Paul Revere by Cyrus Dallin, North End, Boston

~~~

~~~

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Paul Ryan's Political Baggage




Ryan implied the military lies:

In March, Ryan accused the military’s top brass of not “giving us their true advice” when it comes to the correct size of the Pentagon budget. “We don’t think the generals believe that their budget is really the right budget,” he said. Dempsey fired back, saying Ryan was “calling us, collectively, liars.” The congressman later apologized.


Ryan voted AGAINST the repeal of "Don't Ask Don't Tell."


Ryan supports the traditional definition of marriage as between one man and one woman. While in office, he has voted in favor of the Marriage protection act, twice in favor of an amendment to the Constitution to define marriage.

On birth control and abortions:

Ryan:  "Personally, I believe that life begins at conception, and it is for that reason that I feel we need to protect that life as we would protect other children," Paul Ryan wrote in a 2009 op-ed.

Ryan supported mandatory ultra-sounds for girls and women seeking legal abortions.  As a "Get Government Out of Our Lives" conservative/libertarian, he supports government-forced examination of girls' and women's uteri. 

He also supported the Protect Life Act, which would allow federally-funded hospitals to deny a woman an abortion, even if it's necessary to save her life.  IOW, he's in favor of taking a desperate life and death decision away from a girl or a woman, her family, and her doctor and giving it to the government. That's a real "death panel" idea. 

Ryan also co-sponsored the Federal Abortion Ban, which criminalizes abortion and prescribes a two-year prison sentence for doctors in some cases, and the Sanctity of Human Life Act, which defines life as beginning at fertilization and could outlaw some birth control and IVF.

Ryan's personhood amendment could, in theory, subject every girl or woman who suffers a miscarriage to a criminal investigation on why the miscarriage occured.  When a person dies unexpectedly, an investigation into the causes of death follows.  Personhood for zygotes and embryos would require an investigation into every cause of death by miscarriage.  Government would have to set up a gigantic agency to handle the millions and millions of miscarriages suffered each year by girls and women.

Paul Ryan is strongly opposed to the free-contraception mandate included in Obama's healthcare reform. Four times he has voted to defund Planned Parenthood, and his proposed budget would completely defund birth control, STD screenings, and cancer screenings for low-income women available under Title X.

Ryan voted for more government intrusion in private family matters:

"Ryan, in 2005, also voted in favor of the so-called Palm Sunday Compromise that allowed federal courts to intervene in the case of Terri Schiavo, a move meant to save the life of the brain-damaged Florida woman whose family had fought to keep her alive." --Politico


Paul Ryan voted against the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, legislation that makes it easier for women to challenge unequal pay.

Paul Ryan has stated with deep conviction that the writer Ayn Rand has influenced him and his philosophy more than any other person in his life.  Now that the country has the opportunity to examine Rand's atheism and pro-abortion position, Ryan is running away from his stated conviction and loyalty to Randian thought and politics.  No wonder Romney chose him.  He can flip-flop on core convictions quicker than he can.

Paul Ryan loved Ayn Rand, before he said he didn't.

"He told the Weekly Standard in 2003 that he gave his staffers copies of 'Atlas Shrugged' as Christmas presents. Speaking to a group of Rand acolytes in 2005, Ryan said, 'The reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand. And the fight we are in here, make no mistake about it, is a fight of individualism versus collectivism.'

Even three years ago, Tim Mak of Politico noted, Ryan channeled Rand. 'What’s unique about what’s happening today in government, in the world, in America, is that it’s as if we’re living in an Ayn Rand novel right now,' Ryan said. 'I think Ayn Rand did the best job of anybody to build a moral case of capitalism, and that morality of capitalism is under assault.' ”

[skip]

"Jonathan Chait, writing in New York magazine, suggested Ryan cannot slough off his connections to Rand’s thinking that easily. The journalist cited Ryan’s 2009 remarks about the immorality of government attacking productive members of society.

'It is not enough to say that President Obama’s taxes are too big or the healthcare plan doesn’t work for this or that policy reason,' the lawmaker said. 'It is the morality of what is occurring right now, and how it offends the morality of individuals working toward their own free will to produce, to achieve, to succeed, that is under attack, and it is that what I think Ayn Rand would be commenting on.' ”



Ryan Shrugging Off Ayn Rand?

"[Ryan's devotion to Ayn Rand and her philosophy] began, according to a 2005 speech Ryan gave to The Atlas Society, when he was still a student. And it guided his thinking on monetary policy decades later:


'I grew up reading Ayn Rand and it taught me quite a bit about who I am and what my value systems are,' he told the group.  'It’s inspired me so much that it’s required reading in my office for all my interns and my staff.'

Ryan has since denied making his staff read the books.

He continued: 'But the reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand. And the fight we are in here, make no mistake about it, is a fight of individualism versus collectivism.'

Rand’s literary inner circle was called, ironically perhaps, 'The Collective.'

Ryan has...taken a step back from his avid Rand-regard in the past few years. And in an interview with the National Review this April, he did a pretty firm about-face:
'I reject her philosophy,' Ryan says firmly. 'It’s an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview. If somebody is going to try to paste a person’s view on epistemology to me, then give me Thomas Aquinas, who believed that man needs divine help in the pursuit of knowledge. 'Don’t give me Ayn Rand,' he says.
So after all that, Paul Ryan, it seems, has shrugged off Ayn Rand."



Why should we believe a guy on anything who, his entire life, professes his strongest support of Randian ideas, then when he understands those ideas will be uncomfortable to defend as he seeks high political office, runs away from them?

Next post will be on Ryan's Big-Spending Conservative Record.

37 comments:

Les Carpenter said...

WhoooAhhhh , More diversion from the issues that are important. DLT or diversionary leftist tactics.

Debt, deficit, DoD budget, entitlement reform... The list is long. As the nation approaches the cliff...

Infidel753 said...

Like most modern conservatives, Ryan is a theocratic absolutist enemy of individual freedom, whose views imply a totalitarian state more intrusive than the Soviet Union or North Korea.

We need to keep hammering away at these points. The evil, cruelty, and lies inherent in his budgetary plan are important too, but shouldn't cause his full support of the broader right-wing anti-freedom agenda to escape notice.

RN, the fact that a man in a position of great potential power holds such totalitarian views is an issue that's important -- much more important than any of the ones you list.

Right-wing commenters on this blog constantly try to change the subject because they can't address the substance of the posts. It's Orwellian surrealism to accuse a blogger of "diversion" because she writes about the things she thinks are worth writing about instead of the topics you want to change the subject to.

KP said...

<< The evil, cruelty, and lies inherent in his budgetary plan are important too ... >>

What is one to make of Erskin Bowles? Do I write off the former White House Chief of Staff, Erskin Bowles, as a kook because he said:

"He (Ryan) is honest, he is straightforward, he is sincere. And the budget he came forward with is just like Paul Ryan. It is a sensible, straightforward, honest, serious budget and it cut the budget deficit just like we did by four trillion dollars."

Paul said...

If those issues (Debt, deficit, DoD budget, entitlement reform...) are so important (they are) explain why Republiscums ignored them for the last 30 years.
In fact they promoted the irresponsible fiscal policies of cut taxes but not spending for decades.
NOW they are serious about budget balancing, that's laughable.
The American people totally understand Republiscums are disingenuous when it comes to talking about budget balancing.
Then Republiscums offer policies that would increase death, hunger, and poverty to balance the budget, while giving rich people further tax cuts.
That kind of twisted thinking only comes from greedy, selfish, elitists. What Randians call "self interest."

Shaw Kenawe said...

KP, that's not unusual to see in politics: a supporter of one ideology crossing over to another one.


Bruce Bartlett is sort of the Erskin Bowles of the GOP: He served as a domestic policy adviser to President Ronald Reagan and as a Treasury official under President George H. W. Bush. And worked with Republican Senator Jack Kemp and Republican Rep.,Ron Paul.

Bartlett wrote a piece for the Daily Beast in which he attributed the recession of 2009 to George Bush and Republicans, whose policies he claimed resulted in an inferior record of economic performance to those of President Clinton. In the same editorial, Bartlett wrote that instead of enacting meaningful healthcare reform, President Bush pushed through a costly Medicare drug plan by personally exerting pressure on reluctant conservatives to vote for the program. Bartlett claimed that because reforming Medicare is an important part of getting health costs under control generally, Bush could have used the opportunity to develop a comprehensive health-reform plan and that "[b]y not doing so, he left his party with nothing to offer as an alternative to the Obama plan." Bartlett concluded:


Until conservatives once again hold Republicans to the same standard they hold Democrats, they will have no credibility and deserve no respect. They can start building some by admitting to themselves that Bush caused many of the problems they are protesting."

In his book, The New American Economy: The Failure of Reaganomics and a New Way Forward, Bartlett defends Keynesian economic policies, stating that while supply-side economics was appropriate for the 1970s and 1980s, supply side arguments do not fit contemporary conditions."

Paul Ryan voted for several expensive unfunded programs that contributed to the deficit, and he's flip-flopped on his devotion to the person he credits for his very involvement in politics--Ayn Rand. And he's done that back-flip just recently.

If he is sincere, as Bowles claims, then I wonder he'll change his position on the next sincere idea that he proposes.

BTW, not every economist agrees that Ryan's budget proposal is sensible and serious. And it won't balance the budget for another 28 years. Meanwhile the federal debt will continue to rise because his tax cuts for the wealthiest of the wealthy kick in immediately. He hasn't named which loopholes in the tax code he'd close, either.

We just have to take him on his word.

And we've all seen how fungible his word is.


BB-Idaho said...

Guess that makes Ryan the John Galt of the Knownothing Party...

KP said...

Thanks Shaw. I always appreciate being able to follow your thoughts and comments. And thank you for separating conservatives from Republicans. Progressives and conservatives are small voting blocks relative to likely voters and it is a disservice to use Republican and Democrat as synonyms to concervatives and progressives. They are not synonymous.

As you know, our elections are split nearly 50/50, Dem vs Repub, and the far right and far left can only make up about 10-15% each. That means 70% of us don't fit into the progressive or conservative characterization.

Some comments:


From what I can tell, Ryan is one of the people in Congress who works across party lines and is well liked and respected by both Dems and Repub. Some of the ideas in his budget proposal are from Simpson Bowles as well as from the Democratic party in the 90s (much like Obamacare has Repub ideas from the 90s.

Ryan appears to be from the middle class. He is a devoted husband and father. He has a worthy life story. He is making his way (as you say) within the federal government as a career choice to make change he believes in. In these respects he is a lot like Obama. And I am equally surprised by hateful comments about Obama as I am about those casually tossed around about Ryan.

If he is as radical as some say, and his "evil, cruelty, and lies inherent in his" politics are true, why is he repeatedly re-elected in a swing district by Dems and Repub alike? He is not one of those gerrymandered, pre-fabricated politicians we see come out of California districts. The guy speaks to likely voters on both sides (excusing progressives).

In that way, again, he is a lot like Obama who got some voters to ignore the Dem definition. If I am correct, that would explain the over the top opposition to Obama from the far right as well as the same type reaction from progressives toward Ryan. In other words, they are a threat; young, handsome Dems and Repubs that have appealed to swing voters.

KP said...

BTW, I see nothing wrong with a man or women changing their opinion on important issues. I am a different person now than I was in my twenties. I see no problem with Obama shifting his views on gay marriage. Or others altering their views on gun ownership. Heck, half of all people married end up divorced; meaning people can't understand the man or women they commited to love the rest of their life let alone politics. And then there are shifting views of God, abortion, sex, etc. Ryan and Obama and Romney and anyone can be expected to change. It's up to the voter to decide if their are honest about the change.

Jerry Critter said...

Romney has changed his mind on so many issues that if he is being truthful, then he is indecisive. Indecisive or a liar, neither are good qualities for a president.

Shaw Kenawe said...

"BTW, I see nothing wrong with a man or women changing their opinion on important issues."

I wish you had had influence over the people who mocked John Kerry in 2004 and who labeled his changing of his mind as "flip-flopping."

In my life, I have never changed my mind on core issues--since the time I was very young to now--a grandmother of six.

I believe government, while flawed (the people who run it are human, afterall), can be a force for good, that we need to help those who cannot help themselves; we should protect and preserve our environment, and all Americans should enjoy the equal rights guaranteed by the Constitution.

I've favored a woman's right to choose since I can remember, and I've been against the sale of automatice weapons. [We're now experiencing a mass shooting a week.]

There are other things, but those are off the top of my head.



Shaw Kenawe said...

I'm sure Mr. Ryan is a fine husband and father, but I can't admire his plan that proposes this:

"Even as House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s budget would impose trillions of dollars in spending cuts, at least 62 percent of which would come from low-income programs, it would enact new tax cuts that would provide huge windfalls to households at the top of the income scale. New analysis by the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center (TPC) finds that people earning more than $1 million a year would receive $265,000 apiece in new tax cuts, on average, on top of the $129,000 they would receive from the Ryan budget’s extension of President Bush’s tax cuts.

The new tax cuts at the top would dwarf those for middle-income families. After-tax incomes would rise by 12.5 percent among millionaires, but just 1.8 percent for middle-income households. Low-income working families would actually be hit with tax increases.

Chairman Ryan claims that his budget would fully offset the cost of his proposed tax cuts by closing tax expenditures (tax credits, deductions, and other preferences) for high-income households. But his budget contains no specific proposals to do so, and meeting this goal would be all but impossible, given that the Ryan budget rules out reducing the tax expenditure most heavily tilted to high-income households: the preferential rates for capital gains and dividends."

SOURCE

KP said...

I am not surprised we agree on the core issues you listed. I also believe government, while flawed, can be a force for good, that we need to help those who cannot help themselves and that we should protect and preserve our environment. As well, all Americans should enjoy the equal rights guaranteed by the Constitution.

After having children I have changed my personal views on abortion but have always supported a women's right to choose. I have also changed my views on automatic weapons. I see no place for the sale of them.

KP said...

Do you agree that if we had tax reform that closed loopholes that the wealthy would pay more in taxes without raising rates? I realize that is a big "if".

skudrunner said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
KP said...

@Shaw << I'm sure Mr. Ryan is a fine husband and father, but I can't admire his plan >>

Sure, I understand. I am not out to change anybody's mind on the left or right. But I do enjoy the discussion. Thanks for making it available. It's no easy task maintaining a web site that gets people to read and respond.

KP said...

I would point out that Ryan's plan to make changes to Medicare is not near as risky for Romney as it may appear on first blush. He has made it clear that no changes would be made to anyone 55 or older and not for another ten years. So older folks (in Florida for example) are going to get the message that they are secure.

Along those lines, ask young people what they expect from Medicare and most of them will tell you they don't expect anything from Medicare because the they feel the program will be bust long before they are eligible.

Ryan's plan may end up being a vision that is embraced by the old who want to continue to be served and the young who want a chance to be served.

skudrunner said...

"Low-income working families would actually be hit with tax increases."

How can that be true because they don't pay income tax. Are you referring that they will not get as much income tax credits as before so the handout will be less?

The left just keep misrepresenting the truth, lie, about most of what Ryan proposes. His plan will make no changes for people over 55, the idea that it will increase income taxes on the poor is just another lie because they pay no income tax.

He has one point that really irks the left. He is not for punishing success and raising taxes on just the "rich, who pay 80% of all taxes now and get 13% of income. Let the Bush tax cuts expire but for everyone not just a select few.

Jerry Critter said...

The problem is not how we pay for healthcare, although I happen to think that a shared-cost, low overhead plan like Medicare is the best for everyone. The problem is the COST of healthcare and how to reduce the Cost, not how we pay the cost. Ryan's plan limits the cost to government, not the total cost of healthcare. By limiting the cost to government, he can justify giving tax cuts to wealthy people. That's what his plan is about.

Shaw Kenawe said...

KP: "Do you agree that if we had tax reform that closed loopholes that the wealthy would pay more in taxes without raising rates? I realize that is a big "if"."

Yes. I think that the deduction for home mortgages should be ended. That was instituted to encourage people to buy homes. I'm a homeowner, and have no problem with ending that.

skudrunner, what universe do you live in? Poor people most certainly pay taxes. They pay taxes everytime they go to the gas station, everytime they go to the store, and even when they work at minimum wage jobs.

I said "low-income people" not poor.

You misread and then jumped to the wrong conclusion.

Jerry, I agree.

I've gotta run. There's a three-year old running around here who wants me to take him to the beach and look for hermit crabs.

skudrunner said...

JC
A lot more revenue would be collected if the current administration would focus more on creating an environment that attracts jobs rather then demonizing the successful.

He has no interest in job growth and is totally focused on blaming the rich for all his failures.

He blamed Bush for the first two years and now it is successful small business people who were just lucky and the rich.

It is a coincidence that until the democrats took control of congress unemployment was in the high 4% and low 5%. The democrats gain the majority and it has been uphill since. I know this is hard to swallow because liberals hate facts and would rather blame someone else, but look at the statistics.

One large factor in the cost of healthcare is low deductible insurance that is employer paid. HC providers raise prices because they can and the patient says nothing because it doesn't cost them anything. Much like income tax, if you had to write a large check you might take other action.
How many people say they got money back on their income taxes instead of saying I overpaid. They consider that a gift. If they had to write a check for income tax once a quarter, they would have a different view of government waste. Same goes for healthcare, make deductibles a portion of income and people would consider costs differently.

When was the last time you asked your physician for a lower cost approach, depends on who is paying.

skudrunner said...

Shaw,

I said income tax you say sales tax. How is the Ryan plan raising sales tax?

Since 48% of Americans don't pay income tax you are saying that 48% of Americans are low income. I didn't think that many people were low income.

Agree, have everyone file the short form. Eliminate deductions for real estate taxes, interest, child care, medical and all other deductions. Have them pay on earnings and make the rate a sliding scale but everyone pays something.

Shaw Kenawe said...

"In 1936, Roosevelt sought re-election despite 17% unemployment. One can imagine Mitt Romney, Karl Rove, and the Koch brothers running attack ads, reminding Americans that unemployment has been "above 17% for 48 consecutive months" as incontrovertible proof that the New Deal was a "failure."

But on Election Day, FDR won 46 out of 48 states. How could an incumbent president win re-election with an unemployment rate at 17%? Because voters realized the Great Depression wasn't Roosevelt's fault, and the economy was getting better, not worse.

Seventy six years later, President Obama is in a tough fight because unemployment is stuck at 8.25%. Is this high for a modern incumbent president? Obviously it is. But here's the detail I think much of the political establishment fails to appreciate: the Great Recession was a catastrophic economic crisis, unlike anything Americans have seen since the Great Depression.

When pundits compare Obama's economic record against every president since Truman, they're making a fundamental mistake -- no administration was forced to confront a crash of this magnitude since FDR. Comparing Obama to the last 11 presidents is, at its root, deeply misguided."

Skudrunner, you are misguided at best, and willfully ignorant at worst.

Mr. Obama didn't create the worst economic crash since the Great Depression, that happened under George Bush.

Mr. Obama has added jobs since Bush's administration was bleeding, and in fact, last month added 163,000.

If the political parties, especially the GOP, had cooperated, things would be even better, but the GOP's goal was to make Mr. Obama a one-term president, NOT help America recover from the economic mess the GOP started.

That you blame the president for not recovering fast enough is damn foolery, especially when he's been stopped at everything he's tried to do.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Skudrunner, go back an re-read, I did not say "sales tax."

Your problem is poor reading skills.

News Flash said...

JANESVILLE, Wis. — In 2009, as Representative Paul Ryan was railing against President Obama’s $787 billion stimulus package as a “wasteful spending spree,” he wrote at least four letters to Obama’s secretary of energy asking that millions of dollars from the program be granted to a pair of Wisconsin conservation groups, according to documents obtained by The Globe.

The advocacy appeared to pay off; both groups were awarded the economic recovery funds — one receiving a $20 million grant to help thousands of local businesses and homes improve their energy efficiency, agency documents show.

The documents show that Ryan’s attempts to take advantage of the stimulus funds even after he voted against them was more expansive than previously reported. Ryan was criticized by some House Democrats in 2010 after the Wall Street Journal reported that he was among several Republican lawmakers who sought the stimulus money for their constituents by, in his case, writing a letter in 2010 to the Department of Labor.

Ryan’s campaign spokesman, Brendan Buck, declined to comment on Monday, pointing the Globe to the statement from Ryan’s Capitol Hill spokesman at the time of the Wall Street Journal article in 2010.

In addition to the appeals for stimulus funds, Ryan also received congressional approval for $5.4 million in earmarks — appropriations by Congress members for specific favored projects — in fiscal 2008, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan watchdog group. The requests included $3.28 million for bus service in Wisconsin, $1.38 million for the Ice Age National Scenic Trail, and $735,000 for the Janesville transit system.

In 2005, Ryan boasted in a letter to constituents that he had voted for a five-year federal transportation bill that would provide Wisconsin with $711.9 million, a 30 percent increase, in annual funding for highway projects. That bill, which authorized work paid through the national Highway Trust Fund, included the infamous “bridge to nowhere” in Alaska.

“This trillion-dollar spending bill misses the mark on all counts,” said Ryan in a statement. “This is not a crisis we can spend and borrow our way out of — that is how we got here in the first place.” But later that year, once the bill was passed and signed into law, Ryan sought to make sure his constituents benefited.

In an interview with MSNBC two years later, Ryan again bashed the stimulus package. “All this temporary booster shot stimulus didn’t work in the stimulus package, didn’t work when the last administration tried these things, so we don’t want to go with ideas that have proven to fail. We want ideas that have proven to succeed,” he said in the interview in September 2011. “I think tax reform is the key.”

Ryan’s support for the initiatives he championed for Wisconsin is not reflected in his budget plan passed by the House earlier this year.

That plan, which did not pass the Senate, would cut the Department of Energy’s discretionary budget from roughly $8 billion annually to $1 billion. Over a decade, the proposal would cut nearly $100 billion from electric vehicle and other energy efficiency programs.

“It waves a white flag on competing in energy technology,” said Joshua Freed, vice president for clean energy at Third Way, a nonpartisan Washington think tank. “The rest of the world recognizes the enormous and growing energy market. They are funding innovation, which is hard to finance strictly in the private markets . . . That is exactly what the Ryan budget would destroy.”

ralph said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
skudrunner said...

So what taxes do poor people pay, sales and excise. How does the Ryan plan affect any of those taxes?

I knew facts would get you in a mood. Unemployment was fine until the democrats took control of congress and their housing debacle too down the country.

Bush didn't do enough to stop them so I guess it is his fault.

We are actually jobs neutral according to the BLS. There are as many people leaving the workforce as there are jobs created so you can surmise it to be a wash.

The Supreme Ruler has no plan and his only vision is to punish those who had nothing to do with building their businesses.

Paul said...

Politicians can change their minds, but should be prepared to be criticized.
When Ryan condemns the bailout, but begs for the money, his convictions do come into question.
When Ryan claims to be a deficit hawk but votes for Bush tax cuts that raise the debt, votes for an unfunded war that raises the debt, votes for an unfunded drug program that raises the debt, in fact Ryan has voted for bills that raised the debt 5 trillion, then he is a hypocrite.

Anonymous said...

But...but...it's Obama's fault!/skudrunner

Shaw Kenawe said...

Great quote:

"Paul Ryan is an Ayn Randian who believes you incentivize rich people by giving them more money, and you incentivize poor people by 'screwing them a little.'” --Chris Matthews

Unknown said...

I'm in the middle of an argument with someone. Specificaly regarding " maybe he supports that"personhood amendment" but he co-sponsored the Federal Abortion Ban, which criminalizes abortion and prescribes a two-year prison sentence for doctors in some cases, and the Sanctity of Human Life Act, which defines life as beginning at fertilization and could outlaw some birth control and IVF. and by the way with that said personhood amendment --- in theory, subject every girl or woman who suffers a miscarriage to a criminal investigation on why the miscarriage occured."
^^^where are these things cited from? So I can give more credibility to these statements :)

please and thank you

Shaw Kenawe said...

The Daily Beast covers it <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/08/11/paul-ryan-s-extreme-abortion-views.html>HERE.</a>

And this:

Paul Ryan is a cosponsor of HR 212, the Sanctity of Human Life Act, the text of the act is admirably brief and direct:


(B) the life of each human being begins with fertilization, cloning, or its functional equivalent, irrespective of sex, health, function or disability, defect, stage of biological development, or condition of dependency, at which time every human being shall have all the legal and constitutional attributes and privileges of personhood; and

(2) the Congress affirms that the Congress, each State, the District of Columbia, and all United States territories have the authority to protect the lives of all human beings residing in its respective jurisdictions.

In fact, if this bill were passed and the Supreme Court upheld it, a rapist could go to court and sue to prevent his victim from getting an abortion. He'd argue that the fetus was legally a human being, and the court has no power to discriminate between one human being and another."

It was MY speculation that this could subject girls and women to criminal investigations as a result of miscarriages.

When a person [the bill confers "personhood" on a zygote and embryo] dies of unknown causes, an investigation is launched into why that person died. My speculation is, this could extend to the "personhood" of zygotes and embryos, since not every cause is known when a miscarriage occurs. It would be deemed a "death of unknown causes," and would have to be investigated.

IOW, this bill could criminalize miscarriages.

Shaw Kenawe said...

I broke the Daily Beast link.

Here it is.

Les Carpenter said...

Chris Matthews is a buffoon that thinks with his posterior.

Anonymous said...

Now there's an intelligent comment

skudrunner said...

Shaw,


"It was MY speculation that this could subject girls and women to criminal investigations as a result of miscarriages."

Tell me you got that from one of Biden's speeches because he is the only doofus that would come up with a statement like that.

It appears that the left is making the Presidential race about the Vice President, as the did last time. If you think about the totally incompetent person who is president look who is a heartbeat away. Biden is the only person who could make Obama look competent.

Shaw Kenawe said...

skudrunner, your desperation is showing.

Mr. Obama is doing quite well in the polls.

If he were as bad as you like to believe he is, RR would be killing him and Biden in the polls.

That isn't happening. At all.

That is the truth.

Live with it.

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