Alito

[wendybeth]

Originally Posted by Alex Stroup

Sure, especially since I have no idea what that is a picture of.

A Catholic's man rather large brood.

[Alex]

Originally Posted by SacTown Chronic

It's a picture of a class-action lawsuit aimed at an incompetent abortion doctor.

Well, that explains the forcep scars on each of their foreheads.

[Name]

Originally Posted by wendybeth

Thank you, Prudence.

(Ahem...)

Title: Every Sperm Is Sacred
From: Monty Python's The Meaning of Life
Transcribed By: unknown


There are Jews in the world, there are Buddhists,
there are Hindus and Mormons and then
there are those that follow Mohammed -but-
I've never been one of them.
I am a Roman Catholic
and have been since before I was born,
and the one thing they say about Catholics is
they'll take you as soon as you're warm.
You don't have to be a six-footer.
You don't have to have a great brain.
You don't have to have any clothes on, you're
a Catholic the moment dad came
...Because...
Every sperm is sacred,
every sperm is great,
If a sperm is wasted,
God gets quite irate. (2x)
Let the heathens spill theirs,
on the dusty ground.
God shall make them pay for
each sperm that can't be found.
Every sperm is wanted,
every sperm is good.
Every sperm is needed,
in your neighborhood.
Hindu, Taoist, Mormon,
spill theirs just anywhere
but God loves those who treat their
semen with more care.
(misc choruses)
Every sperm is useful,
every sperm is fine.
God needs everybodies,
mine, and mine, and mine.
Let the pagans spill theirs
on mountain hill and plain.
God shall strike them down for
each sperm that's spilled in vain.
(misc. choruses and finale)

hee hee hee

[scaeagles]

Originally Posted by Alex Stroup

But my point scaeagles is that you are conflating separate issues:

1) The right of a woman to control her own body.
2) Financial responsibility for offspring.

My, I'd like to think logical, response is that just because the former can impact the need for the latter does negate the independent existence of the latter.

I do not see them as separate whatsoever.

IF the item growing inside her is an unviable tissue mass, and IF she can remove it at her discretion and no one elses, or allow it to grow and be born at her discretion and no one elses, then it is her responsibility alone. She made the decision to bring it into the world.

No birth, no offspring. The birth is the complete decision of the woman. The man has no legal standing in making a determination as to if the tissue will be permitted to grow and be born.

edited: deleted a really poor analogy.

[Alex]

Put another way, conflating what I see as two issues is the same logic that results in laws requiring people to wear helmets and seatbelts. Or laws that outlaw smoking, or laws that limit personal choices due the costs those choices can cause to others (i.e., since if you don't wear a helmet it increases the chances that you'll end up in ICU on the public's dime, we collectively gain the right to force you to wear a helmet or face punishment).

I could be wrong, but I'm guessing that on most such issues, you would take the position that either this is the cross to bear when allowing personal freedoms. Besides, you didn't ask for a logical argument that you would agree with, just a logical argument. Disagreements with my initial axiom does not render the resulting points illogical.

Your point would not argue that the father should be required to approve an abortion but rather that the father should be more easily able to sever parental responsibility for a child. That is not an abortion issue but rather simple social poilcy.

You have not shown how being financially impacted by the absense of abortion gives a right to prohibit the abortion (it is kind of like saying "since you not wearing a motorcycle helmet could cost me money, I have the right to require that you not wear a motorcycle helmet). If this financial burden creates a right to involvement in abortion decisions, at most it would give the right to require an abortion (that is, a right to avoid enburdenment, but not a right to be enburdened).

So, in conclusion gentleman of the jury, I think I have given a logical argument for why abortion decisions can ultimately reside solely with the woman without simultaneously diminishing the male responsibility for support. In response I think you have given a logical argument for why either family responsibility should be weakened (alloweing easier severance of paternal responsibility) or male projenitors should be able to force abortion on unwilling women.

Arguing that there exists a fetal right to life that trumps a woman's right to bodily control is yet another separate argument, which also has no bearing on the father's burden to support. It is also an argument at the point of axiom and axioms can not be proven within the framework of the argument but only assumed to establish a framework. In other words, there is no way to empiricly prove when a fetus gains rights that trump other rights, we each have to decide where we will assume that line is (conception, first trimester, second trimester, birth, weaning, proof of lack of serious defect, etc.). Rational people can easily reach different conclusions.

And that is why the legality of abortion should not be a judicial matter, but a legislative one (and that is why Roe v. Wade was wrong, not because of the conclusion it reached but because it wasn't a conclusion that the judiciary should be reaching).

So long winded I am today.

[Gemini Cricket]

I thought this was funny:


The family of Judge Samuel Alito, daughter Laura (L),
son Philip (C) and wife Martha (R), stand underneath a
portrait of former president Bill Clinton as they watch
President Bush nominate Alito to the Supreme Court in
the White House, October 31, 2005. (Reuters)

[scaeagles]

Originally Posted by Gemini Cricket

More info:

Source
Her husband's permission?!

I've looked into this a bit.

Actually, what his opinion was was that there was no constitutional prohibition to a law that required such. I beleive the way the article was written was done in such a way as to make it sound as if he supported such a law. His opinion says nothing about whether he thinks it is a good idea or not. He ruled on the constitutionality of the law, which is what I suppose he is supposed to do.

Here is the opinion in question:
http://www.confirmthem.com/?p=1764#comment-62642
It is extraordinarily lengthy.

I am wondering if anyone knows what the case was all about.

The spousal notification provision at issue did not give the husband a veto power. Rather, a married woman simply had to certify (through her own uncorroborated and unnotarized statement) either that she had notified her husband, or that her case fell within any one of several statutory exceptions (like can't find the hubby, he might beat her up, etc.).

The key quote from his decision, I beleive, is the following -
"Whether the legislature’s approach represents sound public policy is not a question for us to decide. Our task here is simply to decide whether Section 3209 meets constitutional standards."

So, this is far from how it is being portrayed by some. In no way did Alito support a law requiring a woman to to get a husbands permission for an abortion. It is notification and notification only. Reading his opinion (while long and tedious, most certainly), I saw nothing even close to unreasoned or inflamatory.

[scaeagles]

Originally Posted by Gemini Cricket

I thought this was funny

Maybe Clinton is the father?

(it's a joke - relax - not intended to impune Mrs. Alito, but to poke at Clinton's playboy image.)

[Gemini Cricket]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

Maybe Clinton is the father?

(it's a joke - relax - not intended to impune Mrs. Alito, but to poke at Clinton's playboy image.)

lol!

[wendybeth]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

Maybe Clinton is the father?

(it's a joke - relax - not intended to impune Mrs. Alito, but to poke at Clinton's playboy image.)

You know, the tall kid does look a bit like him....