The Abortion Debate

The one thing that really bothers me about the abortion debate is that as debates go, this one sucks. Both sides really stink it up when it comes to reasoning through this complex issue. Pro-lifers generally hide behind their Bibles which is great when preaching to the choir, but utterly worthless outside of their little clique. Or they'll say "life is sacred," and then get hammered into the ground with the death penalty. But I'll take it easy on the pro-lifers, because I'm on their side. Besides that, it's more fun to beat up on the pro-choicers. Let's take some of their ideas and just... run with them.

The first centers around the question of "When does a fertilized egg become a human being?" Many learned people have come up with arcane and elaborate formulas for this, which can be debated until the heat death of the universe. I prefer much more simple and elegant solutions that can be proposed and discussed in the space of no more than two martinis. So a couple of years ago, I came up with a Modest Proposal-esque solution to this dilemma. It's really dead simple (rimshot, please): Let any mother abort any baby at any time, with one condition: under penalty of death, she has to eat the fetus. Raw, straight up, and no Tabasco sauce. If it's not a human being - just some foreign tissue growing inside of her then there's nothing really wrong or gross or even cannibalistic about it, right? Heck, it just came out a nearly sterile environment and any toxins in it are just stuff she's got in her already. Just think of it as a really exotic dish. Biologically speaking, it's not nearly as gross as eating sushi, and I love to eat sushi. In fact, since some sushi is actually served alive, we really don't even have to kill it first. If you catch it early enough you can just suck it right down like an oyster. Maybe we can throw in just a little Tobasco. Remember: it's not a baby or anything like that. And ... um... how's that argument working for you right about now?

Another line of reasoning suggests that OK, OK, maybe it is human and all, but since a fetus isn't viable outside of the womb it's not really all the way human or something like that. This assertion fraught with problems to begin with (as anyone born prematurely can attest), but let's just take it at face value because we can have fun with it. The obvious question that comes to mind is "why stop at birth?" Babies can't survive on their own, nor can small children... or even many adults. If they can't support themselves then they're not viable, and we should be able to abort them instead of letting them drain our financial and biological resources (hey, they're costing me money and that's standing between me and more sushi). You could even go so far as to say that people who don't make enough money to pay taxes aren't viable in the sociological sense (ditto). Heck, we could solve social security insolvency, welfare problems, and eliminate the possibility of any Democrat being elected to anything ever again right there! It's tempting.

And finally, we get to: "My trigger finger is part of my body and the government can't tell me what to do with my body!!!"

(For the moonbats reading this, yes, this is satire, and no, I'm not going on nor advocating a shooting spree. But if you can eat the fetuses... well, you win.)

On Capital Punishment

Capital Punishment is one of those ideas that works better in theory than in practice. In theory, I have no problem with the state killing killers. In practice, the people doing the prosecuting achieve considerable political gain for pushing for the "we're all mad so let's kill somebody" solution instead of actual, you know, justice. Because actually killing the right person may be difficult if not impossible and we can't let that screw up our next election, now can we?

Blatant and well-publicised prosecutorial abuse doesn't even seem like much of a career detriment these days if the new Senator from the Great(ly screwed up) State of Illinois is anything to go by.

There's one exception where I think capital punishment is appropriate and necessary, prosecutorial misconduct be damned: Any legislator caught accepting bribes should be crucified (old-school) in front of their legislative building, and their body left in place to rot as a warning to the others. It gives a whole new meaning to "getting nailed." Or maybe death by impaling. Tough to decide which.

Pelosi - More abortion will help the economy

From an interview with George Sephanopolous at ABC News (via Yuval Levin at The Corner via DrewM at Ace of Spades), Nancy Pelosi delivers this little nugget of Progressive Truth:

Well, the family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children's health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those - one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.

It digs down to one of the most basic, core, fundamental differences between progressives and libertarians / conservatives.

Progressives see people as a liability - mouths to feed, drains on the limited resources of our fragile planet and benevolent state, etc.

Libertarians and conservatives see people as assets that can contribute to the economy with their work and the betterment of humankind with their inventive genius.

Of course if the people in these movements make these judgements based on their peers, it's easy to see why they feel this way.

It also underscores the real reason that Progressives fight so hard for the open borders and refuse to do anything about illegal immigration. People's political beliefs are often based on those of their parents. Progressives need to build new generations of people who are dependent on their largess to support their power base, and the numbers they gain jumping the fence are roughly the numbers they lose to "family planning" (I just love the way that euphemism drips with irony).