I wrote this recent post discussing the unfortunate timing of two significant threats to American security that may materially effect the Democratic Presidential candidates ability to retake the White House in 2008.
However, the damage done to one candidate in particular, John Edwards, by the JFK airport plot uncovered this past weekend, seems to be outsized.
Talk about bad timing. Here's a YouTube clip featuring Edwards' remarks that the global war on terror is 'just a bumper sticker,' pre-dating this weekend's events, including the Democratic candidate 'debate' in New Hampshire. Edwards had re-iterated this theme, which he evidently believed to be a winning slogan.
His continued diminishment of this real threat was lampooned in this humorous video clip, also from YouTube.
And, here, Rudy Giuliani rebuts Edwards' foolish remark with his own sentiments.
Perhaps the most telling measure of the longer-term effects of Edwards' attitude toward this real global conflict was seen on Bill O'Reilly's program last week. I happened to catch a few minutes of it one evening, during which he cited polls that had Edwards losing 8 percentage points of support in recent surveys of Democratic Presidential contenders.
At this rate, Edwards may need to start sharing a bus with co-contender Dennis (The Menace) Kucinich to save on campaign funds.
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Monday, June 4, 2007
Some Insights on Birth Control and Abortions
For years, liberal acquaintances have informed me that the Repubican party has been captured ny the religious right. Apparently, all issues boil down to abortion, in the eyes of these liberals, especially for their arch-nemeses, the aforementioned rightist splinter group.
I'm not an active Republican by any means. I'd rather not register with either party, but, in order to vote in a primary, I am forced to do so. Thus, my identification as more conservative than partisan.
Recently, Kudlow & Company, Larry Kudlow's week nightly program on CNBC, featured the results of a Gallup poll which found nearly-identical percentages of Democratic and Republican voters would cast their vote for President on the single-issue of abortion. If memory serves, that percentage was roughly 18%. Thus, not only was the Republican party not 'captured' by these single-issue zealots, but the Democrats were hostage to the opposite sentiment, to the same degree.
Thus, a column in a recent Wall Street Journal caught my attention. Ms. Riley, the article's author, cast the piece through the eyes of Dr. Atul Gawande, who recently guest-wrote an op-ed piece in the People's Daily (a/k/a New York Times). It discussed the widely-available knowledge about birth-control methods, and their usage. How then, it asked, to accuont for the 1.3 million US abortions, over half of which were performed on women over the age of 25?
According to Ms. Riley, surveys record that 75% of American women,
"think abortion is morally wrong in at least some circumstances. The most common exceptions- rape, incest and life of the mother- are in fact the least common reasons women have abortions. So what gives?"
Riley quotes Kay Hymowitz, author of "Marriage and Caste in America," as writing,
"There isn't really a bright line between wanted and unwanted pregnancies."
Ultimately, Ms. Riley comes to a rather chilling conclusion,
"Whether they're suburban professionals with two sons who really want a daughter or poor inner-city women who hope their boyfriends will stay around if there is a child in the picture, women will often subvert their better judgment to fulfill a biological urge.
This is not the sort of sentiment that sits well with feminists- or with anyone, for that matter, who believes women are the ones thinking with their heads instead of their hormones."
It turns out that six in ten US women who have abortions are already mothers, and more than half intend to have more children. As Riley points out,
"These women know exactly how one gets pregnant, and how one does not."
Which leads Ms. Riley, and us, to the logical conclusion. Abortion has become an expensive, morally questionable form of birth control used by women who hope things will develop, over nine months, into a situation in which they feel comfortable bearing a child. But when circumstances do not comply with their hopes, they opt to terminate the pregnancy instead.
When you depart from the purely emotional arguments about "a woman's body," etc., and look at the facts, you rapidly realize that the issue is not about young, inner-city, uneducated women who have accidentally 'made a mistake.' Rather, it appears that our moral retreat on the question of how our society views the sanctity and right of each life to be protected has resulted in many women callously choosing to become pregnant, realizing that they can wait quite a few months and simply abort the child.
I'm not a single-issue voter, and I certainly don't intend to begin now, with this issue. However, I find the facts troubling. As part of a broader loosening of moral consistency in America, beginning in the late 1960s, our current dilemma vis a vis abortion, when electively used as birth control, seems to me to send entirely the wrong signal in a society which, in so many other areas, alleges to value life and protection of the weak. Of what value are so many governmentally-financed aid programs for surviving children, when our society actively supports the ability and means of women to abort other children before birth for no more reason than inconvenience?
I'm not an active Republican by any means. I'd rather not register with either party, but, in order to vote in a primary, I am forced to do so. Thus, my identification as more conservative than partisan.
Recently, Kudlow & Company, Larry Kudlow's week nightly program on CNBC, featured the results of a Gallup poll which found nearly-identical percentages of Democratic and Republican voters would cast their vote for President on the single-issue of abortion. If memory serves, that percentage was roughly 18%. Thus, not only was the Republican party not 'captured' by these single-issue zealots, but the Democrats were hostage to the opposite sentiment, to the same degree.
Thus, a column in a recent Wall Street Journal caught my attention. Ms. Riley, the article's author, cast the piece through the eyes of Dr. Atul Gawande, who recently guest-wrote an op-ed piece in the People's Daily (a/k/a New York Times). It discussed the widely-available knowledge about birth-control methods, and their usage. How then, it asked, to accuont for the 1.3 million US abortions, over half of which were performed on women over the age of 25?
According to Ms. Riley, surveys record that 75% of American women,
"think abortion is morally wrong in at least some circumstances. The most common exceptions- rape, incest and life of the mother- are in fact the least common reasons women have abortions. So what gives?"
Riley quotes Kay Hymowitz, author of "Marriage and Caste in America," as writing,
"There isn't really a bright line between wanted and unwanted pregnancies."
Ultimately, Ms. Riley comes to a rather chilling conclusion,
"Whether they're suburban professionals with two sons who really want a daughter or poor inner-city women who hope their boyfriends will stay around if there is a child in the picture, women will often subvert their better judgment to fulfill a biological urge.
This is not the sort of sentiment that sits well with feminists- or with anyone, for that matter, who believes women are the ones thinking with their heads instead of their hormones."
It turns out that six in ten US women who have abortions are already mothers, and more than half intend to have more children. As Riley points out,
"These women know exactly how one gets pregnant, and how one does not."
Which leads Ms. Riley, and us, to the logical conclusion. Abortion has become an expensive, morally questionable form of birth control used by women who hope things will develop, over nine months, into a situation in which they feel comfortable bearing a child. But when circumstances do not comply with their hopes, they opt to terminate the pregnancy instead.
When you depart from the purely emotional arguments about "a woman's body," etc., and look at the facts, you rapidly realize that the issue is not about young, inner-city, uneducated women who have accidentally 'made a mistake.' Rather, it appears that our moral retreat on the question of how our society views the sanctity and right of each life to be protected has resulted in many women callously choosing to become pregnant, realizing that they can wait quite a few months and simply abort the child.
I'm not a single-issue voter, and I certainly don't intend to begin now, with this issue. However, I find the facts troubling. As part of a broader loosening of moral consistency in America, beginning in the late 1960s, our current dilemma vis a vis abortion, when electively used as birth control, seems to me to send entirely the wrong signal in a society which, in so many other areas, alleges to value life and protection of the weak. Of what value are so many governmentally-financed aid programs for surviving children, when our society actively supports the ability and means of women to abort other children before birth for no more reason than inconvenience?
Sunday, June 3, 2007
War Clouds on The Horizon For Democratic Presidential Candidates
Just as it seemed the liberal Democratic Presidential frontrunning candidates- Hill, Obama Bim Baden...gee, is there anyone else?.......were safe running to the left on defense and terrorism, two events this past week have made the water suddenly very unsafe for them.
Exhibit number one was this past week's Russian test of an anti-anti-ballistic missile defense system missle. So much for post-Reagan progress on arms control. Putin is off the reservation now.
No, it's not George Bush's "fault." Nobody can control another country's leader. Putin and his coterie are still smarting from their nation's fall from superpower status. Thus, their bet on militarism and economic blackmail, via oil and gas, to attempt to regain that status.
Say goodbye to the end of the arms race, my friends.
Exhibit number two is the just-announced apprehension of those terrorists involved in planning the total destruction of New York's JFK airport, along with a substantial portion of nearby Queens.
Yet again, we are reminded that terrorism lives, and is seeking to strike on our shores again.
Doesn't voting to withdraw from Iraq look silly when old and new enemies abound, are active, and demonstrate the continued danger of simply maintaining peaceful, healthy global trade and economic interdependence?
What idiot would vote to pointlessly retreat behind the non-existent "protection" of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
Heck, we can't even keep our own TB-infected citizens out of our own country.
My own expectation is that these recent events will bring home to American voters that we are never "safe." That now is no time to vote for liberal pansies and appeasers.
Fate has a way of making some candidacies irrelevant, despite their own best efforts. Nixon lost his gubernatorial bid amidst the media coverage of the Cuban missile crisis. Kerry ran for peace during a hot, vital war against terrorism, attempting to invoke his own checkered and uncertain military service as his qualification.
I'd guess that by November of 2008, a candidate who is well-credentialed, strong on defense, and likable, will be leading in the race to replace George Bush.
I'm guessing that person will be either Fred Thompson or Rudy Giuliani. I don't think any prominent Democratic candidates will be able to tack back from the far left, where they headed to win their own party's nomination, to the center on defense, with any credibility left.
In fact, it occurred to me yesterday that you have to go back to Harry Truman to find a Democratic President of whom that party is still proud, and was not soft on defense. Johnson's abysmal mismanagement of both the Vietnam War, and the economy, amidst his wrong-headed, southern-white-guilt inspired social policies, earned him a place near Carter in the pantheon of failed Democratic Presidents. Clinton was lucky war did not find him as he dismantled our defenses and ignored the rising threat of global, Islamic-fringe-driven terrorism.
It could well be a rerun of the candidacies of (drumroll, please): McGovern, Mondale, Dukakis, and Kerry.
Exhibit number one was this past week's Russian test of an anti-anti-ballistic missile defense system missle. So much for post-Reagan progress on arms control. Putin is off the reservation now.
No, it's not George Bush's "fault." Nobody can control another country's leader. Putin and his coterie are still smarting from their nation's fall from superpower status. Thus, their bet on militarism and economic blackmail, via oil and gas, to attempt to regain that status.
Say goodbye to the end of the arms race, my friends.
Exhibit number two is the just-announced apprehension of those terrorists involved in planning the total destruction of New York's JFK airport, along with a substantial portion of nearby Queens.
Yet again, we are reminded that terrorism lives, and is seeking to strike on our shores again.
Doesn't voting to withdraw from Iraq look silly when old and new enemies abound, are active, and demonstrate the continued danger of simply maintaining peaceful, healthy global trade and economic interdependence?
What idiot would vote to pointlessly retreat behind the non-existent "protection" of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
Heck, we can't even keep our own TB-infected citizens out of our own country.
My own expectation is that these recent events will bring home to American voters that we are never "safe." That now is no time to vote for liberal pansies and appeasers.
Fate has a way of making some candidacies irrelevant, despite their own best efforts. Nixon lost his gubernatorial bid amidst the media coverage of the Cuban missile crisis. Kerry ran for peace during a hot, vital war against terrorism, attempting to invoke his own checkered and uncertain military service as his qualification.
I'd guess that by November of 2008, a candidate who is well-credentialed, strong on defense, and likable, will be leading in the race to replace George Bush.
I'm guessing that person will be either Fred Thompson or Rudy Giuliani. I don't think any prominent Democratic candidates will be able to tack back from the far left, where they headed to win their own party's nomination, to the center on defense, with any credibility left.
In fact, it occurred to me yesterday that you have to go back to Harry Truman to find a Democratic President of whom that party is still proud, and was not soft on defense. Johnson's abysmal mismanagement of both the Vietnam War, and the economy, amidst his wrong-headed, southern-white-guilt inspired social policies, earned him a place near Carter in the pantheon of failed Democratic Presidents. Clinton was lucky war did not find him as he dismantled our defenses and ignored the rising threat of global, Islamic-fringe-driven terrorism.
It could well be a rerun of the candidacies of (drumroll, please): McGovern, Mondale, Dukakis, and Kerry.
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