This poll isn’t about Sarah Palin and her daughter’s pregnancy. Not directly. The Republicans and Obama rightly agree that her children (and of all politicians) should be off limits. How candidates raised them is not as it goes to what kind of person they are, their beliefs, and so on.
No, this poll is about the more general question of what should be private and personal relative to government intervention. As the poster on reddit who’s item prompted my post put it: “I agree with the Repubs, daughter’s pregnancy is private, just as abortion, gay marriage, euthanasia, and recreational drug use are private matters that should be beyond government and politics.”
Do you agree with that sentiment? Given the Republicans are (or used to be) about freedom from government intrusion, should the government not police drug use (other than when it does affect others such as DUI), try to legislate abortion, who marries whom, end of life decisions by lucid, rational individuals and other private, personal and family matters? Should the government be involved in what a person does to and with themselves and does consensually to and with others? Should the individual have true freedom from government intrusion in the privacy of their home or should the government, often based on the religious tenants of the legislators, be able to regulate how one lives or dies?
Sound off!
#58 – brenda,
The same demo craps tht are outlawing smoking in your car in CA? ROFL.
I believe that California law has more to do with protecting the children that anti-choice wackos right here on this thread have advocated protecting until the age of 17 or 18. Presumably, we should protect their health as well as their life, right? If so, the law banning smoking in cars with children makes sense.
Why California Law Must Protect Our Kids From Secondhand Smoke
So, before you criticize a law, at least try to understand it.
To the wackos on this thread who want all life protected until the age of 17 or 18, presumably, you fit in with the rest of the republican party platform as well, right? Are you for the death penalty? Go ahead. Say it.
Once that child you’ve been protecting is of age, then it’s OK to perform a state mandated retroactive abortion any time after the 75th trimester, right?
Won’t someone stand up and defend the republican all life is sacred except that I don’t want to have to pay for its welfare or health care and then I get to give it a lethal injection at age 18 platform? Come on. Make my day.
#63 – bobbo,
Good point about the parliamentary system. I agree that it can at least provide some representation to the minority who currently get no representation at all.
* I have no environmentalist candidates.
* I have no liberal or progressive candidates.
* I have no atheist candidates.
I have no representation at all for the issues that are most important to me, the environment, liberal and progressive politics, or separation of church and state. No one represents my views. Some are better than others. But, certainly there are no senators to represent me and no presidential candidates either.
In fact, even in the most liberal district in the country, an out of the closet atheist wouldn’t stand a chance.
Deep questions.
Drug use in the work place in and around cars and many other places is a safety issue.
If you are clearly endangering the lives and property of others then the public has the right to act to protect itself.
I don’t see much reason to prevent people who are checking out from doing so gracefully and on their own terms.
I haven’t given the rest enough thought. If I could devote a few decades to the topic…
Individual rights ARE for the person/individual.
If a person wishes to JO in the bed room, he should be allowed, but NOT in public view.
what 2 consenting adults DO, is up to them ONLY. If one wishes to QUIT, they can QUIT.
One persons PERSONAL opinion MEANS nothing, in the group. except to be listened to.
An ASS is an ASS, no matter the COLOR, RACE, RELIGION, COUNTRY, BELIEFS, or missed childhood.
and an idiot CAN have a good idea, once in awhile.
Just because someone SAYS TO DO IT THIS WAY, doesnt compare to looking aorund and seeing what OTHERS have done, and what WORKED. Look at our freeways, and ask how many MULTIPLE-HANDICAPPED BLIND DEAF DUMB RETARD… people it took to make it happen. Insted of looking to OTHER states to figure out IT DONT work that well.
First things to teach a child..
Listen to your parents. It might save your life.
as you get older, you DECIDE if your parents were Correct.
IF’ you make the mistake…YOU LIVE WITH IT.
Society, SHOULD NEVER Judge a person on his mistakes. AS an OPEN book…Society is the WORST.
#64 Misanthropic Scott said:
* I have no environmentalist candidates.
* I have no liberal or progressive candidates.
* I have no atheist candidates.
I do appreciate the parliamentary system. It ain’t perfect either but I have a slate of candidates which would fill all the categories above along with strongly conservative candidates.
Interestingly our Green candidate got 11% of the vote in the last federal election in oil crazy Calgary.
You’re also about to see a real strength of the British parliamentary system. Our PM is about to dissolve parliament and a full federal election will be called. I betcha we will go the polls in six weeks which means we’ll be done before you guys are.
I think there are so many problems in the US system since you are basically in election mode all the time. That costs a whole swack of money and means that lobbyists are special interest groups of all types spend their lives raising money for both political parties.
BTW, I know many of you in the US see the two parties as polar opposites but they really are as different as Visa and Mastercard.
#60, Calin,
If I can’t afford any facility, one is already appointed to me by the state (the local E.R. has to treat you).
Wrong. An ER only has to stabilize you. They don’t have to treat you if you are not in danger.
And the Democraps are trying to ban those.
Tobacco is a dirty, filthy, smelly, deadly habit. It has no redeeming value. I am unaware that anyone wants to ban alcohol or caffeine. Please supply some references.
Or the same ones that are trying to ban foods that might make you fat?
Several drugs have been banned that provided less danger than these over salted, high fat foods. Why should we allow outlets to sell dangerous food when we know safe food is fully available?
Or the same ones that tried to dictate to the music industry?
That would be mostly Republicans. Ted Stevens anyone?
Remember Dee Schneider telling Al Gore his wife was looking for bondage?
Dee Schneider is a effen waste of oxygen. Much like you. I have no idea what your point is here.
I am officially afraid to say what I really think about all of this.
What about massively addictive drugs? You mean like alcohol or caffeine or maybe tobacco.
OhForTheLoveOf said, on September 2nd, 2008 at 11:16 am #28 – A recreational” meth user????
Huh?
There is probebly more of those the you will ever imagine. Probebly working right next to you.
#65 – deowll,
Drug use in the work place in and around cars and many other places is a safety issue.
If you are clearly endangering the lives and property of others then the public has the right to act to protect itself.
Just as drunk driving is a crime, driving under the influence of other mind altering drugs would have to be. Just as drinking in the workplace is discouraged, so too would drug use.
The same rules would then apply for all drugs.
To see my more detailed opinion on it, which would be way too long for a reply on this topic, please go to Let’s Win the War on Drug Lords. I address many additional issues there, including advertising, vice taxes, drug rehab programs, etc.
#67 – QB,
Excellent points. Unfortunately, we didn’t follow that system. As for D vs R, I’d say MasterCard and American Express. Both parties are bought, but by very different interests.
In the U.S., I vote for the candidate beholden to the most people with whom I agree. I then hope like hell for an honest politician, one who stays bought.* Then I wash my hands to clean the psychological filth of having voted for scum.
* A partial quote from Heinlein.
The question of when government should be allowed to intervene in private affairs is probably the oldest question about government. In a way, it’s the essential question; after all, what else _is_ government than interference in people’s lives? Where do we draw the line? What is allowed and what is not? Should government be able to raise armies and navies and send their own people in harm’s way (and at the same time put other people in the same harm’s way)?
One of the most widely accepted criteria (after defense of the nation) is that the government should act against public harm. If someone is selling food (medicine, cars, whatever) that is killing people, we should make them stop! This has led to regulation of food and drugs, consumer protection laws, traffic safety laws and so on and so forth.
As one of the favorite pastimes of humans is to push things to their logical conclusion and beyond, the concept of protection from public harm has grown to include protection of public order, and public order has been stretched to include, or rather exclude, some lifestyle choices. If a certain drug is so addictive that it tends to make its users turn to theft, burglary and robbery, a good argument can be made for strongly regulating if not outright banning that drug and its manufacture, sale and possession. But what of a drug that merely tends to make its users lazy and not live up to their full potential? Shall we have a “Get a job or go to jail” law? How about a “Get a _better_ job or go to jail” law? How big a stretch is it from that to “Go to college and get a 2.5 GPA or better, graduate and get a job making $50 000 a year or more or go to jail” law? (Some would say that is a de facto law in our society.)
As humans, we’ve been arguing about these things since we evolved speech. Things go one way, then the other, movements arise, leading to counter-movements and so on and so forth. Most people just want to be left alone enough to raise their families and live in peace, so in the interest of minimizing unrest, some kind of balance is usually struck. Long-lasting societies tend to find a way to make it a dynamic balance, capable of changing as circumstances change.
What concerns me is that over the last 25 or 30 years, groups that tend to be repressive, narrow-minded and mostly fundamentalist religion-based have come to the fore world-wide, so much so that they seem to have support well beyond what their membership is capable of. What really chills me about this is that Robert A. Heinlein predicted this in his “Future History” outline…
I will only say this about the whole Palin/pregnancy thing: the best sex ed class (assuming the goal is to minimize broken hearts and lives, teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases) is one in which a counselor and the girls discuss and debunk in detail the top 25 or so lines guys use (“If you _really_ loved me you would…”), and the guys are taught in no uncertain terms that no means NO! Actual studies have shown this works. If the goal is to teach health or biology, what is taught should be up to the professional pedagogues.
72–Uncle==nice pedagogical review, but you started off on the wrong foot. You say: “The question of when government should be allowed to intervene in private affairs is probably the oldest question about government.”
Its not a question of “when,” rather its a question of whether the government should interfere with personal freedom or not. Saying when grants the government the right to do that.
What I don’t understand is how we can have such a perfect experiment in this called PROHIBITION against liquor and find and agree to the great majority that the harm of police action to prevent personal injury just isn’t worth it. WHY is that lesson not applied to all the other vices?
I’m not interested in the “politicians make money from illegal drugs” but am interested in the people that would not make booze illegal because they have learned about prohibition, but still want to apply the concept to drugs. Usually I hear because drugs are worse than booze but that so often is not true, but even if true, doesn’t change the lessons learned.
So I say government keeping its police power out of private lives should be our constant goal. That means other people will be doing things I don’t agree with, and vice/versa. Such is Freedom!
Wrong. An ER only has to stabilize you. They don’t have to treat you if you are not in danger.Then your county health department has doctors on staff to treat your needs. Likewise, it you can’t afford medical care, chances are you qualify for Medicaid.
Tobacco is a dirty, filthy, smelly, deadly habit. It has no redeeming value. I am unaware that anyone wants to ban alcohol or caffeine. Please supply some references.So, it’s the government’s job to save you from yourself in the case of tobacco….but not pot or x?
Several drugs have been banned that provided less danger than these over salted, high fat foods. Why should we allow outlets to sell dangerous food when we know safe food is fully available?Again, it’s the governments place to dictate to me my food choices? Why, if I cook pork fat in my house and eat it raw…what business is that of the government? That’s no different than telling me I can’t masturbate.
That would be mostly Republicans. Ted Stevens anyone?…Dee Schneider is a effen waste of oxygen. Much like you. I have no idea what your point is here. That would mean you’re too young to remember the events. The PMRC was headed up by Tipper Gore…far from a Republican. Let’s not forget Hillary’s attempts to censor video games. Right, this is a Republican cause too.
Sadly neither of the major 2 parties are willing to give up whatever control they can.
I figure if we can reduce the taxes that go into the government, we can reduce the services offered by the government, and thusly have them focus on the issues that are most important.