Gas Bandit's Political Thread V: The Vampire Likes Bats
- Thread starter GasBandit
- Start date
Nope, just an observation. Not everything is about you
Cool. How about this - Planned Parenthood breaks up into two completely separate organizations. One provides all the services except abortion, the other provides abortions and no other services. The one can refer patients to the other, but money doesn't cross between the two.
That should make it easy to support all the current services provided, while allowing people to direct how their taxes and donations are spent. Those who support abortion will know that their money is going directly to the cause of terminating fetuses. Those that support women's services will know their funds are going towards that end. Those that want to support both can do so with ease, while those that have ethical, cultural, or religious disagreements with one or the other can choose how to allocate their funds.
The nice thing about this plan is that there are many services that provide everything planned parenthood does without the abortions, and people can vote with their pocket book, and urge their representatives to support one and not the other.
In other words, the market is already choosing how these funds are allocated, and the system is working.
If planned parenthood wants better access to government funds to provide their services, they can separate out their abortion services - many of their clinics don't provide abortions at all, and it would be a fairly easy division.
Until then, try to promote your point of view, but please spare us the "If planned parenthood gets defunded then we are hurting women's health" pandering BS. Yes, this might leave some holes in non-abortion activities in some areas as the market adjusts to changes, but similar changes happen in other areas of healthcare for a variety of reasons - it's just that this one can be politicized. Any gaps can be filled in, and Planned Parenthood isn't the end-all-be-all of women's health services.
I'd be happier if any defunding legislation presented included reallocation to similar reproductive health non-abortion services. It would still require other clinics to apply for the funds and meet the requirements of the funds, but I suspect people will be a lot happier with that than the simple removal of funds altogether from reproductive health services.
GasBandit
Staff member
Not about just me, but a passive aggressive jab at every male in the threadNope, just an observation. Not everything is about you
I love strawmen as much as anybody, so I'll just post this to illustrate the caricature.
If that was a joke about the character's status within the narrative about that film, it was very well done.Nope, just an observation. Not everything is about you
GasBandit
Staff member
Here's an excellent lesson on why positions and platforms isn't enough to go on when it comes to a candidate.
In the mid 2000s, at the height of my libertarian fervor, there was a Libertarian politician I supported named Wayne Allyn Root. I did so because I read up on the candidates on their websites, and found that Root's position on the issues most closely matched my own - his stated position was he was pro choice, in favor of gay marriage, in favor of legalizing pot, but also fiscally conservative, wanted to cut spending and entitlements, all the right things that were music to my ears. I even read articles written by him and found myself mentally applauding his points. He ended up being the VP nominee for the Libertarian Party in 2008 (the Presidential candidacy went to Bob Barr).
Now, all these years later, I see that he has not walked the walk that he talked back then. Since his (obviously) unsuccessful veep bid, Root has left the Libertarian party and joined the Republican party, become a Trump supporter, and has returned to his old pre-politics bread and butter of sports handicapping to make his money - an occupation I wasn't even aware of when I supported his bid. Reading testimonials from people who have worked with and for him, he is a charlatan of the highest order, described as "pathological."
He only came back into my mind because starting this week I'm running advertisements for his sports betting tips company on my radio station. Checking into what he's been up to was disheartening, to put it lightly. He's a snake oil salesman whose mouth writes checks nobody could cash, and then when the jig is almost up, he folds up shop, moves on, and starts again somewhere else.
This is an important lesson for everybody - no matter what a person's stated positions look like on paper, their personal, professional, and political history matters. This is what more people need to realize before they vote for Hillary - and I still maintain that, after all these years, the fact that Hillary Clinton is not in prison is some of the greatest evidence of how dysfunctional our justice system really is. It's what makes websites like the one in the "who do you support" thread that only compare your answers to the on-paper positions of the candidates so very dangerous.
In the mid 2000s, at the height of my libertarian fervor, there was a Libertarian politician I supported named Wayne Allyn Root. I did so because I read up on the candidates on their websites, and found that Root's position on the issues most closely matched my own - his stated position was he was pro choice, in favor of gay marriage, in favor of legalizing pot, but also fiscally conservative, wanted to cut spending and entitlements, all the right things that were music to my ears. I even read articles written by him and found myself mentally applauding his points. He ended up being the VP nominee for the Libertarian Party in 2008 (the Presidential candidacy went to Bob Barr).
Now, all these years later, I see that he has not walked the walk that he talked back then. Since his (obviously) unsuccessful veep bid, Root has left the Libertarian party and joined the Republican party, become a Trump supporter, and has returned to his old pre-politics bread and butter of sports handicapping to make his money - an occupation I wasn't even aware of when I supported his bid. Reading testimonials from people who have worked with and for him, he is a charlatan of the highest order, described as "pathological."
He only came back into my mind because starting this week I'm running advertisements for his sports betting tips company on my radio station. Checking into what he's been up to was disheartening, to put it lightly. He's a snake oil salesman whose mouth writes checks nobody could cash, and then when the jig is almost up, he folds up shop, moves on, and starts again somewhere else.
This is an important lesson for everybody - no matter what a person's stated positions look like on paper, their personal, professional, and political history matters. This is what more people need to realize before they vote for Hillary - and I still maintain that, after all these years, the fact that Hillary Clinton is not in prison is some of the greatest evidence of how dysfunctional our justice system really is. It's what makes websites like the one in the "who do you support" thread that only compare your answers to the on-paper positions of the candidates so very dangerous.
GasBandit
Staff member
Well, yes and no. Generally most have some skeletons in their closets, sure, but not all of them.
For example, take Bernie Sanders.
I don't agree with much of anything he supports.
But as far as I can tell, he's not a charlatan, and he walks the walk in addition to talking the talk.
For that, if nothing else, I can respect him.
Necronic
Staff member
I mean, 3% of the work Planned Parenthood does is abortion. It's not a big part of their repertoire. As for the alternative services, if I had ever seen one of those I would take the option seriously, but I haven't. Pretty much all I've ever seen are ads focused on trying to keep women from getting abortions. I don't see any of them talking about the other 97% of the work. I do agree with your last statement, they should have presented an alternative, but presenting alternatives isn't something the republican party has been big on in recent years. I still haven't heard an alternative to the ACA or increasing the debt ceiling.
And as for the politicizing issue, yes, I agree, we should stop politicizing this. If we stopped doing that we could actually talk about the absolute wealth facts and figures we have on this topic instead of made up and exaggerated stuff about sports cars and back alley fetal sales. The truth of the matter, the non-political truth, is that without these services, both abortive and non-abortive pre/post natal care, you will see declining health and future expectations for poor women and their children. We are already seeing evidence of an alarming increase in self-induced abortions. Which is not unexpected and should represent actionable evidence.
Abortion is absolutely a last option. It's not good. I personally find it morally objectionable. And I think that we as a society should do everything in our power to end it. But banning it like we did? All that does is push it underground. We are still seeing abortions, except now they endanger the mother and cause significantly more suffering for the unborn.
And you guys call this a win.
Yeah, how about we not politicize this. This didn't end abortions. It just made them more terrible.
ed: I understand this is a very sensitive issue, and I sincerely apologize if you find these views offensive. I understand that at a deep personal level the idea of abortion is frankly evil to some of us. But I hope you understand that as offensive as you may find my statements, I find the current state just as unpalatable. The idea that women are killing their unborn children with drugs and alcohol and abdominal trauma is seriously upsetting to me.
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Hopefully this doesn't end up with truckloads of burnt civilians. The effects of white phosphorous on humans always squick me out.
So if Planned Parenthood wants to receive tax funds they only have to jettison 3% of their services. That's a pretty small piece of their business, and they should seriously consider doing that.
Oh, I'm sorry, were you expecting that terribly misleading statistic to support your position?
It's a bad number, and you should stop trotting it out as though it's useful in determining public policy. If PP were more open and transparent then we might be able to make better decisions, but they aren't giving us any options or even useful information. This doesn't even approach all the actions they perform in the name of "women's health" that they try so hard to hide.
As is stands, they will continue to run just fine without tax funds, so why are you defending them so strongly? There are so many organizations doing so much good in the US, why do we have to fund organizations that present ethical quandaries? Why not focus on those organizations people agree with for public funds, and allow the other organizations - that may still be doing good work - to seek out their own donors?
This is probably the best social solution. However, because it would be more expensive to break the shared stuff into two independent segments, it will probably never happen, because people have continually shown that they are willing to compromise their personal ethics when money is involved.
Really, it's about babies. Most human beings assign a higher value to human babies than to any other kind of baby, which is completely expected.
However, some people assign higher values to some subset of human babies over other human babies, or set their baby-life value higher than what they set for adult humans, and that is what gets politicized.
--Patrick
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Necronic
Staff member
Why is it a bad number?
If we're going to start defunding organizations because they present ethical quandaries, I suggest we start with the biggest ones, like the prison industry, or the defense sector.
It sounds like you are unfamiliar with that number, what it represents, and why it probably shouldn't be used to form public policy on abortion and reproductive health service funding. Consider researching it further, or simply accept at face value my assertion that if it's only 3% then it must surely be worth dropping abortion if it means they can keep government funding. Surely the government funding is worth more to them than the paltry 3% of their services they provide to others.
Necronic
Staff member
Ol, so I looked into it further. Which is pretty hard considering that most of the articles on this are from Breitbart style sources. Didn't realize this number was such a hot button issue.
Looks like, from what I can tell, the 3% number is based on a numerical count approach to the services. So an abortion adds to the total count the same way anything else does. That does seem misleading.
Has anyone actually made the effort to figure out the actual split? Because I have a hard time believing PP is actually using federal funds for abortions (aside from rare life saving events paid for by seeing as it's crazy illegal.
Looks like, from what I can tell, the 3% number is based on a numerical count approach to the services. So an abortion adds to the total count the same way anything else does. That does seem misleading.
Has anyone actually made the effort to figure out the actual split? Because I have a hard time believing PP is actually using federal funds for abortions (aside from rare life saving events paid for by seeing as it's crazy illegal.
The defunding of planned parenthood is happening though state and national legislatures. If you want them to focus on cutting funding to other things you find ethically troubling, talk to your representative and make your position clear.[DOUBLEPOST=1447879880,1447879732][/DOUBLEPOST]I should clarify further that most interpretations of the constitution allow for public funds to go toward internal and external security, but nothing suggests that public funds are constitutionally provided for elective abortions. So even if there's an ethical quandary, it's harder to attack something the constitution specifically requires public funds for.
I do not have a representative because of my legal status, the taxes I pay don't come with a voice (unless I'm willing to lie and impersonate a voter/constituent).
Are you disagreeing with the importance of prioritizing defunding of ethically troubling organizations with a sort-by-funding approach? Are you disagreeing with the two examples given being ethically troubling?
If neither, then why pay attention to $600M before $900B?* Do you agree with the legislators' priorities?
*Those are the roughly right figures to the best of my ability for PP gov funding and Defense+Prison spending. They're probably both horribly wrong and I should be flayed using rusty merkur razors.[DOUBLEPOST=1447880581,1447880360][/DOUBLEPOST]
Internal and external security could be decoupled from all the big ethical concerns people have with them. Guantanamo et al don't need to be run by the U.S. military, let the private market decide.
(Religious) morals and political decisions don't mix. Interracial marriage was considered evil and debasing - by some equal to bestiality. Some people consider pedophilia to be not evil as long as the child seems happy (there was a push for legalization in the '70s, remember?). Giving women equal rights was considered wrong. There are people who consider the Catholic Church to be a power of Evil in the world, covering up pedophilia and abuse, cause of the Crusades, accomplice to the Nazi war crimes. Some people believe genetic modification of fetuses is meddling in God's work and evil, others consider it the best way to improve the race and assure the continued survival of our species, thus not only good but necessary. Drug use is, according to some religions, evil because it compromises your ability to make (moral) judgements; while it's considered good by other religions because it allows coming closer to the Divine.
Weed out prejudice - yes, including my own, "rationality" isn't always all it's cracked up to be either - try to be neutral, try to look at it amorally and try to look at it practically. In this way, abortions are much like drugs. Hardly anybody's actively in favor of it - I've met girls who (ab)used abortions as a form of birth control, but frankly, they're (luckily) rare and there's something wrong with them. Hardly anyone's greatly in favor of drugs - mostly it's considered a vice.
In both cases, trying to suppress it completely is practically impossible - there will always* be people searching it out, and pushing it completely into illegality is an assurance for needless death, low quality, dangerous practices, unchecked amounts, taboos, shame, etc etc. In both cases, allowing it, in a controlled environment, in certain cases, followed closely, with campaigns to make it known but also to warn of the dangers and disincentivize it but not push it into taboo, is the more humane solution. Better to know how many people are using drugs or having abortions, to be able to provide adequate and proper care, and keep it in professional hands, than to have the money go to unlicensed, unscrupulous, unprofessional and unchecked criminals.
As for "I don't want to subsidize it", heh, I don't want my money to go to the army, or the church, either. And I don't intend to have kids! I don't think we should support schools or universities! Ah, wait, that's the social contract. We all pay for stuff we don't want or need.
*unless we're willing to put up with a whole lot more big brothering than we are.
@Bubble181 The idea that abortion regulation/legalization leads to a more harmonious or prosperous society is not universally accepted, I don't believe, so framing it as equivalent to public education funding doesn't quite work, because of the missing axiom: "this is overall useful to society". You also run into the issue that some people don't weigh human preferences the same way you do, and might prefer (say) 10 suffering humans and 10 live births to 10 neutral humans, 5 live births, and 5 abortions.
I would remind you that you could start (or join) an anti-military, pro-laicist and/or anti-natalist party in your country of citizenship, and campaign for reform along the lines of what you want.
I would remind you that you could start (or join) an anti-military, pro-laicist and/or anti-natalist party in your country of citizenship, and campaign for reform along the lines of what you want.
Necronic
Staff member
It's also true that for many people abortion is indistinguishable from murder. And that's not something that can be argued in either direction to a logical conclusion. You either believe that life begins at conception of you don't. Proving the existence of "life" is...well it's not possible, so you have to accept the potential validity of both sides, and to err on the safe side would give you a pro-life stance.
And when it comes to murder for the benefit of society, that's, well. Actually it's sort of interesting. Things like eugenics and genetic cleansing are considered wrong by both sides, but the death penalty? I would guess there is a significant correlation between pro life and pro death penalty.
Similar arguments could be made for war as well. Murder for the benefit of society.
And when it comes to murder for the benefit of society, that's, well. Actually it's sort of interesting. Things like eugenics and genetic cleansing are considered wrong by both sides, but the death penalty? I would guess there is a significant correlation between pro life and pro death penalty.
Similar arguments could be made for war as well. Murder for the benefit of society.
GasBandit
Staff member
That was the logical train of thought that made me realize I was pro choice. I support the criminal death penalty. We, as a society, believe there are circumstances in which it is acceptable to end a human life, be it the death penalty, self defense, or abortion where the mother is at significant risk of dying if the child comes to term. Beyond that, it starts to get fuzzy. If the mother's life isn't in danger, at what point is it acceptable to end the pregnancy, end the "life" of the growing human? The Catholics don't even consider contraception/birth control acceptable (I will personally pistol whip whoever posts Monty Python's "Every Sperm is Sacred" segment from Life of Brian in response to this
). Meanwhile, there are other people who consider abortion no more reprehensible than cosmetic wart removal - merely a simple procedure to let them continue to act/live as they wish.So the debate becomes, at what point exactly do we find this practice acceptable? Conception? First trimester? Second? Heart development? Brain development? Viability outside the womb if removed? The argument rages on, and it has been further exacerbated by the Rowe vs Wade decision - unelected justices simply "deciding" where to put the meterstick instead of any kind of actual national referendum.
For my part, I don't consider a fetus to be a child any more than I would consider a child to be an adult. But there are others that disagree with my stance, on both sides. And as Necronic points out, there's no factual evidence, only belief and conjecture, that says "this is the point at which it stops being acceptable." And that is why the debate on the practice rages on.
About 19 years after conception.
We already have laws on the books. If one person accidentally kills (or almost kills) another, there are existing manslaughter or negligence charges which can be brought, and punishments which can be meted out. It has also been established that ignorance of the law is no excuse. If a fetus' existence endangers the life of the mother, then it seems there's already a legal path to follow for all this (if someone wants to get all technical about it). Of course then there's the debate over whether or not a fetus constitutes a Real Person, etc.
EDIT: Looks like Gas already touched on that point while I was composing.
--Patrick
GasBandit
Staff member
(Tap tap tap tap tap)
Err, yes? Seems pretty clear to me.
I'm sorry, are you disagreeing that there's ethical issues with the prison industry in the U.S. (e.g. privatization, stigmatization, inmate-inmate abuse, system abuse, solitary confinement), or are you disagreeing that $80B is a bigger number than $600M?