Conventional wisdom has been that the confirmation of Justice Samuel Alito will be enough to swing the U.S. Supreme Court decisively to the right ideologically. But many are closely watching moderate Justice Anthony Kennedy to see how much sway his swing vote will have now that Sandra Day O’Connor has retired. And liberals are holding onto hope, albeit feeble, that the president won’t have an opportunity to further shape the court. The liberal radio network Air America has even been playing a song parody titled “Hang on, Stevens,” a parody of the 1965 McCoys’ hit “Hang on Sloopy,” with lyrics calling for 85-year-old liberal Justice John Paul Stevens (in photo) to “Just wait until Bush leaves before you resign.”
One revealing test of the new order of things on the court will be what it makes of the federal law banning partial-birth abortions, a case it accepted Tuesday.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
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Hold on to your hats, the abortion issue and the Supreme Court will be taken up again. The predominate liberal/conservative litmus test in nominee hearings for decades will be tested for the the first time by the court since it’s two newest members were confirmed. This case will be limited to partial birth abortions, but it will be an important case. The 2003 legislation has been hung up in the lower courts since it’s passage.
The abortion war is a polarizing one, in which neither side has left any room for compromise. Partial birth abortion is the low hanging fruit for abortion opponents, and with good reason. More than any other abortion procedure, it takes the question of whether a human life is at stake out of the equation. Kansas is one of 15 states that supported the appeal.
The legal point of the case hinges on the lack of an exception for the health of the mother, though an exception for saving the life of the mother is included in the legislation. As in many Supreme Court decisions, it is likely to revolve around a narrow point of law, rather than on more sweeping grounds.
Even so, it will be the first test of the hopes for the newly formed court by abortion opponents, and the fears of advocates.
http://theflyoverzone.blogspot.com/2006/02/partial-birth-abortion-goes-to-supreme.html
The abortion issue is really about state’s rights but that seems lost on most people.
Alito is also against evil affirmative action programs but he will be at odds with shrub and most neo-cons over that issue.
Viva La Raza Blanco!!
I don’t care about the abortion issue, but that’s funny about people begging the judge to wait until Bush leaves office until he resigns.
AirAmerica? That still going? I thought it was wrapped up in embezzlement scandles and huge money problems. It’s a loser. They don’t get that leftisim is not a very popular or commerically viable audience.
Abortion is the Supreme Court’s Gordian Knot
The conundrum of abortion decisions in the courts is an insoluble one. That is because the federal courts are an inappropriate place to fight this one out in the first place. The Constitution of the United States simply does not address the issue. It took an activist court to create the legal grounds for Roe vs. Wade, and that creation reflected the personal views of the Justices, not well founded constitutional principle. That is always trouble.
Both sides on abortion would like the Supreme Court to decide that all Americans must adhere to their respective views, imposing it’s will as it has since Roe vs. Wade on us all. Neither outcome would reflect the views of most Americans.
A little over half of Americans support the availability of abortion in general. A little over half also oppose abortion when it is solely for the purpose of terminating an unwanted pregnancy. Both sides of the abortion zealots are unhappy with this. They want either completely unfettered abortion as a “constitutional right” or they want all abortions to be illegal.
The courts and congress need to get out of this thicket of thorns and turn the issue back to where it belongs – to state legislatures or ballot initiatives. That would make the lobbies on both sides unhappy, and the American people the winners. A novel proposition.
As a practical matter, it will take a long time, if ever, before common sense prevails. You may recall the endless questions in confirmation hearings regarding stari decisis. Why all this attention to a Latin term most people have never heard of? Because it boils down to the principle that previous court decisions should be respected and rarely overturned. It was a code word for “Will you leave Roe Vs. Wade alone?” It makes reversing even bad decisions of unduly activist courts difficult.
The larger the issue in a case, the less likely a conservative court is to throw it out. Even when the decision is horribly pernicious, the court often feels compelled to follow stari decisis. The classic example was the famous Dred Scott decision on slavery, that in the words of Chief Justice Charles Evan Hughes, was a “self-inflicted wound” from which it took the court at least a generation to recover.
Dred Scott v. Sandford was never overturned by the Supreme Court, it was overturned by the Thirteenth Amendment which abolished slavery, and the Fourteenth Amendment, which granted citizenship to former slaves. The lesson is that even the worst decisions die hard.
The late Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, in his book “The Supreme Court”, discussed “when the court is working within the bounds of the Constitution and when it is going beyond these bounds to impose on the country its own views in the guise of constitutional doctrine..” Roe Vs. Wade is just such an excess, but we will likely have to live with it for some time to come.
http://theflyoverzone.blogspot.com/2006/02/abortion-is-supreme-courts-gordian.html
Ian – BrandonI don’t look upon any abortion as a “States rights” or a “Federal rights”. I look upon it as a woman’s right. I also look upon it as a no brainer. Why is there such a fuss over removing something that is a part of a human anatomy.Making abortion against the law is the same as removing ones tonsils or appendix.I repeat a previous post:
The laws of natureIf our legislators had any guts at all they would define “when it is human?” and settle this never ending squabble.As many of you already know, due to nature’s metamorphosis, a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, a cut worm becomes a moth, a tadpole becomes a frog, a grub worm becomes a June bug and a sperm from a human male has a chance of becoming a human.A caterpillar is not a butterfly, a cut worm is not a moth, a tadpole is not a frog, a grub worm is not a June bug and a sperm from a human is not a human. In fact, after conception, it is nothing more then a loveable parasite in a human female’s body, sucking life from this host body. It will continue to suck life from this host body until it either dies in the womb or the umbilical cord is cut. Until that time (the cord is cut), based on the law of nature, it cannot be called human.
Until this basic fact is acknowledged into law, this problem will never be solved.
Guy, A parasite!?! Doesn’t a parasite have to live it’s total life taking nutrition from the host? Isn’t a parasite just a parasite throughout it’s life span? How can you equate a human fetus with a tapeworm or a tick? And how can you say that a fetus is no different than a tonsil or an appendix? It’s twisted ideology like yours that make it easy to deny the reality of abortion. The Nazis also convinced themselves that the Jews weren’t human. I guess that coping skill eases the conscience regarding genocide.For the record, I don’t think abortion should be outlawed, but I refuse to deny the reality of what it really is, and that’s the termination of a HUMAN life.I’ll repeat my post, also.My son and his wife (who is at 20 weeks gestation)got to see their baby girl for the first time last week. They got to see her face, her arms, her legs, her little body, and they watched her move around. At 200 weeks, a fetus breathes, can suck it’s thumb, unrinate, hear, feel pain, blink, swallow, and sleep. Tell me, what about her isn’t human? The stupid ideology stating a human can’t be considered human until the cord is cut has absolutely no basis in reality, it’s just proabortion rhetoric. It’s denial, pure and simple. If you believed that an fetus was human, then you’d have to admit it’s ok to kill someone because they’re unwanted.
I meant “20″ weeks, not “200″. It’s a little early for me and my fingers tend to push the wrong keys!
Damoon,Sorry to have to get into it with you again. But, no parasites do not have to live their whole life inside the host. For example, the parasitic worm strongyloides has a soil free-living cycle, and a parasitic cycle within humans. Very few parasites could survive without a free living phase because they have to infect someone else. Likewise, several types of moths lay their eggs inside slugs, the larvae hatch eat the slug and, spin their cocoon and molt into adult moths.Finally, as I responded to your highly biased misuse of science to support your views in the previous thread, your son and daughter saw an IMAGE of your future grandchild. Had they actually seen her; she would not have survived. You saw an image taken THROUGH your daughter-in-law’s stomach. I still think that matters. I am still waiting to hear how you can claim fetuses can breathe. Moore and Persaud, gold standard embryology, disagree with you. Finally, you have described functions that are all reflex (though pain at 20 weeks is more believable than 10), as cute and adorable as they all sound, and not indicative of even minimal consciousness or basic human independence. I also disagree that urinating into amniotic fluid so that the mother still has to absorb it, turn it back into urine and urinate it herself is not exactly the same thing as our ability to excrete waste.
Allie,
Are you really that dense? The point of Damoon’s was not to give you an Apples to Apples comparison, but to show you that the idiocy of someone saying the unborn child is nothing but a parasite!
no matter how much you try to spin it, compare it, or define it, the unborn child is a developing human being.
There is no doubt in anyone’s mind as to what that unborn child is going to be. A HUMAN CHILD.
You are the one who is forced to argue semantics to condone abortion. It is nothing but semantics to say that the location of the unborn child is the factor which denies the humanity of it.
That is just plain sick.
I can’t wait for this new Supreme Court to start reversing some decsions to end this genocide.
Me neither, Nathan.
Let the roll-back of abortion rights begin.
And let the inevitable voter PAY BACK against conservatives begin along with it.
My point is until our government legislates once and for all when a sperm/egg/fetus becomes a human we will always have the abortion battle. Also being convicted for 2 murders when a pregnet woman is killed.This thing of being a human upon conception is totally ridiculous and is false in the eyes of natural metamorphosis.
Why is it that endangered species unborn have more protection than human unborn?
Seriously.
If all these arguments are that the unborn human is nothing but a parasite, a clump of cells, just some tissue mass in side the womb…etc…etc.
Then what is a sea turtle egg?
Breakfast?
Why is it punishable with prison time and hefty fines for the destruction of a sea turtle nest? We pay law enforcement to go fence them off to protect them from humans and other predators.
Why? They are not really sea turtles are they?
Apply this to any endangered species.
Nathan,I know you don’t have a uterus, but how sick is it to think that the difference between being INSIDE a person’s body and in a basinet is just a matter of changing location? And, do please show me in what ways a fetus is substantively different from a parasite (and I recognize that they become humans and not worms, so show me they are not something like a “parasitic humans”), since parasites do have indepentent lives after their hosts, whether they become a worm or a butterfly.
6 Billion humans doesn’t imply that they are an endangered species, especially since we are responsible for endangering most species. No one is saying that fetuses don’t become humans, when they are born. But, we can pretty easily distinguish a tutle egg from an actual turtle, which does imply that there is a difference between turtle eggs and turtles, like umm fetuses and humans.
People who believe in “judicial activism” are morons. I’m sorry, I hate to be harsh, but its true. They obviously have absolutely no idea of how the American legal system operates, and they have no idea about the procedure with which judges formulate legal precedents. They have their heads up their butts and the entire legal community is laughing at them.
Allie: Your callous views regarding human life is morbid and frightening. Comparing a child in womb to a parasite! That kind of thinking must be a salve to reduce guilt feelings. I can’t comprehend.
Fortunately, medical science is more and more capable of showing women what they are really destroying. I hope the evidence of reality continues to work on and change hearts and reduce the number of these tragic situations.
And Outie, what do you do to salve your conscious when our taxpayer funded “daisy cutters” level blocks of houses full Iraqi children?
Oh, that’s right. You just don’t think about it.
You all overlooked “loveable parasite” which will one day become a loveable human but until that time IT IS NOT HUMAN.
Outlander,Your unctuous piety is really charming in the way that it means you don’t have to offer any support for your position, just condemnation and sanctimonious superiority. Do you get enough air up there on such a moral high horse? Be careful of medical information, it proves a lot of the pro-life propaganda totally wrong. I take your retreat to ad hominem and flowery propaganda as signs your argument is vacuous.
Proudlib,
Tell me when we ever dropped a daisy cutter leveling blocks of houses of Iraqi children?
Good ol’ “Know Nothing” Nathan, right on cue to question what is as plain as the buckshot on Whittington’s face.
From “Artillerymen Clear Path for the Infantry”
“Before ground troops entered Fallujah on Monday night, warplanes pounded insurgent targets with bombs; mobile artillery batteries followed with cannon and mortar fire. The effect was significant, according to military commanders and soldiers inside the city. . .
“Inside the Paladin’s turret, where the chief and two crew members load the big gun, Blakey rubbed his hand across a 155mm round sitting in the chamber. ‘Three of these,’ he said, patting the round, ‘and I can take out a whole building.’
Blakey said he tries not to think about what the shell hits — humans or structures.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41015-2004Nov10.html
And here’s a nice little flash video showing the victims you never see on CNN or (heaven forbid) FOX. This was put together on the occasion of our second anniversary of “liberating” Iraq.
http://www.bushflash.com/y2.html
Of course in just a few weeks, we’ll be to the THIRD anniversary of a war that was supposed to last as Rumsfeld said, “six days, six weeks, I doubt six months . . .”
That’s great Proudlib,
Where did any of that confirm that we dropped daisy cutters leveling homes “full of iraqi children” like you said?
Good ol’ “Know Nothing” Nathan, right on cue to question what is as plain as the buckshot on Whittington’s face.
From “Artillerymen Clear Path for the Infantry”
“Before ground troops entered Fallujah on Monday night, warplanes pounded insurgent targets with bombs; mobile artillery batteries followed with cannon and mortar fire. The effect was significant, according to military commanders and soldiers inside the city. . .
“Inside the Paladin’s turret, where the chief and two crew members load the big gun, Blakey rubbed his hand across a 155mm round sitting in the chamber. ‘Three of these,’ he said, patting the round, ‘and I can take out a whole building.’
Blakey said he tries not to think about what the shell hits — humans or structures.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41015-2004Nov10.html
And here’s a nice little flash video showing the victims you never see on CNN or (heaven forbid) FOX. This was put together on the occasion of our second anniversary of “liberating” Iraq.
http://www.bushflash.com/y2.html
Of course in just a few weeks, we’ll be to the THIRD anniversary of a war that was supposed to last as Rumsfeld said, “six days, six weeks, I doubt six months . . .”
And in the flash video above, the hideously burned children were a result of the American military using an illegal chemical weapon–white phosphorous “to smoke ‘em out of their holes.”
Your tax dollars at work . . .
How is White Phosphorus an illegal chemical weapon?
And since we are repeating our posts:
That’s great Proudlib,
Where did any of that confirm that we dropped daisy cutters leveling homes “full of iraqi children” like you said?
“Your unctuous piety is really charming in the way that it means you don’t have to offer any support for your position, just condemnation and sanctimonious superiority.”
Allie: I call it like it is. To refer to a human fetus as a parasite is degrading and it is telling. I don’t have to add anything. It speaks for itself.
“And Outie, what do you do to salve your conscious when our taxpayer funded “daisy cutters” level blocks of houses full Iraqi children?”
I dunno ProudLib, how do you salve yours?
Outlander,So, you are saying it is degrading because you can’t say that it is a false analogy? Show me how you think it is wrong, not just how you think it is unpleasant. If it is accurate, then I agree it is telling, but not about my moral status but about the status of a fetus.
Allie: I have not argued that it was a false anology (although I could). I said that it is degrading, disgusting, and telling of the person who would use such and analogy.
Outlander-So, it is really just an ad hominem? Not much of an argument. It offends your sensibilities, fine. Being dismissive of women’s autonomy offends mine. You think it means I am a bad person. Alright, my opinion of many pro-lifers is equally low. Since we both think that each other is somewhat deficient in moral character, the only interesting thing would be why you think it is a poor analogy.
The use of the term “parasite” seems strangely and politically oriented.
A baby is a parasite. Now just wait a minute. Lets do be clear here. A child is a “parasite” on it’s parent or parents for at least 14 years. Now of course, most parents do not see that child as such. But the right is couting on it.
Gotta feed that BABY! Get a job or 2 or three! You made it! It is all on YOU! Feed that baby! Its the “parasite”that your boss needs to keep ya showing up at long hours and on the weekends.
Thing is the baby is just a standin parasite. That baby is what gets used against you to keep ya showing up to work for a jerk who doesn’t care a whit about you or the baby. The responsibility for your child that they so promote GUARANTEES their power over you. Gottta feed that baby!
Make no mistake, the agenda of the anti choice crowd is not first directed at the birth of unplanned children. Their first agenda is to make sex “naughty”. But making that baby they force to be born fits real well as a PUNISHMENT and a restriction and a sentence.
Workplace daycare? Early government child care? Family medical leave act? NO!!!! You made that baby! Now get to WORK! One job not enough? Get a second or third!
Abortion is NEVER going away. The sick right needs it too much to delude people to make them think the right cares about anything but money and exploitation.
JR-I think there is a difference between fetuses and babies. Babies and children are certainly socially dependent on the families and on society (as are all humans). However, fetuses are biologically dependent on women. Babies and children can be give up for adoption, sent to day-care, handed over to grandma. Fetuses cannot.I understand the comment you are making on what may happen after birth to people forced to give birth. But, conflating fetues and babies/children is the pro-life stance, and I think it is incorrect.
Right on AllieI’ll just let you handle it from here, you can explain it far better then I.