matter through.
But I can’t make the leap that you do that the entire organization should be shut down simply because they provide abortion – I wouldn’t do that with a hospital either.
The fact that you can draw any sort of equivalence between a hospital and a Planned Parenthood “clinic” in this matter shows that you simply don’t care about the abortion issue at all, save as a vague and private fancy… or else your ability to draw proportions has been surgically removed.
Now, in bold, you frame the question like this: Why, given your repeated claims that “you hate abortion” and “you vote for Dems only because neither party does anything about abortion, so you might as well cast your vote to help the poor”, do you think it is a “good thing” (and not simply a “legal thing”) for the federal government to deny health care funding to the poor in Texas, simply because of a desire to safeguard abortion? This is like a TERRIBLY written survey poll question.
…which you dodge, yet again.
Now, you and I both know that this isn’t the only reason the money isn’t going to Texas.
Pardon me, but: can you mention even ONE reason (accessible to the public) which was ever offered for the Obama Administration’s decision in this case, which did NOT involve Planned Parenthood and/or other abortion providers? Please give me links to any such clear information, if you have them… and please give me an explanation as to why you contradict yourself on this point, below.
Federal highway money, for years, has been tied to the certain guidelines by the state. Do you honestly, ever, think that the feds would let a state completely disregard those guidelines and say “oh well, we were just kidding – here is the money anyway”. Seriously?
This is the price you pay for skimming my comments, rather than taking upon yourself the agonising burden of reading them. I addressed this silly type of response, already.
Texas knew that when passing that law, they were putting their funding out the door
Pardon me, but: WHAT law? You would not be referring to the law prohibiting funds being sent to abortion-providers, would you? Because if so, then your blather about the “terribly-written poll question” was either nonsense, or else a flat-out lie.
if they didn’t know that, they are idiots.
Hm. And if someone not only “doesn’t know that”, but assumes that “it isn’t the only reason the money isn’t going to Texas” (and you do realise that your position would still be in ruins if the abortion issue were simply the MAIN reason, and not the ONLY reason, for the federal boycott?), would that person also fall under the indictment of “idiot”?
And if you think that the feds should write regulations that are agreed upon and well known, and then let the states, without consequences, ignore those regulations – then what are they there for in the first place?
That was (for the umteenth time) never my point. I was merely pointing out your hypocrisy, and your now-discredited claims to be pro-life, your now-discredited claims to support the Democrats (and flee the GOP) because “at least the Dems will help the poor, and no one is doing anything about abortion anyway”, and so on. All of these were mere winds and words, meaning nothing true. And again: I’m not at all happy to discover that fact, nor do I take any joy at all from seeing this particular argument of yours crumble; it makes me rather heart-sick, in fact… though I’m sure you’ll be tempted to decry this “maudlin statement”.
It just is bizarre to me that you can’t seem to piece this all together.
That, friend, is a sparkling example of 24-carat irony. And if I may parody your sentence: it is baffling to me that you cannot see this fact.
Paladin
I think this debate boils down to two questions here – the role of regulations in federal funding at the state level, and the role of planned parenthood in the larger society (and more specifically, can anything they do be considered ‘good’).
On the first – I think we are going at the question two different ways, and correct me if I’m wrong here…
A: The feds have defined requirements that say to get federal money, you must adhere to X. The state of Texas said, we don’t want to adhere to X, but we still want the federal money. The feds said no, you didn’t adhere to X.
B. The feds have loose requirements, or no requirements in regards to who gets federal money. The state of Texas said we don’t want to adhere to X. Though the feds have no requirements, they threw a trump card and said, ‘well, we don’t want to give you money then, no matter who it hurts.
Option A is the fault of Texas (in my humble opinion). Option B is the fault of the feds. I believe A happened. I think you believe B happened.
Question 1 – Are all my assumptions correct?
Question 2 – Do you have any evidence to the contrary that I am not correct in believe option A is what happened…I’ve read articles on it, but I’m not in the federal government, was not in any meetings, nor was called on the matter. Is there information that I’m missing that says that option B is what truly happened?
Second point of contention. I believe in our conversations, it’s clear that you don’t believe abortion is just a little bit evil. So any company/organization that has its hands in abortion would either be tainted or they wouldn’t. So how can you so quickly dismiss the case that a hospital that performs the occasional abortion is okay to receive federal funds (along with all their affiliated clinics, ambulatory services locations, etc…) – but that planned parenthood is not?
Again, there are many planned parenthood locations that do not perform abortion services – and women walk into the clinic and receive services. You would call those services “good”, and agree they should be paid for if they were received anywhere else (presuming that organization has absolutely no tie to abortion). How can you arbitrarily draw your line in saying that planned parenthood has hit a target or percentage where anything they do, even services you would consider good – that they are a bad organization – and then draw your line that other organizations that do the same thing, but to a lesser extent, are okay?
I mean, how do you get off lecturing me on this and labeling me however you want, where all you are doing is drawing the line at a different place? You scold me on not understanding proportions – can you at least admit then that those proportions are are arbitrarily decided by you, and the scolding happens if it doesn’t pass your standard?
Couldn’t a person even further pro-life than you now come on and say “silly Paladin – any hospital that refers or performs services is just a lesser planned parenthood, but has sinned just as equally – so to give them a free pass shows your political vendetta more than your following of your own guidelines”.
I think you got a little high and mighty in your last post and are treating me like I’m an immoral idiot. I think, in reality, we have a situation where we haven’t come to an agreement on what the feds really did – and we’re drawing lines in different places as to how close an organization is to an evil before being evil through and through.
Hmm. “Second point of contention”
I think the point would be that the wolf howling at the door of life is not the odd hospital or independent clinic. One doesn’t hear leftist peaceniks hollering about some small defense contractor — they go after the Halliburtons and the Blackwaters. One wouldn’t expect pro-lifer energy to be spent on small fry either. PP has made themselves a big target. It’d be silly to spend ammunition gunning for small fry.
Note: it’s OK to use gun metaphors, now that the Left has forgotten its histrionic, non sequitur umbrage in the wake of the Giffords shooting, and is trafficking in such language itself again. Nice that the full range of tropes is once again permissible!
Ready on the left…Ready on the right…
(Seriously, though, EG, when the CDC goes after diseases, do people complain when they start with the population where the disease is most prevalent? Think about the simplicity of this for all of two seconds. “You’re not warranted in treating that cohort unless you also attend to outliers in Timbuknine!”)
Sorry for the delay; I’m out of town for a bit, but I’ll be back in a day or two! More then…
No problem Paladin – I think the thread stays open for a while.
Good news Ex-GOP, I’m pretty sure they have said that the threads don’t actually close anymore. Every once in a while, comments pop up on threads from last year.
Awesome – thanks for the info JDC…I often times clean out my subscriptions, so didn’t know that.
Just out of curiousity, is the length of this thread the current record-holder for this site?
Oh, not even close. There’s some with 200+ or even 400+ comments.
Let me guess; the topic was Obama’s initial campaigning and election?
Finally! A moment to breathe and type!
EGV wrote, in reply to my comment:
Paladin, I think this debate boils down to two questions here – the role of regulations in federal funding at the state level, and the role of planned parenthood in the larger society (and more specifically, can anything they do be considered ‘good’).
I’d suggest at least one other question: “Does EGV think that the federal government could ever do anything wrong/immoral with its handling of state bequeathals of money”? The answer seems to be “no, so long as it’s a liberal, pro-abortion administration”. When I ask why the federal government is willing to withdraw funds from poor women in Texas simply to protect abortion, you replied (at least three times) that “the federal government has every right to set whatever requirements it likes on state grants, and no one should be surprised if they do!”. This leads me to think that “EGV sees no moral boundaries, whatsoever, in federal application of ‘requirements’, and that the promotion of abortion trumps support for the poor (since exclusion of abortion clinics is the only stated reason for the HHS’s refusal to grant the money)”. No one is forcing the federal government to champion abortion in this case (or any other), EGV; why do you not see this? And why are you hiding behind the specious defense of “but it’s federal money, so they can do with it as they wish”?
So far as you are concerned, the federal government is free to withdraw every last dime of federal funds from every state whatsoever, until such time as all medical facilities supply abortion… on the ridiculous grounds that “it’s federal money, and the states knew that strings would be attached!” I don’t see how you could maintain anything of the sort, while still claiming to care about the poor (even at the cost of allowing abortion to run amok), and while claiming to be pro-life. Apparently, you’re infinitely more concerned with protecting the federal right to tie string to money than you are with either the poor or the unborn. Curious… and a flat contradiction of your stated political axioms. Until you can resolve this contradiction, I’m forced to assume the most likely explanation… which is that your comments about “pro-life” and “help the poor” were mere blather.
On the first – I think we are going at the question two different ways, and correct me if I’m wrong here…
You do have a talent for understatement; I’ll give you that.
A: The feds have defined requirements that say to get federal money, you must adhere to X. The state of Texas said, we don’t want to adhere to X, but we still want the federal money. The feds said no, you didn’t adhere to X.
(*sigh*) For what must be the fifth time (no, I didn’t count… you may, if you like), NO… I do not contest that fact. I merely challenge your smiling ACCEPTANCE of that fact in this instance, given that it clashes with what you claimed (in the past) was your highest moral priority in the political realm.
B. The feds have loose requirements, or no requirements in regards to who gets federal money. The state of Texas said we don’t want to adhere to X. Though the feds have no requirements, they threw a trump card and said, ‘well, we don’t want to give you money then, no matter who it hurts.
Perhaps, if you imagined some obscure province of Germany which refused to round up Jews, and who subsequently lost their federal funding for the poor for that reason, you might better understand why your reasoning is morally bankrupt and bizarre. “Hey, it’s not the fault of the Nazi government” declares a 1940’s-version of EGV, “since the province made a free choice to ignore the clear requirements for the money! Obviously, the province’s desire to have its own way means more to them that do the lives of the poor in their jurisdiction!”
Option A is the fault of Texas (in my humble opinion). Option B is the fault of the feds. I believe A happened. I think you believe B happened.
I would have a difficult time finding a portrayal which was more incorrect, actually.
Question 1 – Are all my assumptions correct?
Absolutely not.
Question 2 – Do you have any evidence to the contrary that I am not correct in believe option A is what happened…
No. I merely claim that it is quite beside the point, and that you are (forgive me) being singularly obtuse in failing (or refusing) to see (or admit) that fact. Honestly… this is akin to having me complain that you are rearranging deck-chairs on the Titanic (rather than helping women and children onto life-boats), and having you insist (in the most passionate terms) that your particular arrangement of deck-chairs is the best of all possible deck-chair options, and that several highly-regarded studies on deck-chair arrangement (done by institutions of the highest caliber) have agreed! It’s positively surreal…
I’ve read articles on it, but I’m not in the federal government, was not in any meetings, nor was called on the matter. Is there information that I’m missing that says that option B is what truly happened?
Since I do not claim that “B” happened, and since “B” is a rather transparent straw-man of your own design, I wouldn’t expect to find any evidence that “B” *did* happen, no.
Second point of contention. I believe in our conversations, it’s clear that you don’t believe abortion is just a little bit evil.
(*wry look*) How perceptive of you. I was holding out hopes that you might be of like mind; but that hope is vanishing quickly.
So any company/organization that has its hands in abortion would either be tainted or they wouldn’t.
Not quite. Do you remember our conversation about remote vs. proximate cooperation in evil, the consequent (possible) reduction of culpability, and the like? If you truly desire to know how I make such decisions, perhaps you might investigate the “principle of double-effect”, and the conditions under which it is morally lawful to tolerate an evil effect? My own humble illustration of that principle can be found here:
http://paladinforchrist.blogspot.com/2008/11/cooperation-with-evil-part-ii.html
So how can you so quickly dismiss the case that a hospital that performs the occasional abortion is okay to receive federal funds (along with all their affiliated clinics, ambulatory services locations, etc…) – but that planned parenthood is not?
Your memory seems a bit short, friend. On April 25, 2012 at 2:37 pm, I wrote, in reply to you:
[EGV]
Have we banned funding from hospitals where abortions are performed in some situations?
[Paladin]
“Have we?” No. Should we? Yes.
When I chided your lack of proportion, I was not suggesting that the hospital participation in abortion was any better, nor was I suggesting that such a hospital was any more worthy of federal (or other) monies, nor was I suggesting that any move to make such monies contingent on a complete absence of abortion would be anything other than a morally licit thing to do. I merely suggested that your ability to blur, with “EGV broad brush-strokes (TM)”, a local hospital which does [by your reckoning] “some” abortions with an international abortion-provider who provides no critical services to save life and limb in emergencies (i.e. the only justification for tolerating any such evil), and whose very mission is to promote abortion and contraception to the world, is stunning (and misguided). Does that clarify?
Again, there are many planned parenthood locations that do not perform abortion services
How praiseworthy! Perhaps I could refer you back to the fact that Planned Parenthood runs a tiny fraction of the clinics in Texas, and that alternatives can readily be found, so any indulgence in their services (so long as they promote such striking moral evils as the slaughter of unborn children for pay) is not morally justifiable? If PP were slaughtering Jews legally, I doubt (or at least I hope I can doubt) that we’d be having this conversation… since you’d never entertain support for them for an instant!
I mean, how do you get off lecturing me on this and labeling me however you want, where all you are doing is drawing the line at a different place?
Because that is not all all what I’m doing. I label you based on your logical inconsistency and the moral incoherence of what you’ve written, not on any supposed good deeds, exemplary driving record, or anything else to which I’m not privy; I am examining the intent, mission, availability of alternatives, etc., of each organisation (hospital vs. PP), which you steadfastly refuse to do. That seems to be where we differ most: you approve of any and all federal “strings” to money, for example, regardless of the CONTENT of those “strings”… whereas I examine the content and intent (and such), and judge from there.
You scold me on not understanding proportions – can you at least admit then that those proportions are are arbitrarily decided by you, and the scolding happens if it doesn’t pass your standard?
No… because that is not at all what is happening, here. See above.
Couldn’t a person even further pro-life than you now come on and say “silly Paladin – any hospital that refers or performs services is just a lesser planned parenthood, but has sinned just as equally – so to give them a free pass shows your political vendetta more than your following of your own guidelines”.
No. See above. There really is a distinction between a “qualitative difference” (which I claim is the case; see “Principle of Double Effect”) and a “quantitative difference” (which you claim is the case).
I think you got a little high and mighty in your last post and are treating me like I’m an immoral idiot.
I am treating you as a moral relativist, and as one who is either strikingly confused or grossly dishonest in his stated moral imperatives/ambitions. The data you give me leaves me little logical freedom to do otherwise.
I think, in reality, we have a situation where we haven’t come to an agreement on what the feds really did –
I don’t think so. I do think we agree on what the feds did (i.e. withhold money for poor women, because abortion advocacy/protection happened to be the sine qua non of federal “requirements” for that money); I simply assert that you are utterly indifferent to the content of that requirement, so long as it is, in fact, a requirement. Your position is analogous to those who say that “abortion is all right, because it’s legal.” Question-begging is raised to something of an art-form, in such cases.
and we’re drawing lines in different places as to how close an organization is to an evil before being evil through and through.
No. See above.
Okay – I’m going to keep the focus on those two points of contention here.
On the first. I 100% believe that the feds set bad standards. In no way do I want to imply that just because the fed set it, it is good. What I do have an issue with is the line of reasoning that it is the feds fault for upholding the rules that have been decided on. You claimed that the feds were simply witholding the money, almost like it was a random decision. I, 100% believe you can argue that it is a bad standard that they’ve set. I can’t, however, without putting all logic aside, say that a rule should simply be ignored, and if it isn’t, it is the fault of whoever created a rule.
You seem to be arguing, and correct me if I’m wrong, that if the feds set guidelines for highway money tied to seat belt laws (and they do), and a state said “to heck with it, we don’t want the laws”, and the feds said “you don’t get the money” – you would blame the feds for witholding the money. Now, you’ll dance around this with your “how can you ever compared seat belt rules to abortion…” – but I’m not doing that. I’m saying that the feds have a regulation, good or bad. States can decide to either adhere to the regulation and get the money, or not adhere and not get the money. The decision lies with the state.
In your second to last paragraph – I don’t care about the content of the requirement. You simply stated that the feds were at fault for withholding funds. I disagree with that.
On the second point
I read your blog, and I do appreciate your reasoning, knowledge, love of the Lord, and love for human life. I want to acknowledge that.
I just need to clarify your position before I hit on the rest – so the state of Texas, in your mind, should have banned all medicaid monies to planned parenthood, and any medical system in which abortions occur. That is what you think should have happened, is that correct? Or do you think that Texas should have drawn the line at PP, but not witheld monies from other facilities?
EGV wrote, in reply to my comment:
I 100% believe that the feds set bad standards. In no way do I want to imply that just because the fed set it, it is good.
All right; that’s good to hear, at any rate. There’s much more to be said on this point, and I’m still baffled at your obsession with the “it’s a rule, so we have to live with it” idea, but… progress is progress.
What I do have an issue with is the line of reasoning that it is the feds fault for upholding the rules that have been decided on.
Perhaps you’re not familiar with the moral axiom, “Evil laws/rules are not morally binding?”
You claimed that the feds were simply witholding the money, almost like it was a random decision.
I do not think that it was a “random” decision, in the least (and I said as much, repeatedly); I assert that the Obama administration (and helpers) has a methodical, systematic agenda which includes the complete normalisation and liberalisation of abortion in every possible venue. No, this was not a whimsical or spur-of-the-moment decision.
I, 100% believe you can argue that it is a bad standard that they’ve set.
…but you do not seem to see the relevance of that fact in the moral scheme of things, and you don’t seem to think that this fact has any relevance at all, save perhaps as a reason for having some isolated people (such as I) feeling emotionally disgruntled.
I can’t, however, without putting all logic aside, say that a rule should simply be ignored, and if it isn’t, it is the fault of whoever created a rule.
My dear fellow, you’ve missed the main point for this entire conversation: if a law/rule is morally evil, then (1) it is most certainly “the fault” of whomever enacted it, (2) it is not morally binding, and (3) it is not “the fault” of any moral agent for doing what they’re supposed to do (i.e. refusing to obey the evil law).
You seem to be arguing, and correct me if I’m wrong, that if the feds set guidelines for highway money tied to seat belt laws (and they do), and a state said “to heck with it, we don’t want the laws”, and the feds said “you don’t get the money” – you would blame the feds for witholding the money.
Yes, I’m afraid you’re wrong, and yes, I’m afraid I must correct you. I would not “blame the feds” for any such situation, since the requirement to wear seat-belts is not an evil law (and it is, in fact, a good and praiseworthy law, by any sane standard–both in intent and in application), and there would be no moral basis for “civil disobedience” against it.
Now, you’ll dance around this with your “how can you ever compared seat belt rules to abortion…” – but I’m not doing that. I’m saying that the feds have a regulation, good or bad. States can decide to either adhere to the regulation and get the money, or not adhere and not get the money. The decision lies with the state.
And I’m saying that you cannot validly conflate good laws with evil laws, in such an example as yours, since they must be handled very differently. Rosa Parks, for example, was fully justified in refusing to obey the unjust law which commanded her to defer to while customers… and this situation is immeasurably worse than that (since Rosa Parks was not being threatened with death by dismemberment, at tax-payer expense).
In your second to last paragraph – I don’t care about the content of the requirement.
(?) Pardon me: are you CONFIRMING the idea that you do not care about the content (i.e. agreeing with my accusation against you), or is this an awkwardly-formatted restatement/quote of my own comment, without agreeing/disagreeing? DO you actually care, or do you not? I saw no evidence that you did; hence my earlier comments.
You simply stated that the feds were at fault for withholding funds. I disagree with that.
See above.
On the second point: I read your blog, and I do appreciate your reasoning, knowledge, love of the Lord, and love for human life. I want to acknowledge that.
All right… and thank you for the generous words.
I just need to clarify your position before I hit on the rest – so the state of Texas, in your mind, should have banned all medicaid monies to planned parenthood, and any medical system in which abortions occur. That is what you think should have happened, is that correct?
That is correct. That protocol should be the norm in every state of the union (and at the federal level), as well. Once a particular system renounces abortion (provably/verifiably), I would not object to the restoration of funds to that system, at all.
Or do you think that Texas should have drawn the line at PP, but not witheld monies from other facilities?
No, I do not think that. I would, of course, say that it is WORSE to give money to Planned Parenthood (whose mission and identity are inseparable from abortion-promotion and supply) than it is to give money to, say, hospitals which “perform occasional abortions”… but that is aside from the fact that both are unacceptable. If (God forbid) I were faced with an “either/or” choice… to defund Planned Parenthood, or to defund such hospitals, but not both… I would choose to defund Planned Parenthood, simply for the sake of fighting the greatest evil. Does that clarify?
Whoops… a typo, above, caught after the editing window of opportunity:
Rosa Parks, for example, was fully justified in refusing to obey the unjust law which commanded her to defer to while white customers…
(??) EGV, I just received an e-mail with a new comment from you, but it’s not here; was it deleted?
It is stuck in moderation…it might be because I said the d word. (Dam*, not Democrat)
Paladin -
Well, darn. I kind of feel like we’ve wasted about 10,000 words on this.
At the beginning, you blamed the Obama administration for witholding funds, and tried to trap me in a statement regarding me caring about health care for the poor.
You were never concerned about the actual “who is at fault”, and how regulations work – you are saying that the government should say, “well, abortion is evil, so we’re going to ignore this rule and allow it anyways”.
In the scope of the argument, when you made the case that the feds are at fault for the loss of funding, and not Texas – that is what I’m saying in reference to the content of the law not mattering. I’d put it in bold if it weren’t annoying…my simple case is, whether or not the regulation is stupid, if the feds have a regulation, and the states say they aren’t going to follow it, you can’t blame the feds on the funding aspect of it. The feds didn’t “withdraw” money at this point. That has been my long standing contention during this entire argument. Take abortion out of it – I’m just saying, you can’t blame somebody for setting a rule and then having it stand when challenged.
I believe I’ve said a few times – if you want to focus on the moral aspect of the regulation, that is a different argument (from at least the one I’ve been having). I’ve been arguing the lack of funding.