Oh puhleese, another sound bite. It would appear the only people who have a year's limit (the Obama cave in) on their insurance are the people who aren't paying for enough insurance to cover their actual potential costs. Once again the truth is ignored, uninsured people are gambling with other people's money. If they lose the gamble those of us who pay for our health care pay their bills. Here's your choice if you want the freedom you propose, change the law that says EDs can't leave patients to die on their steps. If you're serious, that is the true option. Otherwise stop griping that I don't want to pay for the deadbeats anymore as their health care costs are shifted to my bill.
@minstrel: I'm glad for you. However, I can't look past the things they've done wrong (same goes for the Reps, mind you). Here we go. . . . Do I think Democrats are socialists? Not all of them. Only the ones in DC. I didn't want to fight you, just as I don't think Minstrel wanted to fight Republicans when he said they're all controlled by the Tea Party. I think all drugs should be legalized, actually. When they legalize all of them, I'll pay mind. Governmental discrimination against gays is gone, yes. You know what I don't think is freedom? Having the option to kill my child before they're born. I don't think some people should have voting rights, namely those with an IQ below 110. I'm assuming they're against this. I don't find it American or Constitutional that Dems want to punish me for a criminal's doing by taking my rights away. If you let them have a little they'll think they can have more. You also mention keeping guns from criminals. I'm afraid that's not possible. The government could only really ever be able to control legal guns, which criminals don't have. Dems are okay with killing unseen babies who are unwanted, but not children who are? One or the other: pro-child-death or not. It's really that simple. I didn't make lists of reasons why I hate the DC Democrats or many other problems I have with them because I don't want to derail the thread. We're obviously very different in our beliefs and it will be impossible for us to argue until we find out which opinion is correct, so this is where I say goodbye.
It's really, really not. I have more than once wondered what would happen if a lawmaker proposed that when a man fathers a child, he is liable, for the rest of that child's life, to provide blood, bone marrow, organs, and whatever other parts of his body that child might need. After all, the mother endangered her life and health and dedicated her organs to carrying that child through childbirth; it's the father's turn now. The kid needs a kidney? You have no choice but to give that kidney, just as a woman who's deprived of an abortion has no choice but to carry that child and give birth. They come get you and take it out. You only have one kidney? Aw, you're not going to be one of those "life of the father" wimps, are you? You're in poor health and you are in one of those wimpy jurisdictions that cares whether you live or die? OK, can you *prove* to the satisfaction of a judge that the surgery will probably kill you? The kid needs a heart-lung transplant? Hm. "One or the other: pro-child-death or not. It's really that simple."
This confused me, as the woman 'forced' to carry a child would only carry for nine (or however) months. Why would the father have to give any to all of his organs over the entire duration of the child's life?
The mother only carries the child for nine months, but the resulting health consequences could last a lifetime, and could kill her. And the mother will almost certainly experience some health impact for that nine months, while the father may well get off scot-free. But, sure, let's assume that the man is only liable from the time that the child hits, oh, age sixteen until age sixteen and nine months. What if the child needs that heart-lung transplant while in that window? Edited to add: Also, what happened to it all being about the child's life? Why do we suddenly care about fairness to the parent now that the father is involved? Surely if a woman should be willing to die to carry a child to term, a man should be willing to die, at any point in his life, to keep that child alive.
And here I was thinking you were writing of a sixteen year old girl who got knocked up. How wrong I was! If a mother truly loved her child, she would die for it, even if she had never really known it. If the father truly loved his child, he'd do the same. You see what I'm saying?
So a father should be willing to die, to give his heart and lungs, to his teenager? And if he isn't willing, the law should compel him to do so?
Look: unborn babies have no say in whether or not they want to live. If the son, sixteen, decides he will die without making his father go through the surgery, so be it. My biggest concern is that unborn children have no say in anything. They are treated worse than animals. If the unborn child knew of their mother's struggle and was somehow able to communicate with her how they would be okay with dying for her, so be it! The point is, they're not able to do that. I'm afraid we're far off topic. I think I'll stop here.
Did you guys know that a fetus fits the definition of a parasite? All drugs? Really? Not in all states. That's a bit elitist, isn't it? Besides, a higher IQ does not make you a more informed voter.
Of course, all the debate on the abortion issue presumes that we know at what point the unborn can be given the status of a "person." One cell? A ball of cells? Further in development? At viability? Without the answer to that question, you can't really draw analogies to a sixteen year old. Even with the answer, it is difficult to do, but you have to be able to figure out when the unborn go from a collection of cells to a person.
Really, the key is when is the "person" capable of living without requiring the physicality of a specific, particular person? A 6 month old baby is, of course, dependent on others for its continued existence. But that person can be anyone - not just the mother. If the fetus is removed from the mother, can it survive on it's own, with no assistance from that particular mother? I don't believe in forced gestation.
The IRS administers the laws that are passed by congress. If you don't like the tax laws, blame congress, not the IRS. What's more, IRS workers are now into their 4th straight year of pay freeze and second straight year of skeletal budgets. They can't even afford to train new agents properly. The IRS doesn't even have the power to be the beast that people love to portray it as being. The agency was completely gelded by the Revenue Reconstruction Act of 1998.
IQ is a somewhat imprecise measure of intelligence, and in fact, only one measure. It is not the definitive assessment of how "smart" someone is or how much they can contribute to society, or how well they can understand issues.
I agree with the both of you. I was trying to find a way to fit basic intelligence, maturity, etc under one thing, and I chose that one means incorrectly. I apologize. Did you know that a fetus is an unborn baby? It's a baby. I don't care how small it is, I don't care how it looks. It's a baby. If we end this pathetic 'war on drugs' gang violence will go down. (I have an entire theory on it, though I believe it best to explain a different time.) I know. I merely meant that the government cannot discriminate for things like military, marrying in court, etc. It doesn't automatically make you an informed voter, but it shows me that you are not an idiot who will vote for someone "because." You're right, though, it does sound a bit elitist (though I think 110 is the average of the country), and those with an IQ of 110 might not do the necessary research. In that case, maybe raising the age will fare better. Hopefully people will have matured enough to vote out of hope their preferred candidate will help our country by the time they're 21. Again, these are just opinions. My opinions are different from yours, obviously, but I'm not going to change them. I think we're derailing the thread.
100 is supposed to be the "average" score, and I've never heard that the United States in particular had a higher average score than was typical or expected. (Or that it was higher than that in other countries.) There are a lot of people with high measured IQs, who nevertheless have some truly bizarre, immoral, or frightening ideas. (For example, many serial killers tend to have very high IQs.) Also, voter participation among younger people is very low, but there isn't any real reason to think that younger voters are less informed than older voters. Indeed, many college age voters are very well informed of the issues and the candidates -- more informed, perhaps, than people who might be closer to 30.
That's fine, and I realize that neither of us is going to convince the other. But I'd just ask you (no need to respond; I just don't know if I made my point clear) to consider the terror, a terror that a man never, *ever* has to face, that having sex can result in a situation where your fellow humans decide that you are going to die for the sake of your child. Not that you should be willing to die, but that barring a medically impossible miracle, you *are* going to die. The law doesn't do that to men, not under any circumstances whatsoever. A father can't be legally compelled to so much as give a pint of blood to his child. I think that that fact is worth considering.
You'll have to elaborate. If you mean you shouldn't have to make any contributions to the community, that ideology is unrealistic. If you think your tax dollars trickle up into corporate coffers, all the while corporate riches are under taxed, that would be one of those areas the Democrats and the Republicans are equally negatively influenced by the money in politics.
What has Minstrel done wrong? And what does that have to do with the false charge Democrats are anti-freedom? Obama couldn't be more pro-capitalism or pro-business. The socialism charge is a campaign slogan and a lie repeated so often it's believed. (See Goebbels) I do believe Minstrel said the Republican Party, not all individual Republicans were controlled by the TEA Party. An understatement.
Thank you for being so civil about this, by the way. I can try to understand the terror (though I doubt I ever will), and of course I don't think it's fair that men don't have any obligation to their children unless they want it. Men can walk out on their child and the woman they impregnated without any repercussions. It's sad, but it's true. I hate it, but it happens. This I couldn't agree more with.
I do believe it was Karl Rove who first tapped into low information voters but to read the right wing blogosphere you would think it was the opposite. Of course that is also from the Rove Playbook, whatever your competitor accuses you of, accuse them of the same, the truth of the charge matters not. It's not that there aren't low information voters on both sides of the isle. There are almost certainly close to equal numbers. But Rove courted their votes actively and unabashedly.
What about the freedom to not be an ambassador killed in Libya and freedom to not have the reason be covered up and lied about on national television?
