North Dakota appears intent on triggering another round of litigation in the hopes of overturning Roe v. Wade. North Dakota’s House of Representatives has voted 51-41 to declare that a fertilized egg has all the rights of any person. The vote would make abortion murder.
Minot Republican Dan Ruby previously sponsored other bills banning abortion but they all failed. Strangely , Ruby argues that the bill is compatible with Roe v. Wade: “This is the exact language that’s required by Roe v. Wade. It stipulated that before a challenge can be made, we have to identify when life begins, and that’s what this does.” That is a pretty convenient reading of the case and its progeny of cases. It misses the repeated holdings that states cannot deny a woman the right to choose in such cases.
With Democrats in control, some activists may view this Supreme Court as the best they are going to get for some time. Before any further changes occur, they may want to try one more time to further narrow or outright overturn Roe.
For the full story, click here.
Should we now officially refer to the North Dakota House as simply the College of Cardinals?
I’m sending a piece of legislation to the ND House requiring that all ghosts residing (or even purportedly residing) within the territorial boundaries of the state be considered citizens for census and economic stimulus package and all other purposes purposes. It has no downside. The constituents don’t exist so no dissent. You can’t read their ballots because unless they’re Patrick Swayze, their writings or movements aren’t visible. They take up no space, consume no consumables, don’t organize, and like most creatures with dead or decaying brains hold to Republican values. It’ll sail through.
The fertilized eggs are probably the best constituents these Republican radicals have. It may sail through the ND legislature, but hopefully the courts will slap them down. I think maybe ND is just trying to increase their census numbers so that they can claim more stimulus money.
If the citizens of ND vote idiots like that into office perhaps they deserve idiotic laws. Perhaps they thing that by doing this they will raise the collective IQ of the state. I doubt that it would lower it.
The abortion issue is a hard one to wrap your mind around. When I was in college I used to argue about it with a catholic buddy who was anti abortion we would go round and round. he had a couple of good arguments against it and I had a couple of arguments for it. But when I had my first child things took on a whole different perspective and I am very conflicted about it. On the one hand you have potential life and on the other you have life with potential. The rights of the individual vs the rights of the state (the state could go either way – restricting abortion completely or requiring abortion). I suppose in the end you must give more consideration to the rational being. But do you limit abortion to a certain trimester, how do you determine when life begins? It most certainly begins at conception in the biological sense, but most children are not aware of themselves as individual conscious beings until they are between 2 and 3 and most of us would agree that we dont kill babies after they are born.
In the end it is probably best left to the individual. But even here there is room for argument, has the individual gotten arguments and information from each side of the aisle and made a serious effort to understand all facets? In the final analysis I am glad I am not a women and will never have to make that choice.
For the largest part of human history, it wasn’t a person until it could survive UNASSISTED outside the womb. That’s why Englash has words like “stillborn” and “miscarriage”. Nothing has changed except that some think they can force their “belief” down your throat against nature. If it’s not yet viable, it’s not yet a person. It a growth with potential for life. Period. To take it to the Bill Hicks extreme, “Hey, they’re not people until they are in my phone book.”
George Carlin pointed out some of the problems this terrible decision will cause. I would repeat them here but I think he makes the point better and certainly funnier.
Will this mean that fertilized eggs could inherit?
I, for one, welcome out Blastocyst-American overlords.
The North Dakota legislators will soon unanimously vote to overturn the current official state song then changing it to “It’s a Small World (After All)”
All those priests warnings about “spilling your seed” are being proved half correct!
Finally a legislature that gets it. Protection of the unborn should be paramount.
rofl
roflmao
ROFLMAO
Oh, I think I hurt myself.
Yeah, defending a differentiated cell mass at the cost of existing people’s well being is very Christian.
You want all the unwanted children of the world to care for and feed? The children of rape and incest? The children of mistake that the parent’s love is not in question but their ability to raise one is? Post your name and address so the orphanages and adoption agencies can place them. We’ll send them all to your house.
What’s that? You don’t? Too busy raising the next generation of myopic pseudo-Christians that came from your own polluted loins to care for some sinner’s kid? It’s not your responsibility? It’s just your responsibility to ruin others lives by forcing your BELIEF on them?
Yeah. That’s just what I thought. Because when it comes time to walk the walk, your lot is always just talk. Jesus lived in a time where infant mortality was sky high. Dead and stillborn babies were not a shock to them. They knew you weren’t alive until, duh, you were alive on your own. And I got a clue for you – Jesus wasn’t teaching zygotes, he was teaching full blown viable outside the womb humans. I’m thinking the actually living were more his realm of concern, not enforcing YOUR twisted dogma on others.
Thanks for providing another example of People Misusing Jesus’ Teaching Because They Are Stupid To The End.
They take up no space, consume no consumables, don’t organize, and like most creatures with dead or decaying brains hold to Republican values. It’ll sail through.
Mespo, you made my day!
Just out of curiosity, won’t that ND legislation open up a lot of grounds for liability? Every woman of childbearing years who dies of trauma could potentially be carrying an heir with full rights, including insurance payments?
Also, how will that effect the tax law. Wouldn’t that mean that a pregnant woman would be able to write claim the unborn child before he/she is born?
William Blackstone:
“The right of personal security consists in a person’s legal and uninterrupted enjoyment of his life, his limbs, his body, his health, and his reputation.
1. Life is the immediate gift of God, a right inherent by nature in every individual; and it begins in contemplation of law as soon as an infant is able to stir in the mother’s womb. For if a woman is quick with child, and by a potion, or otherwise, killeth it in her womb; or if any one beat her, whereby the child dieth in her body, and she is delivered of a dead child; this, though not murder, was by the antient law homicide or manslaughter. But at present it is not looked upon in quite so atrocious a light, though it remains a very heinous misdemesnor.”
(William Blackstone, Commentaries 1:120–41)
http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/amendIXs1.html
N.B. It is not until after the first trimester that a woman begins to feel any ’stirring’ within the womb.
Although I’ll have to confess, the image of Jesus teaching a bunch of formaldehyde bottled fetuses at the Sermon on the Mount makes me giggle.
“And so I say unto thee . . . Mary, Peter, look, I just don’t think this is working.”
“Come on, Big J! Give it a shot.”
“I don’t know, Peter, I’ve been teaching for quite awhile and . . . they aren’t very receptive. I’m not even sure they can hear.”
“Mary is right, Peter. And the way they just float there is creepy. No, Peter, I think I’m going over the hill there to that group of adults getting ready to eat that goat. They look ripe for teaching! Let’s try to make their lives better today instead of talking to this, this, well, this bunch of meat in stinky liquid. I’m thinking their ox cart has left the station so to speak.”
“Or perhaps not arrived yet.”
“Good point Mary. But you know what I mean, Peter. I’m about a better today for those already in Dad’s creation, not a might have been better today.”
“Ok, ok, but in thousands of years, this is going to be trouble.”
Bobesq:
you are a man of mature thought and one of our own although not to the point of “I knew you before you were born” i see. But alas I can suffer the fool Buddha for men such as yourself.
Buddha:
I have adopted 3 and my wife and I are looking to adopt a 4th God willing. So my fat little savant I do indeed practice what I preach.
The wrath of God shall know no bounds for sinners and blasphemers, the eye of the storm is at hand and all that enter be wary. Rise up you wrecthed cur so I can smite thee from above with lightning and sulphur. Lay no hand on those that rest peacefully in the womb or suffer as they do.
blah blah blah psycho
“The wrath of God shall know no bounds for sinners and blasphemers, the eye of the storm is at hand and all that enter be wary. Rise up you wrecthed cur so I can smite thee from above with lightning and sulphur. Lay no hand on those that rest peacefully in the womb or suffer as they do.”
Christian,
If you understood the teacher, teachings and his gospels that you purport to follow you might realize why the above is the statement of a fool. Have a nice day.
By my analysis (and Mike’s), I am neither the one suffering nor the fool. My record of analysis speaks for itself. Mike is a heavy hitter too. Have a nice day, indeed.
Buddha:
I think Christian to the end needs to end it (all). Not one to promote suicide or euthenasia I might be able to make an exception in his case.
He must have been joking around, although I suppose he could be a lunatic.
I would hate to be one of his children, I think in that case I would probably thank God he could not reproduce and I was just adopted and not the “fruit of his loins”.
MikeS was a gentleman to just call him a fool.
Bron,
It has been my experience that Mike S. is always a gentleman.
Could the “person” occupying a woman’s womb be charged with trespassing?
Joe,
Now THAT is an interesting avenue for legal exploration. Good show!
Another quandary:
North Dakota’s own Safe Haven law appears to apply to children “under 1 year of age.”
Will that now apply to “children” occupying the womb?
Christian:
You make a valid point and I think the ones commenting so harshly need to do careful examination of their stances. The Pope has addressed this issue so there can be no discussion.
For your transgressors I recommend 5 hail Marys and an Our Father and I will consider them cleansed.
Pious,
When the Pope stop un-excommunicating holocaust deniers, owns up to his own Hitler Youth Membership and reaffirms Vatican II, perhaps then I’ll take him more seriously.
Let’s be clear. The Pope is a MAN. And this Pope, unlike John Paul II – a man I greatly respected even when I disagreed, isn’t even a particularly good man. cough cough Hitler Youth cough cough unwilling to excommunicate Holocaust deniers cough cough . . . His pronouncements mean exactly squat – his opinion based in belief no more valid than any man’s belief based assertions. The day Christianity starting going wrong was the day Peter said “Kiss my ring.” MY ring. Human ego. The Pope no more has the 411 on salvation than Robert Tilton does. That’s why your institution of choice is becoming as irrelevant as Fundamentalism. Look at your dwindling numbers. Look at the sexual abuse scandals – a REAL Christian would have those priests in prison, not shuffle them off to another parish full of potential victims. And please, if he thinks Pelosi would DARE to piss off her district by jumping on the anti-abortion wagon, then he’s got crap for political and psychological profiling skills. She’s a POLITICIAN. She’ll do whatever it takes to retain her illusion of power (that includes not pissing off the very liberal voters of San Francisco). Just like the Pope will do whatever he can to retain the illusion of power. But just like Pelosi, it’s all about HIM. And I don’t mean God or Jesus. Organized religion is failing globally because in the information age the FACT that the organizations 99% of the time exists to only further the organization and the MEN who run it is easier and easier to see. And when people in poverty are told how to act by a man who lives in ridiculous opulence, well, the hypocrisy is tangible. Is it any wonder most Americans describe themselves as spiritual but not religious?
No. Not really.
Christian to the end:
“Bobesq, you are a man of mature thought”
Sometimes I enjoy singing the lines “My name is Luca” over and over again just for the sheer schadenfreude of it all.
“and one of our own although not to the point of “I knew you before you were born” i see.”
Speaking of ’seeing’, see C.G. Jung, “Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious” & “Aion” Collected Works Volume 9.
“But alas I can suffer the fool Buddha for men such as yourself.”
Oh Socrates, when will you ever learn that I make fools like Buddha look like Jiminy Cricket.
BTW, this hopeless case does in fact wear a St. Jude medal.
SIYOM,
Bob
Christian to the end:
And not for nothing, but your endorsement of my post equates to assenting to the argument that Blackstone’s words fail to contradict the notion that the common law did not recognize any fetus during the first trimester.
Lindy Lou:
Right you are about the liability, inheritance, and criminal aspects of this foolish legislation.
Joe Gallagher:
“Could the “person” occupying a woman’s womb be charged with trespassing?”
***********
LOL.
Christian to the end
“The wrath of God shall know no bounds for sinners and blasphemers, the eye of the storm is at hand and all that enter be wary. Rise up you wrecthed cur so I can smite thee from above with lightning and sulphur. Lay no hand on those that rest peacefully in the womb or suffer as they do.”
**********
Wasn’t there something in your magic book about not judging lest you be judged; about the foolishness, pretentiousness, and insincerity of posturing about religion in public; about professing yourself wise only to become a fool. Maybe I mis-read it.
Bob,Esq.,
Thanks for the quote from Blackstone. These so-called Christians have a very quick temper. Buddha,Amen to your comments about the Pope. As a lifelong Catholic who survived the wrath of the Nuns, the Pope is indeed only a man. And as Brother Buddha pointed out, not a very good man. I have to admit that I have always had a problem with the ring kissing stuff. I can’t even bow my head for a prayer because I am always expecting the Nuns to be swinging a yardstick at me when I am not looking! North Dakota is just one more place that I need to avoid. It can get in line behind Texas and Florida. Jill, I agree that the Priests who were “diddling about” may have indeed spilled some seeds that could be worth some money in North Dakota.
Buddha,
“For the largest part of human history, it wasn’t a person until it could survive UNASSISTED outside the womb.”
Is that what you believe also? Should premature babies remain “unassisted”?
Clint:
“Should premature babies remain “unassisted”?”
**************
Not to answer for Buddha, but I suspect his answer will be “Of course, not.” Babies born prematurely are still “born” and entitled to all of our efforts to keep them alive. We’re talking about non-viable fetuses here. Even if we accept your Biblically-inspired world view, you must admit that the greatest abortionist of all is the creator of the universe who decrees that about 25%-50% of all pregnancies ends in spontaneous abortions depending on which study you accept.
As I’ve said before this shouldn’t be a religious debate. Period. We’re not a Christian nation, we’re a secular nation full of Christians. Our laws shouldn’t be based on religious beliefs, no matter how large of a percentage of the population holds those beliefs. That’s why most Blue laws were repealed or found unconstitutional. If you think that abortion is a sin, don’t get one. Just because something is legal doesn’t make it required. Keep your religion out of my politics and I promise to keep my politics out of your religion.
So then we have a debate about when a fertilized egg becomes a human. I don’t think there’s a simple answer, and I think the ideal is a graduated approach, like Roe V Wade sets forth.
Mespo,
Just a quick little quibble A Fertilized egg isn’t a fetus yet. Patty could clarify, but I think it’s after about 2 months (in humans) that something becomes a fetus.
Im unsure on this so maybe someone can better inform me. If someone kills a pregnant woman, isnt he prosecuted for the murder of both lives.
George Carlin said it best: “Not every ejaculation deserves a name!”
Clint,
mespo’s answer stands.
As for you, I told you I was done with you.
Was that too complicated?
This is the last time I’ll repeat myself. Address others if you have questions. Not that I expect you to do that. Zealots are as zealots do. Just don’t expect an answer, Biblical literalist. I don’t carry on discussions with people who insist on basing their faulty logic in a lie. I made that clear.
Gyges:
I defer to you and Patty C. I believe the first stage of Embryogenesis is the zygote, then blastocyst which is about 100 or so cells,and finally the fetus, or at least that is what I recall from freshman biology.
Generally, the term ‘fetus’ applies when a heartbeat can first be detected – around eight weeks. The ‘quickening’ is estimated to occur around the sixteenth week.
Catholics for choice.org has an interesting site and a magazine called ‘Choice’ where this 1996 article, linked below, appeared. It’s interesting to note that it’s only been since 1869, 100 years after Blackstone, that the Catholic Church established it’s ‘position’ on abortion as ‘a sin worthy of excommunication’
- as was murder. And divorce, for that matter! When locking horns with modern christians, I’d stick with quoting Popes and the Saints.
http://faculty.cua.edu/Pennington/Law111/CatholicHistory.htm
More historical background from ASU:
http://embryo.asu.edu/encyclopedia/concepts/?getObject=embryo:124810
Roman Catholic Church Quickening
…’ Many early Church leaders and publications, such as the Didache, Tertullian, Athenagoras, Basil the Great, and others, also indicated that quickening was not used to determine the value of life in the womb. Later Catholic theologians, leaning heavily on Greek philosophers like Aristotle, declared a distinction in the severity of the crime of procured abortion based on a particular point in development. Indeed, St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas both cited a point after conception, generally the point of quickening, as the moment at which the life in the womb becomes human, meaning ensouled with a rational human soul. For Augustine and Aquinas, intentional abortion was always an offense against God but after the point of ensoulment it was much more so. These and other Church theologians often declared that abortion after quickening was a highly immoral action, worthy of immediate excommunication and/or the legal penalty for homicide…’
Carlin clips here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TBGt5K0s8c
I’d be surprised if this even made it to the Supreme Court, after Planned Parenthood v. Casey. You can’t tell me this doesn’t create an undue burden.
Buddha,
**I don’t carry on discussions with people who insist on basing their faulty logic in a lie. I made that clear.**
I’m sorry you feel that way. Declaring that I have faulty logic is not the same as proving that you don’t. Its interesting that you are the one who insulted and demeaned, yet strangely, are also the one who is so offended that you have chosen to ignore me. That speaks volumes. Take some lessons in civility from Mespo.
Mespo,
Interesting viewpoint. What if the premature child would be an “unnecessary financial burden” to the parents? Why would they not have any right to terminate the child’s life?
Sanity prevails in the North Dakota Senate — for now :
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090404/ap_on_re_us/abortion_restrictions
Religion is the curse of mankind