Roger L. Simon: Your tax dollars at work...

"The data clearly show that the majority of older teens and adults have already had sex before marriage, which calls into question the federal government's funding of abstinence-only-until-marriage programs for 12- to 29-year-olds," Finer said.

How does this track with a world where robots will have rights? It doesn't seem fair. [I'm for abstinent robots.-ed. I'm not.]

Comments

Comments require registration through TypeKey. Abusive remarks may be deleted. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of Roger Simon.

I will be glad to be rid of such programs if we can also be rid of abortion funding. Abstinence programs for 29 year olds might be absurd but the idea of my money funding abortion hits me in the gut.

I will agree to cutting funding for the abstinence nonsense as long as those who back federal funding of abortion agree to stop sending my tax dollars to cure the problems of those who cannot say no.

Why wouldn't it be okay to kick a robotic dog? They are annoying when the kids don't turn them off. Pffft.

Oh- if I kick a robot and injure it, will 'it' be able to sue me for damages? Somehow I think Nancy Peloski would go for that.

Oh- now that means social security's in trouble, these things could apply for SSDI benefits. Uh-oh.

This article was published in the Financial Times---and not the Onion? I had to double check to see if perhaps it was a satirical piece. The crazies residing within our postmodernist institutions are truly losing their minds.

Considering the increase in STD's amongst the 15-29 yr olds it seem that money spend on educating youths how to put on a condom on a cucumber (even if you begin with kindergarden age) isn't an effective program to promote healthy, safe sex let alone prevent abortions.

For some reason I get the sense that robotic sexual behavior is being forced upon the youth in order for the Collective feel-gooders to justify government spending to find cures for STD's. It's like they are teaching children to be sexual robots as in 'having sex is good for you even if you don't really know why you are doing it' kind of robotic behavior.

This is what the Sexual Revolution taught me as a young woman and that was back in the 1970's, I can't imagine much has changed since the Collective took control of the popular robot culture.

I did not engage in premarital sex before marriage. It wasn't the government that did it, it was my religion and my parents... nothing else.

Of course, my marriage ended in divorce because we were both young and inexperienced in life.

Now, I have a wonderful relationship with a fantastic girl, a partner thats far more meaningful and wonderful than what I experienced before.

What's so strange about an abstinence program for 29-year olds? It was good enough for me, though in my case,abstinence was involuntary.

Well, why not? If the Germany can send you to jail for violence against creatures in a video game, then why can't England send you to jail for violence against a robot?

Given that sex related industries and porno in various media generate billions of dollars of revenue per annum from willing consumers, a special excise tax would provide ample money to fund abstinence programs and STD treatment nationally. This would be popular across the political spectrum. For the left, it's an opportunity to impose another tax and more social programs, and another layer of government bureaucracy. The political right could adopt the motto, salvation through sin taxes.

Pierre -- just so that people are clear on what "hits you in the gut": the only federal funding of abortion that the federal government will pay for is to allow poor women receiving Medicaid to have an abortion in order to save the life of the mother, of in cases of rape or incest. All other federal funding of abortion is prohibited by the Hyde Amendment, which passed in 1979.

Since you sound pretty hardcore on the issue, I just want to know if you agree with the following proposition: an embryo or fetus is a human being, and the 14th amendment guarantees of equal protection under the law to all citizens; thus, a woman who hires an abortionist to successfully abort her embryo must be treated no differently than a person who hires a hitman to successfully murder another human being.

"You know, education -- if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."
John Kerry's address at Ford's Remedial School for Troubled Robots ;)

Abortion using the excuse that we are protecting Woman's health is absolutely ridiculous.

I object to using alternate terms for the baby, fetus, embryo and other dehumanizing words all meant to make it easier to avoid thinking about what is being done. If the baby had the chance of being anything else at any point inside of the womb then we might be able to call it another name. But unless it is aborted it will emerge each and every time as a baby.

How can we prosecute anyone for murder when we legalized it as a society? But when Libertarians and others start talking about slippery slopes I notice no one mentions the slope we find ourselves on as a society by sanctioning the murder of millions of babies.

I am not a very big fan of those people whose entire existence is centered around catering to their next whim. Which seems to describe those most enamored with the practice. But I digress.

Pierre -- yes you digress, you also don't answer my question, which I put to every pro-lifer as well: if abortion is murder, shouldn't pro-life people INSIST that women who hire abortionists to kill their babies be charged with first degree murder?

Anything else would seem to fall short of the necessary implications of your stated view ("abortion is murder") Talking about a "culture of life", or saying you'll punish the abortionists, rather than the women who hire them, is a cop-out. It is like the pre-civil war debate over whether slave owners ought to be compensated for the loss of their "property." Either slaves were legitimate property or not. If they weren't, their "owners" deserved no compensation.

Also, do you deny that some women are at risk of death if they give birth? Care to debate this issue with an OB/GYN.

Once again, there is federal funding for low-income woman to have an abortion only if she has been raped, impregnated by her father or other close relative, or in danger of DYING if she gives birth.

Markus: you ask the question as though it's some sort of "gotcha!" moment. Actually, it's common sense--if the fetus is human then abortion is murder, with all that that entails.

I had to laugh when you brought up slavery since, under that comparison, you are the slave owner. It is you arguing that the darkies aren't really people, you claiming that they surely can't have the same rights as white people.

I'm not trying to play "gotcha" Tim, I'm trying to get people who think that a fetus is a full human being entitled to equal protection under the law, and the people who that say "abortion is murder", to be honest in political debates about the ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY legal response to abortion that the state must take if in fact their viewpoint is true.

Among all the pro-death penalty Republicans who believe that an embryo or fetus is a full human being, who has the guts to say that women who intentionally abort their children should be executed?

And the answer is: because abortion is legal by Supreme Court fiat, the homicide of the unborn baby is not murder.

Were abortion illegal, I would consider it murder. In fact, in many states, it IS murder to kill someone else's unborn baby without their permission (which really muddies the water about just what rights we are talking about).

As to whether it would be "first degree" murder... we enter into a different realm. Obviously the circumstances are different than other murders, because the baby is a parasite within the body of another person (although usually as a result of consensual acts of that person).

Hence, such a killing might be a lesser crime than, say, premeditated infanticide. Furthermore, as you know, killing the baby to save the "mother" is not murder - it's self defense. So in those few cases where the mother's life (not "health") is at stake, no crime would take place even if a "right to abortion" had not been tortured out of a Constitution which never was intended to mean such a thing.

As to abstinence programs for non-virgins... what's the problem? Do you imagine that abstinence programs exist to (or solely to) preserve virginity? That's the implication, which is absurd.

If (and this is a big if) the government is going to get into behavior modification to prevent pregnancy and/or STD's, then paying for abstinence programs sounds as reasonable as rubberizing bananas. You don't get pregnant and you don't get STD's if you are abstinent - even if you were sexually active before.

John -- "Obviously the circumstances are different than other murders, because the baby is a parasite within the body of another person (although usually as a result of consensual acts of that person). Hence, such a killing might be a lesser crime than, say, premeditated infanticide."

So an unborn child is a "parasite" because it is temporarily completely dependent on one person, it's mother, for survival. After all, adoption isn't even an option until after you've been born! And the premeditated murder of this more vulnerable child "might" possibly be a lesser crime than the premeditated murder of a child that is in fact strong enough to biologically survive on its own. But why would the state do more to protect the strong than to protect the weak?

I remain convinced that if you believe that an unborn child is a full human being and abortion is murder, there is only one legitimate position to take as to what ought to be done in a post-Roe world: unless the mother's life is at risk (which you correctly point out would make the abortion an act of self-defense), a woman who gets an abortionist to successfully kill her unborn child must be charged with first-degree murder.

And the reason this proposal sounds so ridiculous and unjust, even to people who consider themselves "pro-life", is that it is obvious that there is in fact a difference between a born and an unborn child, and the two are NOT entitled to equal protection.

BTW, I agree with you and Hugo Black that there is no right to privacy in the Constitution. It is one of many deficiencies in that great but very imperfect document that ought to be amended, but can't be, due to its undemocratic features, particularly of the amendment clause. A very good book by Sanford Levinson on this topic has just been published, highly recommended for the holiday season:

http://www.amazon.com/Our-Undemocratic-Constitution-People-Correct/dp/0195307518

Both the new born and unborn are totally incapable of taking care of themselves. Both are totally dependent on care to survive. Are both equally at risk because they might be an inconvenient burden?

Markus you are missing the point. It is not murder now because we have decided it is not illegal to "murder" your child.

Murder itself is a matter of definition...once it is illegal I would have no problem calling murder and prosecuting the women for committing it.

It is a measure of how far down the slippery slope we have gone that we are having this discussion.

What if a 2 week old becomes an inconvenient burden on a mother and she strangles the child. Is that murder? What if she has someone else strangle the child is that murder?

Odd how a mothers risk seems to rise when she finds the burden of a baby to be inconvenient burden to her self centered life.

December 19, 2006: Your tax dollars at work...

Comments

Post a comment

Email This Post