The three fundamental problems with Roe v. Wade

First, and most importantly, the outcome of Roe is harmful and unjust. Why? The facts of embryology show that the human embryo or fetus (the being whose life is ended in abortion) is a distinct and living human organism at the earliest stages of development. Justice requires that the law protect the equal dignity and basic rights of every member of the human family—irrespective of age, size, ability, dependency, and the desires and decisions of others. This principle of human equality, affirmed in the Declaration of Independence and the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights, is the moral core of western civilization. But the Roe Court ruled, to the contrary, that a particular class of innocent human beings (the unborn) must be excluded from the protection of the law and allowed to be dismembered and killed at the discretion of others. "The right created by the Supreme Court in Roe," observes University of St. Thomas law professor Michael Stokes Paulsen, "is a constitutional right of some human beings to kill other human beings."

 

The second problem with Roe is that it is an epic constitutional mistake. Justice Harry Blackmun's majority opinion claimed that the "right of privacy" found in the "liberty" protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment is "broad enough to encompass" a fundamental right to abortion. There is no reason to think that's true. Roe ruled that the Fourteenth Amendment somehow prevents Americans from doing what the ratifiers of the Fourteenth Amendment actually did. "To reach its result," Justice William Rehnquist quipped in his dissenting opinion, "the Court necessarily has had to find within the scope of the Fourteenth Amendment a right that was apparently completely unknown to the drafters of the Amendment."

That's absurd. "The only conclusion possible from this history," Rehnquist explained, "is that the drafters did not intend to have the Fourteenth Amendment withdraw from the States the power to legislate with respect to this matter."

 

Third, Roe is undemocratic. Roe and Doe v. Bolton together struck down the democratically decided abortion laws of all 50 states and replaced them with a nationwide policy of abortion-for-any-reason, whether the people like it or not. Of course, the Court may properly invalidate statutes that are inconsistent with the Constitution (which is the highest law). But Roe lacked any such justification.

So, these are the three fundamental and intractable problems with Roe v. Wade. The Supreme Court abused the Constitution to usurp the authority of the people by imposing an unjust policy with morally disastrous results. Unjust. Unconstitutional. Undemocratic.

Singing Fetus

I have a radical sexual idea–a kind of dream.

I have a radical sexual idea–a kind of dream.

Let’s re-re-define marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife–the unique form of relationship that is ordered to and would naturally be fulfilled by the coming to be and rearing of children together. Let’s regard the social role of marriage as uniting a man and woman as husband and wife to be father and mother to any children born of their union, thus conferring upon those children the inestimable blessing of being brought up in the committed love of the two people whose becoming one in an act of marital communion gave them the gift of life, and further providing those children with the benefit of both paternal and maternal examples, influences, and care.

Now here comes the really radical part. Let’s view sex as having its meaning and significance in expressing in the most intimate and profound way the conjugal love and commitment of the spouses. Let’s understand it as uniting them as one-flesh in a uniquely comprehensive sharing of life–a sharing at all levels of their being as human persons, the biological, the affective, the rational-volitional and spiritual. Let’s regard marital love and commitment as the very principle of sexual morality, the normative basis for distinguishing upright from unworthy sexual conduct. Let’s embrace a set of virtues that guard us against objectifying others (and indeed ourselves) and treating human beings (others or ourselves) as mere means of gratification.

Let’s respect each other’s inherent worth and human dignity by honoring each other in all aspects of our being, including its sexual dimension, and never treating sex as a way of asserting, expressing, or exercising power over others. Let’s not deceive ourselves into supposing that virtue in the sexual dimension of our lives is merely a matter of gaining consent from an object of our desires to use him or her to satisfy our lust. Let us not reduce ourselves to seducers or sirens.

Sex has become depersonalized in our culture and in cultures like ours–and the carnage of the sexual revolution that we now see all around us is the appalling testament to that fact. Let’s re-personalize it.

Fear or new complaints at the #womensmarch?

Some of the major issues in the U.S. cited by women’s groups in the last fifty years—we did not see much difference this weekend:  Why?

They are:
1. Poverty, Hunger, and Homelessness.
This is not unique to women. It is a national and global problem.
2. The Continuing Gender Wage Gap.
It is more complicated than this. Most studies point to the fact that women are disproportionately concentrated in the lowest-paying fields and are not well represented in higher-paying fields. However, the myth feeds fear and anger.
3. Violence Against Women.
Recent data shows that women and girls nationwide experienced about 270,000 rapes or sexual assaults annually. However, domestic violence is another key aspect of this issue as well as elder abuse. Seldom mentioned.
4. Continuing Efforts to Whittle Down Roe v. Wade and Women’s Reproductive Rights.
Abortion is and has been a 50/50 split nationally. Reproductive Responsibility is seldom mentioned. Taxpayer funding is morally offensive to those that disagree.
5. Inadequate Maternal and Infant Health Care.
The U.S. has the highest maternal mortality rate among developed nations and ranks 50th among the nations of the world with regard to maternal deaths. Data is hard to gather and analyze. However, the mothers have tangled involvement; poor & single, addiction and poor health habits during pregnancy.
6. The Absence of Laws Mandating Paid Sick and Parental Leave.
The U.S. is the only industrialized nation in the world that doesn’t mandate paid maternity leave. Women would resort to have the government force others to pay the cost of having children. There is no plurality agreement on this issue. However, Trump has made it a priority!?
7. Reasonable Accommodations for Pregnant Women.
Wanting a federal law requiring employers to make reasonable accommodations to the needs of pregnant women such as they are required to make for employees with mental or physical disabilities and in connection with the religious beliefs or practices of their employees. This is clearly discriminatory transfer of wealth. Pregnancy is a choice and the consequences are known. Mental and physical disability are NOT.
8. The Lack of Affordable and Competent Child Care.
 “The lack of quality, affordable day care is arguably the most significant barrier to full equality for women in the workplace,” is the primary complaint. This is driven by more women in the workforce and the demise of the wife as primary care giver. It is a choice for many women. Creating another entitlement for this issue managed at the Federal level would be disastrous; costly and ineffective as other programs have proven to be.
9. The Treatment of Women in Prison.
The number of women committing crimes requiring lengthy incarceration has exploded. The State and Federal organizations are slow to effect change. Criminal behavior by women is another discussion that is ignored. Did you see a sign?
10. Human Trafficking/Sex Slavery.
Trafficking is a modern-day form of slavery. We have many laws and agencies charged with this crime. It is not simply a women’s issue, but a national one.
11. The Severe Continued Under-Representation of Women in Political Life.
Women constitute only 20 percent of our Senate and only 18 percent of our House of Representatives—this, in a country where women are the majority of the population. Our election process allows the people to select the representatives. Since women voters outnumber male voters, this is a vacant complaint.
12. Discrimination in Academia. The higher in terms of faculty rank, salary, prestige, and status—the fewer are the women.
Recent statistics show that only 26 percent of college presidents are women despite the fact that more than 57 percent of the college and university student population is female. Why should a meritocracy be offset by mandated gender rules for hiring into very complex positions? That is discriminatory on its face.
13. Under-Representation in the Justice System: As Prosecutors, Judges, and Police Officers.
Another Federal Law? Recent studies show that women do not choose fields of study or work that prepares and leads to positions in these fields. It is no different than in many other occupations in the U.S.
14. Inadequate Representation Among Those Who Run Our Top Corporations and Serve on Corporate Boards.
In for profit companies, the top jobs are filled by those people that have proven they can produce “value for the shareholders”. Failure to do so results in a failed company or a degradation in stock value. Women do and can compete for these positions with all others. However, the criteria to hold the position does not change with gender. Gender neutral.
15. Inadequate Representation and Unequal Pay for Actors, Writers, Directors, and Producers in the Entertainment Industry.
The general public does not give much care to this issue. Hollywood operates on a different value system that is very progressive. If this progressive culture cannot solve this problem this problem, the rest on this page will not likely be managed.
16. Keeping Women in High-Tech Fields.
At most midsize or large tech companies, HR leaders supervise review scores to uncover and correct patterns of systematic bias. This is a call to action to bring the same rigor to the review language itself.
17. Lack of Health Insurance.
In spite of the Affordable Healthcare Act, it is projected that roughly thirty million non-elderly Americans, many of them women and girls, will still be uninsured. This is the leading rational that liberal policies have not been effective.
18. ERA and CEDAW.
A review of this issue raises the question of “Have we gone too far?” Recent studies show that we have now entered and era of reverse discrimination and the courts are reacting to same.

So, where do we go? When reviewing pictures and audio from the marchers, we see little meaningful indicators of long standing issues. We mostly see fear mongering that somehow America will stand by and let the gains made by our society erode into dustbin of history. The likely hood approaches Zero. I would suggest these women know that. However, I also believe they enjoyed their moment whether legitimate or not. 

Contraceptives reduce child poverty, teen pregnancies and abortions or do they?

Contraceptives reduce child poverty, teen pregnancies and abortions or do they?

One way to reduce childhood poverty is to reduce teen pregnancies. Research cited by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention demonstrate that reducing teen pregnancy is a critical and effective way to combat child poverty. So, with all the free access to birth control, why do we continue to have teen pregnancies?

The background

The research shows that teen pregnancy and birth are significant contributors to high school dropout rates among girls. Only about 50 percent of teen mothers receive a high school diploma by age 22 compared to about 90 percent of women who had not given birth during adolescence. The children of teenage mothers are more likely to have lower school achievement and drop out of high school, have more health problems, be incarcerated during adolescence, give birth as a teen, and face unemployment as a young adult. Where are the fathers? Not being responsible or accountable.

The CDC has declared teen pregnancy a public health priority and “winnable battle” that should be attacked using evidence-based teen pregnancy prevention programs with access to youth-friendly clinical services including birth control.  We do this while teen pregnancies continue.

It is also good news that teen pregnancies (as well as teen births and abortions) have steadily decreased, especially since 2008. Even so they remain unacceptably high.

What is driving the decrease in teen pregnancies?

The respected independent Guttmacher Institute just released a study that documents the decrease in teen pregnancies to historic lows since their peak in 1990. The study suggests that increased access to long-acting, reversible contraceptives like IUD’s and implants (LARC’s) are making a difference.

The study says about recent declines, “it appears likely that recent changes in contraceptive use are driving the reduction. There is evidence that contraceptive practices have improved among older teens. A recent study found that the proportion of 18- to 19-year-old women, who report using long-acting reversible contraceptive methods tripled between 2007 and 2009, and promotion and acceptance of these methods among teens and young adult women has increased.” A prior analysis found that contraceptives accounted for more than 80 percent of the decline in teen pregnancies while abstinence accounted for about 14 percent.

The bad news is that the Guttmacher study finds that the rate of decline in teen pregnancies for teens of color lags behind the decline for white teens. Why?

Studies in the state of Colorado and the city of St. Louis, where free or affordable, long-acting reversible contraceptives were made available to teens show the effectiveness of access to those contraceptives. The program in Colorado resulted in a reduction by 29 percent in teen births. In St. Louis, teen births declined to 34 per 1,000 teens versus the national average of 158.5 per thousand.

The cost to all of us from teen births is significant. In 2010, teen births cost the U.S. nearly $10 billion in increased public assistance and health care and income lost to lower educational attainment and reduced earnings among children born to teen mothers. That is spending that will be reduced when we reduce child poverty.

While many clinics as well as Planned Parenthood are providing much needed access to contraceptives and education which reduce teen pregnancies and combat child poverty, teens under 17 continue unabated.

Community efforts to fight child poverty that include access to contraceptives and evidence-based education to reduce teen pregnancies and the child poverty they cause. However, there is still a missing link. That is, impressing upon these young people the consequences and accountability of teen pregnancies. As this narrative explains, teen pregnancy should be a “winnable battle. However, in addition to contraceptives it comes down to the individual making right decisions.

It also makes sense that anyone who seeks to reduce the number of abortions start by driving responsibility and accountability to the individual level.

Stop Grieving for the Present....

Stop Grieving for the Present....

by Glynda Linkous

My people wait for My justice, for My judgments on the nations. You long for your

(real) home and that is right.

My judgments will not be pleasant to see, but your understanding of what is taking 

place will help you in this. These things must be, for scripture must be fulfilled. The 

time of the end is at hand.

You do well to prepare for the lost who will seek Me in this time for they will be many,

and My people must be ready to receive them, to relay the gospel to them, to 

embrace them in My love.

Be about My business in the earth as you await the end, My children.

War on women is based on 1 thing: Abortion rights

War on women is based on 1 thing: Abortion rights

by Kathleen Parker

It has long been accepted by the conventionally wise that the Republican Party is waging a “war on women.”

Let’s be clear. The war on women is based on just one thing – abortion rights. While it is true that access to abortion has been restricted in several states owing to Republican efforts, it is not true that women as a whole care only or mostly about abortion.

I promise, this isn’t another abortion column, not that the horrific number of abortions performed each year shouldn’t make one’s stomach turn. Instead, extremists on the pro-choice left celebrate the “right” to terminate a 20-week-old fetus. Google an image of this stage of fetal development and try to comprehend the glee we witnessed when state Sen. Wendy Davis, now running for governor, became the belle du jour upon her successful filibuster to protect that “right” in Texas.

OK, sorry, so I digressed just a little. But it isn’t possible to dissect the alleged war on women without mentioning abortion, since this is the entire content of the war as defined by savvy Democratic operatives. It was an effective strategy in 2012, aided quite a bit by some of the GOP’s lesser lights and looser tongues, not to mention good ol’ slut-talking Rush Limbaugh.

On the latter’s offense, and the silliness of the so-called war in general, I defer to Bill Maher, who recently chastised liberals for their selective outrage regarding women’s rights.

“We hear a lot about the Republican ‘war on women.’ It’s not cool Rush Limbaugh called somebody a slut. OK,” said Maher. “But Saudi women can’t vote, or drive, or hold a job or leave the house without a man.

Overwhelming majorities in every Muslim country say a wife is always obliged to obey her husband. That all seems like a bigger issue than evangelical Christian bakeries refusing to make gay wedding cakes.”

Indeed.

This selective tendency is also apparent when only certain women are deserving of defense in the public arena. Sarah Palin, whose vice presidency I politely opposed for legitimate reasons that are now widely embraced, has been outrageously abused in the vilest terms – by Maher among others – and left to twist in the wind. Yet Sandra Fluke, whose appeal for insurance coverage of birth control prompted Limbaugh to call her a “slut,” was elevated to martyr status and perhaps a political career.

A more recent example of a wa ron- women event occurred in Virginia’s closely watched congressional race between Democrat John Foust and Republican Barbara Comstock.

This time it was a Democratic male attacking a Republican female in, shall we say, the most clueless terms.

Lacking facts or finesse, Foust mused to an audience that Comstock hadn’t ever held a “real job.”

Meaning, what, that she’s just a mom? Even if this were so, and it is not, why should Foust get a pass for such an ignorant, sexist remark? Is any Democratic male – even one who manages to insult while pandering – better than any Republican female?

In my experience, a woman who can manage a household and juggle the needs of three children while obtaining a law degree from Georgetown University, as Comstock did, can run a corporation or a nation.

Like many working women, Comstock did stay home in the early years to raise her children. She is also whip smart, funny, irreverent and fierce.

Her resume includes such non-cookie baking activities as serving as a senior aide to Rep. Frank Wolf, whose congressional seat she is pursuing.

She currently is serving her third term in the Virginia House of Delegates, where she has advanced legislation to thwart human trafficking and supported several conservative positions related to health care and tax reform.

Yes, she’s conservative. And, yes, she also opposes abortion. Which is to say, she doesn’t quite count in the national movement to elect more women to public office. When a Comstock ad recently called Foust’s comments “sexist, bizarre, insensitive, ignorant,” the 10th district’s Democratic Party tweeted, “If @barbaracomstock were a man, she’d be down 20 pts w women. Her record & policies are horrible for women.”

No, if Comstock were a man, she wouldn’t have to counter such slander.

Virginia voters who oppose Comstock’s legislative record have a clear alternative. But if they cast their ballots for Foust, they’ll be electing a man whose disrespect toward women and the single job only women can do – mothering – is at least as offensive as Limbaugh’s name-calling. On the other hand, maybe Foust and Limbaugh cancel each other out – neutralizing the war that never was.

Vatican: Nancy Pelosi Must Be Denied Communion

Vatican: Nancy Pelosi Must Be Denied Communion

Because of her longstanding support for abortion, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), a Catholic, must be denied Communion under the law of the Catholic Church, said Cardinal Raymond Burke, head of the highest court at the Vatican.

Cardinal Burke referenced his remarks about Pelosi to Canon Law–the law governing the Catholic Church–and specifically Canon 915, which says those Catholics who obstinately persevere “in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion.”

“Certainly this is a case when Canon 915 must be applied,” said Cardinal Burke in an interview reprinted on Sept. 5 in The Wanderer, a national Catholic weekly. “This is a person who obstinately, after repeated admonitions, persists in a grave sin–cooperating with the crime of procured abortion–and still professes to be a devout Catholic.”

Our Increasingly Soulless Society

Our Increasingly Soulless Society

By Rabbi Avi Shafran
Back in 2005, The New York Times asked a number of contemporary thinkers what idea that is taken for granted these days they think will disappear "in the next 35 years." 

Professor Peter Singer, the Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University's Orwellian-named "Center for Human Values," responded: "the traditional view of the sanctity of human life." That view, he explained, will "collapse under pressure from scientific, technological and demographic developments." 

It's been less than ten years since that prediction but the professor is already being proven a prophet. 

The Journal of Medical Ethics is a peer-reviewed academic journal in the field of bioethics, established in 1975. A scholarly paper that appeared in its pages in 2012 has, for some reason, been receiving new attention. It deserves it.
It was titled "After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?" and was written by two academics, members of the philosophy departments of, respectively, the University of Milan and the University of Melbourne. 

Its authors' summary reads, in its entirety, as follows:

"Abortion is largely accepted even for reasons that do not have anything to do with the fetus' health. By showing that 1) both fetuses and newborns do not have the same moral status as actual persons, 2) the fact that both are potential persons is morally irrelevant and 3) adoption is not always in the best interest of actual people, the authors argue that what we call 'after-birth abortion' (killing a newborn) should be permissible in all the cases where abortion is, including cases where the newborn is not disabled."

And the paper goes on to expand on each of those contentions. In The Weekly Standard, where he serves as senior editor, Andrew Ferguson offered his synopsis of the paper:

"Neither fetus nor baby has developed a sufficient sense of his own life to know what it would be like to be deprived of it. The kid will never know the difference, in other words. A newborn baby is just a fetus who's hung around a bit too long."

By using the word "newborn," Mr. Ferguson is too kind to the writers. In their own words they make clear that they are not limiting their considered judgment to the moments, or even days, after birth. "Hardly," they write, "can a newborn be said to have aims, as the future we imagine for it is merely a projection of our minds on its potential lives. It might start having expectations and develop a minimum level of self-awareness at a very early stage, but not in the first days or few weeks after birth."

While the writers concede that killing babies, or terminating pregnancies, does prevent a meaningful life from happening, they contend that "it makes no sense to say that someone is harmed by being prevented from becoming an actual person…. [I]n order for a harm to occur, it is necessary that someone is in the condition of experiencing that harm."

Missing entirely, of course, in the authors' calculus is the possibility that something other than "harm" to a human being, whether born or potential, may be in play here. Any such concern, they would surely say, is for their universities' religion departments to consider, not their own.

That is part of the toll taken by the compartmentalization of contemporary scholarship. Once upon a time, no essential distinction was made between what was called "natural science" and "moral science."

The latter, part and parcel of philosophy, concerned things like G-d, teleology, human purpose and the soul.

In the absence of the concept of a human soul, there is indeed nothing to prevent us from casually terminating a yet-unborn life or a life no longer "useful" or a life not yet cognizant of its potential. Neither, for that matter, would one be justified to consider humans of any stage or age inherently more worthy than animals. Put succinctly, a society that denies the soul is not only soul-less but soulless.
There are many issues where contemporary mores stand in stark contrast with the 

Jewish values that have permeated the world since the time of Abraham. The issue of dispatching babies, unborn or otherwise, is one.

To be sure, Halacha (Jewish Law) makes clear that the life of a Jewish mother takes precedence over that of her unborn child when there is no way to preserve both lives. And, while the matter is hardly free from controversy, there are respected rabbinic opinions that extend that precedence as well to cases where there is serious jeopardizing of the mother's health.

But those narrow exceptions certainly do not translate into some unlimited mother's "right" to make whatever "choice" she may see fit about the child she carries. And certainly not about a child already born. The mother did not give the child a soul; this was God.

Judaism has little to say about rights; it speaks instead of right, and of wrong; of duties and obligations. And one obligation, although it is being degraded by the increasingly soul-less society in which we live, is to value human life, born or otherwise.