Repudiation: Rand Paul and Big Government

Senator Paul, like his father, is supposedly for smaller, libertarian government.  Also like his father, Dr. Paul really wants bigger and more intrusive government when it comes to particular religious issues, most notably abortion.  Today I received an e-mail from the Senator that directed me to a petition to overturn Roe v. Wade.  As a gay man, I do not have a direct interest in the questions of when life begins and the rights of a woman.  Abortion is distasteful at best.  But I do not believe that either I or the government have the right to come between a woman and her doctor in making such decisions.  Small government.

Nonetheless, having been presented with arguments that I believe to be flawed, let's look at the logic and reasoning on the page of the petition.

Because of Roe v. Wade, more than 56 million unborn children have died through abortion; and

No.  The premise is immediately flawed.  "unborn children" is an oxymoron.  A fetus is not yet a child.  A child has been born already.  The wording makes no sense.

In Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court declared it could not resolve "the difficult question of when life begins" – and on the basis of this unresolved question, declared a new "right to abortion" based on a "right of privacy"; and

The only quibble I have here is the phrasing "a new right".  A person's rights are either recognized or legislated against.  The concept of new does not make sense.

The 14th Amendment to the Constitution states: "nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the law"; and

Yes, but a fetus is not a person.  This is what the whole Personhood Amendment is about ... trying to declare a zygote and a fetus to be a person with the same rights as you and I have.  A "person", legally, is one who has standing in a court of law ... meaning that a young child is not a person so that she or he can have the protection of a parent to stand legally on the child's behalf.  Expanding full personhood not just to children but to include both fetus and zygote is completely absurd.

In Roe, the Supreme Court admitted: "If . . . personhood [for the unborn] is established, the appellant’s case, of course, collapses, for the fetus’ right to life is then guaranteed specifically by the [Fourteenth] Amendment..." (Roe v. Wade [410 US 113 at 156-7]); and

That is a big if which has been assumed as having been established.  It is not.

Science is clear that human life begins at conception when a new human being is formed; and

No.  That is a point of debate, not an established scientific fact.  Yes, the cells of a zygote are living tissue, but that does not designate a new human being yet.

The American people oppose abortion-on-demand and want innocent human life to be protected especially when it is most defenseless; and

Some Americans do oppose any and all abortion.  But neither Dr. Paul nor the National Pro-Life Alliance speak for all American people.  They do not speak for me.

It belongs to Congress to resolve the question the Supreme Court said IT cannot resolve; and

No.  Government should not be intruding in medical decisions like this.

A Life at Conception Act, by declaring that unborn children are persons legally entitled to constitutional protection, will rescue millions of unborn children from dying by abortion-on-demand;

This is a big government intrusion into very personal matters.  I do not believe that a zygote is entitled to any protection other than that which the woman elects to provide.  Most zygotes are spontaneously aborted ... is that to be illegal?  How about a woman demanding abortion to terminate an ectopic pregnancy?  What of those forms of contraceptive that prevent implantation of the zygote?  This would remove many of the protections that couples and women in particular can now enjoy.

Needless to say, I am not signing the petition that Dr. Paul linked.  You will probably see more of this soon.  According to the e-mail from Dr. Paul signing the petition is key, then:

They are the key ingredient in the National Pro-Life Alliance's plan to pass a Life at Conception Act. They'll also organize:

... Hard-hitting TV, radio and newspaper ads to be run just before each vote, detailing the horrors of abortion and mobilizing the American people.

... Extensive personal lobbying of key members of Congress by rank and file National Pro-Life Alliance members and staff.

... A series of newspaper columns to be distributed free to all 1,437 daily newspapers now published in the United States.

... An extensive email, direct mail and telephone campaign to generate at least one million petitions to Congress like the one linked to in this letter.

Of course, to do all this will take a lot of money.

Just to email and mail the letters necessary to produce one million petitions will cost at least $460,000 .

Sorry Senator, but I want the government out of my bedroom, out of my doctor's office, and not interfering with personal decisions made by couples.  Please butt out!

FollowUp 1: Personhood Amendments

Jack Tapper of ABC News interviewed Newt Gingrich on Friday in Iowa regarding when life begins.  This was not a big issue until recently when the Personhood Amendment people moved the debate from which trimester does life begin to which moment after sexual intercourse.Mr. Gingrich's answers are not going to make the Personhood extremists happy.

TAPPER: Abortion is a big issue here in Iowa among conservative Republican voters and Rick Santorum has said you are inconsistent. The big argument here is that you have supported in the past embryonic stem cell research and you made a comment about how these fertilized eggs, these embryos are not yet “pre-human” because they have not been implanted. This has upset conservatives in this state who worry you don’t see these fertilized eggs as human life. When do you think human life begins?

GINGRICH: Well, I think the question of being implanted is a very big question. My friends who have ideological positions that sound good don’t then follow through the logic of: ‘So how many additional potential lives are they talking about? What are they going to do as a practical matter to make this real?’

I think that if you take a position when a woman has fertilized egg and that’s been successfully implanted that now you’re dealing with life. because otherwise you’re going to open up an extraordinary range of very difficult questions

The question of viability of the fetus is no longer on the Republican table.  The only question is a cell count and determination of implantation for their debate.  I'm sorry, but this still leaves women with no choices when they should have control of their own bodies.  With apologies for repeating some of what I wrote last time ...

Mr. Gingrich's position still does not allow for any abortions, including those needed for medical reasons.  So, a woman with an ectopic pregnancy would be prohibited from getting the medical care that she needs to save her life.  In other words, the attempt to prevent her from aborting a doomed zygote (by definition, there is a conception resulting in a zygote, but not a properly implanted embryo) would not save the zygote but would kill the woman.

A woman who is raped and conceives would be forced to carry and give birth to the child of her rapist.  In a sense, she would be raped a second time and not be allowed to leave the rape behind her short of giving the child that she did not choose away for adoption.

Aside from those very real issues, there is a theological dichotomy between religions that should have both of the Republican positions as unconstitutional because of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.  There is no agreement as to when a cluster of cells becomes a person.

Those in the anti-abortion movement claim that as soon as the sperm and ova combine, there is a human person deserving of all rights of any citizen.  They base this claim not upon science but upon the Bible.  In particular, Psalm 139:16 speaks of how God knew David while his body was unformed.  They interpret this to mean that the spirit is formed immediately upon creation of the zygote.  An alternate interpretation is that the spirit, separate from the physical body, is known by God long before it is part of any human flesh.

Similarly, Jeremiah 1:4-5 talks of how God knew Jeremiah before he was in the womb.  Note, this does not mean in the womb, but prior to conception.

There are additional passages in the Prophetical Writings that have a similar vein.  In Judaism, these are not part of the Bible.  These are written by humans, not by God.

The writings of God, for Jews, consist of exactly five scrolls or books.  The germane verse is Genesis 2:7, where God breathed the spirit into Adam.  The spirit is associated with birth, not with conception.  The two Hebrew words that may help understand this distinction are ruach and nephesh.  The Christians think of the soul in terms of ruach.  The Jews think of the spirit in terms of nephesh.  Click on the links for some details.

The debate is also fueled by the first commandment in Genesis 1:28, where God tells Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply.  We have done so.  Their descendents include more than seven billion alive today.  We exceed the number of stars that can be seen with the naked eye.  We exceed the number that our planet can sustain without environmental degradation.

Thanks to Think Progress for the heads up.

11 November 2011, Original Pedantic Political Ponderings post.

19 January 2012, FollowUp 2.

Repudiation: Wisconsin Steps Back from Protecting Gays in the Workplace

Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin seems to be doing everything he can to undermine fairness in Wisconsin.  He went after public employee unions, voting rights, comprehensive sex education, women's reproductive rights, and now the LGBTQ Community.

In March, Governor Walker appointed Laurie McCallum to the Wisconsin Labor and Industry Review Commission (LIRC).  She is one of a three person board who serve staggered six year terms.  Ms. McCallum is the wife of former Republican Wisconsin Governor Scott McCallum, who had first served as Lt. Gov. under Tommy Thompson.  Ms. McCallum is an attorney who has been employed by Wisconsin for over three decades.

The LIRC, among its other duties, determines discrimination claims.  Last month they heard the case of Chris Bowen who complained that suffered discrimination while an employee of Stroh Precision Die Casting.  This was reported in the Wisconsin Gazette.

In a 2-1 decision, commissioners Robert Glaser and Ann L. Crump found that Stroh was responsible for fostering a workplace environment hostile to Bowen because of his sexual orientation. Stroh did not deny that the harassment occurred; nor did the company argue that anti-gay harassment is allowed under state law during the eight years that the case bounced around the court system.

But McCallum, the politically connected wife of former GOP Gov. Scott McCallum, defied nearly 30 years of precedent in state law by asserting that sexual “preference,” as she put it, is not a protected category in workplace discrimination cases.

With this as an example of Walker appointments, the LGBTQ Community in Wisconsin has reason to recall Mr. Walker.  If he is not recalled, he will appoint another member of the LIRC, giving a majority view that discrimination of gays in the workplace is perfectly legal.  The discrimination described by Mr. Bowen, again from the Wisconsin Gazette article, was not trivial.

The court record showed that a group of Bowen’s co-workers repeatedly called him “fag,” “maricon” and “my little bitch,” among other slurs, over a period of years. Bowen once found a bulls-eye hunting target over which the word “gay” was written stuck to his toolbox. Someone put a sign that said, “queer” or “queen” on his locker. A sticker was put in his workplace that said, “Honk if you’re gay.”

In a statement that was excluded as evidence at Bowen’s administrative hearing, co-worker Kathryn Corroo said, “I witnessed the sexual harassment against Chris Bowen, especially during February 2002 through May 2002 by (co-employees) Tom Meier, Rick Hafemeister, David Lepke, Jesse Manhardt and Rose McGee.  … I heard Tom Meier say that Chris was not in a very good mood and that maybe it was because he (Chris) didn’t get a apiece (sic) of ass over the weekend at Pridefest, the day after the weekend of Pridefest. I heard Rick Hafemeister make comments to Chris and myself about how all nigers (sic) and queers, etc. ... (sic) should be put in a big hole and shot. And get rid of them all.”

The Wisconsin Gazette article continues with more along the same lines.

Harassment is wrong.  What Mr. Bowen put up with for years at work was wrong.  That Ms. McCallum finds this acceptable for the workplace, as evidenced by her dissenting vote, is not reasonable.  Mr. Walker really needs to be removed from office to give Wisconsin a chance to return to its progressive roots.

Repudiation: Personhood Amendments

It would have been difficult to miss the news from Tuesday that Mississippi's Personhood Amendment failed at the polls.  It failed by a considerable margin and many think that the issue is now over and done.  That is, many who are outside the anti-abortion movement.

There are national and state-based efforts to get Personhood Amendments (the plural in the title was not a typo) like Mississippi's Initiative 26 in states including Nevada in 2014, Alabama perhaps in 2012, Ohio in 2012, Florida in 2012, Wisconsin in 2012, and more being pushed by a national organization based in Colorado.  It isn't over.

There are a few reasons that this is a bad idea.  The science behind the Personhood Amendments is wrong and the theology is flawed.

The Personhood Amendment does not allow for any abortions, including those needed for medical reasons.  So, a woman with an ectopic pregnancy would be prohibited from getting the medical care that she needs to save her life.  In other words, the attempt to prevent her from aborting a doomed zygote (by definition, there is a conception resulting in a zygote, but not a properly implanted embryo) would not save the zygote but would kill the woman.

The Personhood Amendment does not allow for hormonal contraceptives (such as "the pill"), as these allow for two cells to join before washing them out of the woman's system.  The most common forms of birth control would be outlawed.

A woman who is raped and conceives would be forced to carry and give birth to the child of her rapist.  In a sense, she would be raped a second time and not be allowed to leave the rape behind her short of giving the child that she did not choose away for adoption.

Aside from those very real issues, there is a theological dichotomy between religions that should have these Personhood Amendments fail as unconstitutional because of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.  There is no agreement as to when a cluster of cells becomes a person.

Those in the anti-abortion movement claim that as soon as the sperm and ova combine, there is a human person deserving of all rights of any citizen.  They base this claim not upon science but upon the Bible.  In particular, Psalm 139:16 speaks of how God knew David while his body was unformed.  They interpret this to mean that the spirit is formed immediately upon creation of the zygote.  An alternate interpretation is that the spirit, separate from the physical body, is known by God long before it is part of any human flesh.

Similarly, Jeremiah 1:4-5 talks of how God knew Jeremiah before he was in the womb.  Note, this does not mean in the womb, but prior to conception.

There are additional passages in the Prophetical Writings that have a similar vein.  In Judaism, these are not part of the Bible.  These are written by humans, not by God.

The writings of God, for Jews, consist of exactly five scrolls or books.  The germane verse is Genesis 2:7, where God breathed the spirit into Adam.  The spirit is associated with birth, not with conception.  The two Hebrew words that may help understand this distinction are ruach and nephesh.  The Christians think of the soul in terms of ruach.  The Jews think of the spirit in terms of nephesh.  Click on the links for some details.

The debate is also fueled by the first commandment in Genesis 1:28, where God tells Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply.  We have done so.  Their descendents include more than seven billion alive today.  We exceed the number of stars that can be seen with the naked eye.  We exceed the number that our planet can sustain without environmental degradation.

The point is that the Personhood Amendment is based on dangerous theories that may harm the lives of women.  It is based on religious dogma that is not universal.  And those who want to see this pass are not about to stop trying.

4 December 2011, FollowUp 1.

19 January 2012, FollowUp 2.