Democratic National Convention

amother

Lilac

Wed, Aug 10 2016, 2:00 pm

Amarante wrote:

Sushilover posted that she opposes the kinds of programs that would help the born.

Most right wingers also are inconsistent in that they typically oppose funding for Planned Parenthood or other programs that provide low cost birth control for women.

The Republicans recessed without providing adequate funding to eradicate or control Zika mosquito. President Obama requested funding based on recommendations of CDC BUT republicans would not pass it. Inevitably mosquitoes will certainly fly to ever expanding areas. My understanding is that the Zika mosquito can be eradicated only through fairly labor intensive inspection since it has well adapted to human environment and breeds in th smallest amounts of water.

The Zika bill was blocked by Democrats who felt the Republicans had tried to slip in provisions that the Democrats refused to pass.

Both sides are obstinate politicians. But putting 100% of the blame on the Republicans for the bill not passing is misleading.

sushilover

Wed, Aug 10 2016, 4:24 pm

marina wrote:

This is a thorny discussion- not at all clear.

I strongly believe that our legislation should not be based on a majority vote. This example has already been raised here- bris milah. A city's residents (or even a country's citizens) decide that bris milah is yucky, so they ban it? No- the Constitution should protect us from that ( Tyranny of the Majority).

That's why I don't think a poll of what Americans think about abortion is relevant.

I agree.Polls are useless.
So how do we figure out where we stand morally?
It seems clear from this thread that the pure pro-choice or pro-life options are not sufficient. Most of us are somewhere in the middle.
Does our society feel that an unborn baby has the right to life under normal circumstances?
Do we consider abortion closer to murder, tumor removal, or something else entirely?
It's time we figured out what we believe in and adjust our laws accordingly

marina wrote:

At the same time, from a general global psychological perspective, morality is always shaped by developing social norms. A consistent majority will ultimately create a new social norm for morality, which will inevitably influence legislation and Constitutional decisions.

However, this usually goes only one way --> more tolerance. So our American norms used to be Black People = Yucky. Gay People = Yucky. Interracial Marriage = Super Yucky. Gay Marriage = Super Yucky Grossy Gross. Women = stay in kitchen, make me food.

And hopefully in my lifetime IY"H, we'll go from "unborn babies= mass of cells" to "unborn babies=have a right to live".

sushilover

Wed, Aug 10 2016, 4:48 pm

Amarante wrote:

That's true. I do oppose many federal programs that liberals claim help people. I am a strong proponent of limited government.

That being said, there are many government funded clinics which provide birth control and and other services without providing abortions. Far more, in fact, than there are Planned Parenthood clinics. If right wingers do not want their tax dollars to go toward casual abortions, I think that is only fair.

Amarante wrote:

The Republicans recessed without providing adequate funding to eradicate or control Zika mosquito. President Obama requested funding based on recommendations of CDC BUT republicans would not pass it. Inevitably mosquitoes will certainly fly to ever expanding areas. My understanding is that the Zika mosquito can be eradicated only through fairly labor intensive inspection since it has well adapted to human environment and breeds in th smallest amounts of water.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/27/.....hood/
Democrats blocked the Zika bill for several reasons
1)The bill contained a provision temporarily easing environmental restrictions so that it would be easier to spray pesticides.
2) The bill denied zika funds to Planned Parenthood, and instead would only fund clinics that do not provide casual abortion
3) Democrats didn't like that the some of the funding was relocated from other places such as the Ebola fund.
Democrats decided that these were sufficient reasons to stall funding for the virus.
But of course let's blame the Republicans.

amother

Lilac

Wed, Aug 10 2016, 7:59 pm

Amarante wrote:

Sushilover posted that she opposes the kinds of programs that would help the born.

Another straw man. No one wants babies or anyone else to live in poverty. Unfortunately, the world is not that black and white.

Amarante wrote:

Most right wingers also are inconsistent in that they typically oppose funding for Planned Parenthood or other programs that provide low cost birth control for women.

The MAIN thing that Planned Parenthood provides is abortions.

Now why would you think people who believe abortion is fundamentally wrong, should nevertheless want their tax dollars to support it?

amother

Lilac

Wed, Aug 10 2016, 10:58 pm

marina wrote:

1. Roe v Wade was decided based on the 14th Amendment general concept that the government should not interfere with personal liberty and the 9th Amendment, not the 4th Amendment.

The decision was also based on the Fourth Amendment from which the Court derives the right to privacy, as well as the Fifth Amendment.

marina wrote:

This analysis is also one of the reasons birth control was allowed for married women (and eventually all women) in Griswold v Connecticut. Do you think that state legislation criminalizing birth control - even for married people - would interfere with our personal liberty? What, in your view, are personal liberties that neither state nor federal government should interfere with, if any? Do you think people should be able to marry others of different races or can the government interfere and criminalize that as well? What are the contours of the right to privacy as part of our personal liberty that our Constitution should protect, if any?

Whether or not I personally agree with the outcome in particular matters is irrelevant. Back to your murderer analogy--just like we can't use tainted evidence even if it will prove guilt--that result may be distasteful in that particular case; yet we have to abide by the established principles.

I happen to think that things like the examples you gave would have become adopted by at least most states over time, in any case. There is also the opinion that had Roe v. Wade not been decided, the states would have as a whole, eventually reached the same conclusion legislatively, and our country would not have been so bitterly divided on the issue for so long.

marina wrote:

2. When the Supreme Court bars a law as unconstitutional, it prevents states and the federal government from creating laws interfering with people's lives. It limits the role of government in our lives. This is actually the very opposite of your argument. For example, with abortion and birth control, state and the federal government do not have to create laws allowing abortion or birth control as a result of the Supreme Court's decisions- they instead refrain from creating laws criminalizing those choices.

Except that any decision made by the Supreme Court then becomes grounds for new legislation by Congress regarding those issues.

marina wrote:

That, in fact, is the entire point of the Bill of Rights. It is a limitation on government- it is not, as commonly assumed, a recitation of rights that the citizens have.

The purpose of the Bill of Rights was actually to limit the powers of the FEDERAL government, so state governments would remain strong.

marina wrote:

3. Judicial activism is tightly intertwined with the concept of originalism, which is basically that the Constitution is like the Torah- cannot be changed and we need to analyze all questions as if we were the original framers. Many people do not agree with that perspective. In fact, that perspective makes things very complicated, because there are many things we care about as a society that the framers would never have cared about, including, for example, drug use. The framers would not have cared if someone grew pot or smoked cocaine, but we still legislate against it.

Again, the issue is not whether states can create legislation addressing issues not contained in the federal constitution. Remember, each state has its own constitution and Bill of Rights. The issue is to what extent should Supreme Court judges be able to determine that states' legislative decisions should not stand.

marina wrote:

4. Another complicating factor is that the Constitution really does not want a lot of legislation and every single federal law can only be passed under specific powers that the Constitution grants the legislature. And if a law doesn't fit the specific power, the Court will strike it down as unconstitutional. A recent example was Obamacare- the discussion was really about whether the legislature could pass this as part of the Taxing Power or if it didn't fit.

In the Obamacare case, as I recall, Justice Roberts essentially did not want to be accused of judicial activism--undoing a law passed by the legislature. So he found an argument for upholding it.

marina wrote:

Justice Thomas, in the Court's partial birth abortion decision, was very clear that this ban was pushed through by the federal legislature under the wrong Power and if anyone had presented this argument to the Court he would have voted with the other side. It was a 5-4 decision, so just saying.

Fair enough

Amarante

Wed, Aug 10 2016, 11:13 pm

sushilover wrote:

http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/27/politics/senate-zika-funding-planned-parenthood/
Democrats blocked the Zika bill for several reasons
1)The bill contained a provision temporarily easing environmental restrictions so that it would be easier to spray pesticides.
2) The bill denied zika funds to Planned Parenthood, and instead would only fund clinics that do not provide casual abortion
3) Democrats didn't like that the some of the funding was relocated from other places such as the Ebola fund.
Democrats decided that these were sufficient reasons to stall funding for the virus.
But of course let's blame the Republicans.

Planned parenthood is often the only source of reliable contraceptive and medical care for poor women. Defunding it based on its demonization by right wingers was inserted deliberately by the Republicans. Federal money does not fund abortions so defunding it is as irrational as defunding any other medical provider that offers medical services that are legal.

Given that other critical medical operations of the CDC would be defunded, again a political ploy of Republicans.

Is ther some reason a clean up or down vote to support funding of this critical measure could possibly be justified. If you're against it, vote against it. I hardly see his Reoublicans inserting untenable measures completely unrelated to the common good of citizens is justifiable.

Why not blame Republicans since it was solely their decide to deliberately make the measure fail.

marina

Sun, Aug 14 2016, 11:31 pm

Federal money is allowed to fund abortion in cases of rape, incest, or danger to the woman's life.

So when federal tax money is used to pay for abortion through Planned Parenthood, that can only be direct payment for the above abortions- rape, incest, danger to life.

Indirect payment allegations end up being pretty convoluted. This is how that argument goes: since the federal government gives money to Planned Parenthood for whatever, let's say, mammograms, that frees up some of Planned Parenthood's private funding to make abortions cheaper, because if the Federal government didn't pay for mammograms, then PP's private funding would have to be spread out thinner.

This is not a very convincing argument to me.

As to what PP does, here's a fact check link. Again, statistics is all about interpretation:

http://www.politifact.com/trut.....ive-/

As to community health centers, they could not absorb PP patients. http://healthaffairs.org/blog/.....ight/

marina

Sun, Aug 14 2016, 11:35 pm

Quote:

So how do we figure out where we stand morally?
It seems clear from this thread that the pure pro-choice or pro-life options are not sufficient. Most of us are somewhere in the middle.
Does our society feel that an unborn baby has the right to life under normal circumstances?
Do we consider abortion closer to murder, tumor removal, or something else entirely?
It's time we figured out what we believe in and adjust our laws accordingly

I think our laws reflect the above quite well. The constitution allows states to ban abortions in the third trimester, which is where viability begins, provided there is an exception for the mother's health. This, I think is very much in line with what you wrote above- the middle road.

marina

Sun, Aug 14 2016, 11:39 pm

Quote:

The decision was also based on the Fourth Amendment from which the Court derives the right to privacy, as well as the Fifth Amendment.

http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-.....ttt2:

Quote:

This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy

marina

Sun, Aug 14 2016, 11:43 pm

Quote:

I happen to think that things like the examples you gave would have become adopted by at least most states over time, in any case. There is also the opinion that had Roe v. Wade not been decided, the states would have as a whole, eventually reached the same conclusion legislatively, and our country would not have been so bitterly divided on the issue for so long.

I dk why you have such a positive view of humanity that you think we would all reach the right decision eventually even without courts and legislators. Do you think the same thing about Brown v Board of Ed.? Title VII of the Civil Rights Act?

marina

Sun, Aug 14 2016, 11:47 pm

Quote:

Except that any decision made by the Supreme Court then becomes grounds for new legislation by Congress regarding those issues.

Anything can become grounds for legislation by legislators- that is their job. The Supreme Court's role is to reign those people in. If they want to fight against that, our system allows for it.

marina

Sun, Aug 14 2016, 11:48 pm

Quote:

The purpose of the Bill of Rights was actually to limit the powers of the FEDERAL government, so state governments would remain strong.

Yes, that's what we're mostly talking about here. Although the 5th Amendment applied many of the other amendments to the states. We don't, after all, want states to be free to limit free speech, etc.

marina

Sun, Aug 14 2016, 11:51 pm

Quote:

Right. This limits both the federal government and state government. Look at your last sentence. This limits the state governments' interference in citizens' lives.