Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

I understand why Bloomberg wanted to clear the park out, but from a PR perspective it's kind of annoying that he martyred the movement when it was already self-immolating.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

A little bit within the bubble. The Democratic pollster PPP is coming out with a poll tomorrow showing the Occupy movement has become very unpopular with voters. If anything, Bloomberg and associates waited far too long. I said they should have done this two weeks in.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Amanda thinks they planned this when Obama was in Hawaii to avoid having him take the mayor(s) to task for clearing out their parks? Can someone explain why we're listening to this woman?

UPDATE: Oh, I get it now. BHTV is breaking into the Kids News business.

"Bloomberg is a jerk!" "Perry is stoopid!" "Rich people are mean!"

Amanda's next gig.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

LOL Big Brother Obama wants to keep his fingers in a lot of pies, I suppose. Maybe we should call him the "Vozhd".

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

I oppose abortion because it is a sign of decadence and corruption. Healthy cultures don't think of children as cysts to be removed for the sake of the mother's convenience. In a sane society, Medea is a morality tale, not a model.

This opposition isn't a Rube Goldberg contraption to trip up feminists.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Also, Democrats have consistently stated that they have a bigger problem with mormons than Republicans. Why do pundits constantly push this "Conservative bigot" meme? This never seems to get directed to the left, even when the data shows a voluntary expression of prejudice.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Actually, Allison Kilkenny on Citizen Radio and Sam Seder on The Majority Report commented that Bloomberg and the NYPD might have given the Occupy movement a reason to continue. A small contingent moved to Duarte Square and are continuing with the Wall Street march. I think it was Harry Siegel or Lee Papa who observed too, that the GAs and leadership have been slowly ironing out the identity issues and the concerns non-Occupy types express, and that now Bloomberg might have offered the impetus, to go forward.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Actually...shameless plug for Marcotte:

http://opinionated.wearecitizenradio.../citizenradio/

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

No one thinks of "children as cysts to be removed..."

Some people take the completely rational position that a very small cluster of cells with no human features other than DNA may not be exactly the same thing as a child.

It continues to amaze me how much some conservatives care about human life in the abstract and how little in the actual.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Interesting.

I went to PPP's website to see what was up- I guess the poll tweeted about isn't up yet- and found this instead:

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/m...ally.html#more

Still, why would the trajectory of public opinion about OWS be any different than public opinion of the Tea Party. Would agree that if OWS has become as unpopular as Tea Party, that's a pretty substantial decline for OWS.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Well, if abortions were done by police officers on horses and with batons...

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Man, come on.

Two lifetimes of suffering, mother and child. Necessary, if not almost sufficient, causes to poverty, violent crime, unemployment, degeneracy and high taxes. I think your argument would make a lot of sense prior to the 1970s. These days, it's no longer possible to just get any old job and make a living. Parenting requires a certain amount of grooming and future planning that prior generations didn't have to deal with.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Hard to accept calls for rationality that are so devoid of fact.

Speaking of the "actual", a fetus at 5 weeks has a regularly beating heart. At week 8 "everything that is present in an adult human is now present".

If you are true to the logic you present, you are against abortion sometime around 4 weeks after conception.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Liberalism in a nutshell, the ills of society are to be blamed on unwanted children. This is a good argument for abortions up to the 24th trimester I think.

Parenting requires a lot and the main ingredient is responsibility. This has not changed since the dawn of man.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

And ya gotta love the spin being applied as communities start applying common sense and ending the day of rage/OWS/Obamaville freedom-to-squat in the park movement. Matt Yglesias even ventures the idea that ending the assaults/trashing/vandalism/rapes/deaths might be a good thing.

Even Bloomberg is starting to get it:

“No right is absolute and with every right comes responsibilities. The First Amendment gives every New Yorker the right to speak out – but it does not give anyone the right to sleep in a park or otherwise take it over to the exclusion of others – nor does it permit anyone in our society to live outside the law. There is no ambiguity in the law here – the First Amendment protects speech – it does not protect the use of tents and sleeping bags to take over a public space."

I think he lost them at the word "responsibilities".

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

I don't believe (and nor do most people) that a "regularly beating heart" is the defining necessary and sufficient condition of humanity.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

YOu seem primarily upset that sugarkang, at least WRT abortion, is being consistent with his generally libertarian outlook.

Interesting how some on the right like to talk about how much akin it is to slavery and forced hosting of parasitism to pay a slightly higher marginal tax rate so that poor children and infirm and disabled children and adults can have decent lives, but these same people advocate forcing individuals to host another (in their view) person against their will, within their bodies, putting their health and very lives at risk.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

So we shouldn't allow abortion because it's a sign of decadence. How do we know that it's a sign of decadence? Because you said so, of course. And how do we know that being a decadent society, whatever that means, is a Bad Thing? Because you said so, that's why. Say, what do I have to do to get into the Tautology Club?

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/honor_societies.png

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

No matter what your position is about abortion you should at least try to be accurate.

25% of abortions are performed at 10 weeks.

http://www.i-am-pregnant.com/img/week10-fetus.jpg

15% are performed at 12 weeks.

http://0.tqn.com/d/pregnancy/1/7/-/C/05us12a.jpg

2% of abortions are performed because of rape or incest. 6% because of health issues. 92% are performed because of the child isn't wanted.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Yeah, but you didn't answer his points. Sometimes I think that people who are pro-abortion deliberately try to minimize what the act entails so they don't feel bad.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

So if people preface all of their assertions with 'I think' it's all good.

They look in the dictionary.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

You say this and then post a whole set of unsourced claims about percentages of abortions in a variety of conditions.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

What does this even mean?

Most abortions are not performed to alleviate threats to the mother's life. Why do you insist on characterizing it that way? The decision to have an abortion is mostly made as a convenience to the mother because she doesn't want to have a baby, period.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

What the heck are you talking about?

Stick to whatever it is you are doing. Psychoanalysis is not for you.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Pregnancy, regardless of imminent threats, represents an increased risk of a whole host of negative health outcomes. This is not at all controversial, it's just a fact. Most people are willing to take on the (usually) modest increase in risk, because they want to have a child, and are willing to pay for the the 1% chance that something could go wrong. It's a reasonable, logical decision for most people who want to have a baby.

But anti-abortion people want to FORCE people to take this health risk, against their will. While, as I said, at the same time, arguing that very modest taxes represent a vital affront to human freedom.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

good point.

Reasons for abortions

In 2000, cases of rape or incest accounted for 1% of abortions.[26] Another study, in 1998, revealed that in 1987-1988 women reported the following as their primary reasons for choosing an abortion:[27]

25.9% Want to postpone childbearing
21.3% Cannot afford a baby
14.1% Has relationship problem or partner does not want pregnancy
12.2% Too young; parent(s) or other(s) object to pregnancy
10.8% Having a child will disrupt education or job
7.9% Want no (more) children
3.3% Risk to fetal health
2.8% Risk to maternal health
2.1% Other

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Thanks for the link. 1987-1988. Well, thanks for the numbers, in any case.

Here's the most recent data on abortions:

http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html

You can see that the number of abortions have gone down substantially since the 80s.

More broadly: You seem to be very selective in your concerns about how people frame things. You don't like me pointing out that pregnancy is associated with health risks, but you don't object to Sulla's claims that pro-choice people regard children as cysts. I understand you have your perspective, but really?

Amanda Marcotte is not a Robert Wright fan
 

I just listened to Amanda's Story Collider talk, De-evolutionary psychology. She obviously has a problem with Bob - specifically his book "The Moral Animal." I guess a platform is a platform - no matter who is running it.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

I see. Having a baby is a risk and abortion is simply a rational decision to avoid that risk, pure and simple.

I wish you'd quit bringing up the tax increase BS but I know it is very important to your argument, so you won't be doing that.

I would like to argue with the better part of your statement, however. Is conceiving a child (aside from rape) a voluntary act? And do we not, as a society, have an interest in maintaining a reverence for life such that disposing of that life should be a serious matter. I think that is the real position of anti-abortion folks. They have no interest in forcing anyone to do anything and to characterize it that way is silly.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

My citation was about percentages not the number. I can't see why they would have changed but am open to a more recent survey. And it's good that the number of abortions have gone down especially given the easy access to birth control.

You have shown by your comments that you prefer to regard aborted fetuses as a small collection of cells with no resemblance to a human being other than DNA. I don't know if cysts contain the same collection of DNA as the person who has the cyst but from your description the fetus wouldn't be far from a cyst so why would you object to the characterization?

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

As you noted, people engage in abortion for a variety of reasons. I wasn't making a conclusive claim about peoples' reasons for abortion. I was explaining one reason why I oppose the government forcing people to maintain pregnancies. Among other reasons, they are forcing people to increase their health risks, against their will.


People who object to tax increases argue that being forced to support other human beings is a vile affront to human freedom. I just don't see why that logic doesn't apply to forced pregnancy.


I don't understand what you are saying at all. At least at the farther right point, it simply isn't true. The recently defeated Alabama thing was intended to forbid abortions under any circumstances, including rape and incest. Can we agree that THAT version of anti-abortion is restricting freedom?

As to the "milder" version of anti-abortion that only wants to prevent women from having abortions if the women voluntarily had sex, I still don't see how this isn't a restriction of freedom. most of the women who have abortions were using birth control at the time that they got pregnant. At least for those women, it's clear that they were NOT intending to get pregnant, so this notion that they voluntarily chose to get pregnant seems a little odd. In any case, you seem to think that in this case, it's a JUSTIFIABLE restriction of freedom, but I don't see how it's not a restriction of freedom.

If I look both ways and then cross the street, but a car whips around the corner and hits me, it's true that i wouldn't have been hit by the car if I hadn't been in the street. But it's hard to construe me as having chosen to get hit by the car.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Sulla was making a general claim not specific to me.

He said that liberals regard *children* as cysts.

Had he said liberals regard fetuses as cysts, one might have argued that he was making an overgeneralization, but it would have been in the same universe as a reasonable claim.

The liberals who take my position DON"T regard children as cysts. They don't regard fetuses as children.

Clear enough?

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Got it. So you think of the fetus as a cell cluster and Sulla thinks of a fetus as a child. I think it's a matter of opinion. The opinion about this is at the very core of the argument about abortion (plus of course all of that tax stuff you throw in). I would say that each of you is entitled to your opinion about what a fetus is.

But I will continue to say that your characterization of what a fetus is (very small cluster of cells with no human features other than DNA) is inaccurate. If you want to make a good case for abortion I would suggest you rephrase this. I also think the health risk thing is weak. But I guess it goes with the cell cluster thing. And then to cover all this weakness up you bring in the tax thing. Yes, I am beginning to understand quite well.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Yes, but what sulla was doing was claiming that I (well, "liberals") regard CHILDREN as cysts. We dont' agree with his definition of children; that's a very different proposition. In any case, yes, Sulla's grand claims come about because we disagree. So do mine.

I agree that this is a (not the, but a big part of) piece of the core of the argument).

I keep mentioning the tax thing becuse it seems to be a glaring inconsistency.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Abortion should remain safe and legal. Our government should promote free access to family planning internationally--including access to safe abortion, in which the woman is the sole voting decisionmaker.

When I meet someone who wants to make abortion illegal, I want to hear the person defend such a law with regard to the least problematic abortions. So I want him to explain why using an IUD ought to be viewed as mass-murder.

If someone thinks abortion should be illegal on 10-wk fetuses--but already accepts that earlier abortions should be legally protected--fine, let's have the discussion.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

I haven't listened to the diavlog yet but a dust up on abortion, always a fun time ;)

Not even touching what a Dictator has to say on the subject of abortions ( see Nicolae Ceauşescu ) but I will hone in on an argument or 2.

Good you are pro-choice then. If it is an opinion then the person who's opinion matters most is the woman who is pregnant, certainly at the stage of development we are discussing.

So it is weak to point out that anti-choice activists want the full weight of law to be brought down on the head of a pregnant woman (without taking into any consideration her situation ) and force her to take on a statistically significant health risk. I don't think that way. One could think of it as conscription for certain women in a war that has some risk to their life that men don't have to worry about. I am not trying to conflate pregnancy with a battle but when people want to take away someone else's right to life liberty and pursuit of happiness it can lead to some declaration of sorts.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

I sometimes think conservative type have some notion that it as a modification of the idea of Original Sin. We are born with Original Sin but before we are born we are sinless, so we are in a better Pre-Sin state. Once born we start the Sin thing.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

Exactly quite apart from back alley abortions and the like the mere fact of pregnancy in a country where we women still die in childbirth ( have we learned noting from Gili ) is not really discussed all that much. Of course the conservatives looking to cut benefits for pregnant women and the children women choose to bear so they can cut taxes on the well off seems a bit obtuse at best. Not really connecting the dots on that one are they.


I think this would be an interesting conundrum for the average libertarian.

Re: Values Added: Rootin' Tootin' Edition (Amanda Marcotte & Erica Grieder)
 

There's a certain elegance to that way of understanding the thinking, but it doesn't explain the response to the Schiavo case, which embodies the abstraction at the other end of life.