1973 brought a lot of things to America. That year we pulled out of Vietnam, leaving our South Vietnamese allies to face the Russian-backed North alone. Richard Nixon assured the country that he was not a crook. The World Trade Center became the tallest building in the world. The nerdier among us may mark it as the year Skylab, our first space station, was launched. Nothing that happened that year, however, had a greater impact than the Supreme Court's ruling in Roe v. Wade on January 22 that abortion was a constitutionally protected right. With that ruling state laws across the country banning abortion were struck down, fundamentally changing the nation.
The decision in Roe v. Wade is troubling for a number of issues, some of them not even related to abortion. First, the court found a right to privacy in the Constitution not recognized by any scholar of that document. Certainly the Supreme Court, beginning in 1923, had actively reinterpreted the Constitution to extend the right to liberty found in the fourteenth amendment into a general right to privacy, but the 1973 decision expanded that effort massively. Chief Justice Douglas in Griswold v. Connecticut had found a right to privacy in the “emanations” and “penumbras” of other rights actually found in the Constitution. The district court that ruled in Roe v. Wade prior to the Supreme Court found that the right to privacy was derived from the ninth amendment. Justice Blackmun, in writing his opinion in Roe v. Wade expanded that right to privacy drastically and gave it a home in the fourteenth amendment.
Each possible source of a constitutional right to privacy, however, lacks substance. The argument from “emanations” and “penumbras” is a fairly obvious attempt to read something into the Constitution the founders' did not intend. The argument from the ninth amendment is also badly off the mark. The Constitution is a limit on national, not state, government. The fact that the Constitution does not “deny or disparage” rights not specifically protected does not in any way mean that the states cannot do so. If one were to make the argument that the ninth amendment limits the states no state could pass any law that limits the rights of any individual in any way, since all rights would be protected by the ninth amendment. This is obviously absurd. The argument from the fourteenth amendment is also flawed. Although the fourteenth amendment guarantees that no state can deprive any citizen of “life, liberty, or property without due process of law,” the wording clearly intends “life, liberty, or property” to mean the three forms of punishment possible: death, imprisonment, or fine. Once again, by making the argument that liberty is intended to apply to all forms of liberty one reaches an entirely untenable conclusion.
A greater flaw in the decision's reasoning lies in the age when the unborn child begins to be partially protected. According to the decision states cannot limit abortion in any way except to protect the life of the mother until the baby would be viable if delivered. The obvious implication is that life begins at viability. This lacks even basic common sense. While the decision, based on the ability of the medical community at that time, placed the line when viability began at twenty-eight weeks today fifty to seventy percent of babies born at twenty-four weeks survive. Even at twenty-three weeks thirty-five percent survive. Basing one's definition of what life should be protected on the viability of the child outside the womb thus places life entirely at the hands of technology. Fifty years ago keeping a child born at twenty-three weeks gestation alive would have been unimaginable. Today, although difficult, it is possible. One can imagine that similar advances will occur in the next fifty years, meaning that children who, according to Roe v. Wade, could not be protected by state law now would present little problem to the medical professionals of that time. To emphasis the absurdity of viability as a measure of the beginning of protected life a thought experiment could be useful. Imagine that a device capable of maintaining fetal viability beginning at fifteen weeks gestation was invented. The inventor, being a particularly greedy fellow, refused to reveal the plans or how the complex machine could be used before he was paid. Without a demonstration no company would pay for the eccentric genius's machine, so he died without revealing the secret of his invention. Now, are the unborn children at fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, etc. weeks gestation alive in such a way that they should be protected? Should they be allowed to be protected by state law? After all, the equipment does exist to keep them alive outside the womb. On the other hand, no one is capable of actually using the equipment, so perhaps they shouldn't be protected. One could go on and imagine any number of situations in which fetal viability would be completely inadequate to mark the beginning of life.
This example, along with other objections to fetal viability as a measure of the beginning of protected life, merely highlights the problem: fetal viability has absolutely no relation to life. Arguing that an unborn child is not alive because it would not be viable outside the womb is exactly equivalent to arguing that you are not alive because you would not be viable if a maniac slammed an icepick through your head. One's future or potential state cannot, by definition, affect one's present state.
A simple rule of thumb is that if something is not considered to be characteristic of human life in adult humans it should not be considered to be the single mark of life in the unborn. That means that, since future and potential viability are not considered to be marks of humanity in the population at large, they should not be considered such in the unborn. Further, no one seriously believes that the ability to feel pain, cognizance, appearance, or the size of one's brain or other organs marks human life in the population at large, so it should not be the mark of life in the unborn. In reality, the one physical trait that is universally considered to mark a human being is the presence of a unique set of DNA. One cannot point to any other stage in the development of an unborn human when anything intrinsic to the nature of the child changes dramatically enough to warrant being considered to be the beginning of life.
Given that life logically must begin at conception, when all the information necessary for life is present, society, through government, has not only the right but also the duty to protect that right. First and foremost among government's tasks is the duty to protect life and implicit in that duty is the necessity of first defining life by the best means possible. Thus abortion is not, as many would have us believe, a private, personal choice beyond the reach of government intervention, it is, as we have seen, an attack on the most defenseless among us and as such is well within the purview of government. Even liberal Justice Blackmun admitted that if the unborn baby was a person it would “of course” be protected by the fourteenth amendment. This means that the unborn are protected by the fourteenth amendment's guarantee of equal protection of the laws, and Congress is authorized to pass appropriate legislation to enforce that protection. It is past high time that Congress and the American people shake off the Supreme Court's deadly foolishness by taking appropriate action to protect the rights of every person within the United States, born or unborn.
In the wake of the high profile shootings this year in Colorado, Oregon, and Connecticut several prominent public figures, notably New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, have claimed that stricter gun control could have solved the problem. These avid supporters of further government regulation of firearms argue that the provisions of the second amendment should be set aside in the interests of public safety. After all, some action must be taken to prevent further tragedies of this nature, and current gun laws obviously have not achieved the desired success. This view may sound reasonable, but in reality it is simplistic and ignores vital aspects of the situation.
Many respond by pointing to the fact that America has the highest rate of gun ownership of any nation on earth and has very high rates of gun related homicides (in the top ten worldwide). They argue that the link is clear: Americans have more guns, therefore Americans commit more crimes. The reality is far more complex. Although it is true that America does have higher rates of gun related homicide, it also has higher rates of homicides completely unrelated to firearm use. Americans simply commit more murders (which is partially a result of the fact that the United States groups both criminal homicides and justifiable homicides, creating an inflated number). Further, Switzerland, which requires gun ownership for all adult males and has the highest rate of firearm ownership of any developed country besides the United States, has one of the lowest rates of gun related crime and has the fourth lowest homicide rate overall. Obviously the presence or absence of guns is not the primary indicator of homicide rates (or indeed of the rate of occurrence of any crime except, possibly, sexual assault).
This fact is seen in the lack of a statistical connection between a population's ability to own guns and low rates of gun crimes. According to the United Nations Office on Gun and Crimes (2000), the top five developed countries in per capita rates of homicides are, in order of decreasing homicide rates, Estonia, Belarus, Ukraine, Barbados, and Poland. Of these Estonia, Belarus, and Barbados prohibit gun ownership entirely while Ukraine and Poland allow regulated gun ownership. No correlation is apparent in this data, a trait shared by the five countries with lowest total homicide rate. These, Hong Kong, Singapore, Switzerland, Denmark, and Ireland, are also split, with Hong Kong and Singapore prohibiting all guns and the rest allowing (Switzerland even requires) gun ownership. Further, the top five developed countries in homicide rate with firearms is similarly divided. This group, again listed in descending order of homicides, is composed of Belarus, Barbados, the United States, Slovakia, and Estonia. Belarus, Barbados, and Estonia prohibit gun ownership while the United States and Slovakia do not. Similarly, the five developed countries with the lowest rates of homicide with firearms, Hong Kong, Singapore, England and Wales, New Zealand, and Spain, are equally split, with Hong Kong and Singapore prohibiting gun ownership entirely and England and Wales, New Zealand, and Spain allowing regulated gun ownership. The same statistical trend, or more accurately, lack of a statistical trend, occurs in all other lists of homicide rates by country. This fact is telling. Not only is total homicide rate independent of the legality or illegality of firearms, the rate of homicides committed with firearms isn't even dependent on the legality or illegality of firearms. In some cases banning guns may decrease the rate of homicides with firearms and thus the total homicide rate, in others it may not. Obviously other factors besides guns are far more important here.
Less drastic attempts to limit gun ownership, for example, banning certain types of firearms, has shown itself, at best, no more effective than banning guns entirely: that is, not at all effective. In 1982 Chicago instituted a policy banning handguns outright in the city. That year approximately 45% of homicides in the city were committed with handguns. Since that time the overall murder rate in Chicago has averaged 17% lower. Unfortunately for proponents of gun control, the nationwide murder rate has averaged 25% lower and the percentage of homicides committed with handguns has risen steadily since the ban until in 2008 96% of homicides in Chicago were committed with handguns. It is patently obvious that the ban didn't work at all as intended.
- Agresti, James D. and Reid K. Smith. "Gun Control Facts" Just Facts, September 13, 2010. Revised 12/10/12. http://justfacts.com/guncontrol.asp
- “Murders (per capita; most recent) by country,” NationMaster.com, accessed July 17, 2012, http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-murders-per-capita
- “Rapes (per capita; most recent) by country,” NationMaster.com, accessed July 10, 2012, http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_rap_percap-crime-rapes-per-capita
- “Murders with firearms (most recent) by country,” NationMaster.com, accessed July 22, 2012, http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_wit_fir-crime-murders-with-firearms
Labels: Politics
Recently some voices have taken to howling in disgust at the very idea that some parents might homeschool their children. Proponents of our spectacularly unsuccessful school system argue that parents aren't just unqualified, they don't even care enough to educate their children. They paint horrific pictures of children graduating from their homeschool barely being able to read, along with other frightening things, such as children being taught—horror of horrors—the Bible as part of their daily schooling.
This fear and loathing of homeschooling is nothing new. I have heard a philosophy professor I know proclaim in class that, obviously, no one could object to mandatory public education. Homeschooling has faced fierce opposition since its reemergence in the U.S. in the '70s, '80s, and into the '90s. This, however, was not how things were intended to be. America's founders did discuss the idea of compulsory education, but they rejected it with little debate. The fact is, it is a relatively modern idea that hirelings could even come close to the level of education parents could provide, coming to the U.S. in the 1850s by way of Massachusetts.
How has our distinctively modern education system turned out? Many have noted that U.S. students are falling behind the rest of the world rapidly, particularly in science and math. This education gap is beginning to affect geopolitical situation. Countries like China and Japan, that have not experienced the same decline in science education that America has, have started to challenge and even overtake the U.S. economically. Teachers scream that the problem lies in funding, that if they were only given more money they could make it work. Unfortunately, the solution does not lie in something as simple as throwing money at the problem. We spend about as much per year on education as the next seven biggest spending countries combined. Accounting for the number of students involved, currently the U.S. spends about $7,743 per student per year. The United Kingdom sits in second at $5,834, Australia takes third with $5,766, Canada spends $5,749, and Finland rounds out the top five with $5,653. In other words, we spend a lot more per student than anyone else (133% of what the runner-up spends per student) and we produce a lesser product. In fact, there is little correlation between expenditures per student and test scores and literacy rates. Countries like Sweden, which ranks fifth in money spent per student, ranks first in literacy rates, first in math test scores, and first in science test scores, jump over the bigger spenders. Even Russia has a higher literacy rate that the U.S.! More money simply will not fix the problem.
The problem is deeply ingrained in the system itself. In the past homeschooling and similar methods were recognized as the best way to produce intelligent, well-educated people. The shift to government education was not based on quality of education, but ideology. In the U.S., public education was intended to meld immigrants into American culture. Above all else, including quality of education, it was to produce a uniform product—uniformly good, it was hoped, but uniform in any case. Nor has public education as a form of indoctrination been limited to the U.S.. Hitler and the Nazis in Germany made public schooling mandatory and cracked down on parents who attempted to educate their children at home. Hitler even went so far as to say “When an opponent declares, 'I will not come over to your side,' I calmly say, 'Your child belongs to us already... What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.'” His laws requiring public schooling were explicitly ideological in nature, an overt recognition that the hand that rocks the cradle, as the saying goes, rules the world.
All of this, however, does nothing to meet the new objections to homeschooling: that it cannot possibly provide the kind of education that the trained professionals in the public education system do. After all, homeschoolers spend on average, according to the most reliable estimates, only $500 per student per year (and I know from personal experience that it can be done for much, much less). How can underfunded and overworked parents provide a better education than well trained teachers with the massive well of deficit spending behind them? To put it bluntly, I have no idea—but they do. Homeschoolers score, on average, 30-40 percentage points higher on standardized tests than public and private schooled students. That number is nothing less than stunning. Parents, spending less than 10% what the government does, not only beat government and private schools, they beat them by an enormous margin. In a country plunging further and further into debt, this is the ultimate example of doing more with less. It is simply the best form of education, bar none.
So why do some still oppose it? Perhaps they are uniformed or unintelligent—one can never go too far wrong crediting a population with a large degree of stupidity. Remember, though, that in the past very few have supported public education to provide a better educational product. Instead, the goal has been to eliminate an unfortunate minority, one that the majority, or at least those in power, wishes would go away. Only time will tell whether the goal of those advocating public education here in America is the same.
Recent events have brought into the public eye—or rather, back into the public eye—aspects of politicians' lives which have, for much of American history, been intensely personal. In particular, Newt Gingrich, the thrice married former speaker of the house, has been questioned on his past infidelities. He, and his supporters, argue that a politician's personal life will not affect his public policy, even going so far as to label those who would bring up his actions "despicable." This, however, is far from the truth. When one begins to examine the issue in greater detail one is faced with the overwhelming truth that character does matter, and it matters a great deal.
Certainly one could arrive at a very similar conclusion merely by applying common sense to the issue. Nowhere in life do we see an occasion where someone with no character is able to behave in a moral, principled manner on a consistent basis. When it comes to character, the “truth will out.” Still, it would be pleasant to know that our common sense has not strayed from reality. History shows that it most assuredly has not.
Warren Harding was the first president known to have had an affair while in office. He had one child by his mistress, Nan Britton, and had several other affairs. The affairs were not common knowledge (the pre-Watergate press really didn't delve deeply into that sort of thing) but they demonstrated a lack of character that showed itself beyond Harding's personal life. His administration was plagued by scandal, and indeed he died just in time to avoid facing some of the consequences of his actions. Further, while in office he held poker parties at which he entertained his guests with bootleg liquor during the height of prohibition, often using whiskey only recently confiscated, and flagrantly ignoring the Constitution he had taken an oath to defend. Harding's shortcomings don't end there, but the incredible failings of those who followed him dwarf his.
To simplify the issue, remember this: every American president, to a man, who we have good evidence had an affair while in office has been a disastrous, stunning failure. In fact, the argument for worst president in American history would likely settle around that final group of four. Why would we think that a man who initiated divorce proceedings against one wife while she was hospitalized with cancer and divorced his second only after proposing to his third could possibly break the trend? That is unequivocally despicable and shows a lack of character second to none in modern American politics. Forgiveness is a wonderful thing, but forgiving and forgetting are two completely different things. To forgive is Christlike; to forget completely in a case like this, when the future of our country is on the line, is nothing short of foolish. It is not despicable, then, to mention a candidates infidelities, on the contrary, it is despicable not to.
Labels: Election 2012, Politics
In 2006 the self described watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), headed by former Democratic congressional staffer Melanie Sloan, named presidential candidate Rick Santorum on its list of the twenty most corrupt congressmen. CREW is a notoriously partisan group, however, as a look into the other members of congress named in 2006 will tell. First, CREW named twenty members of congress to its list, with five “dishonorable mentions.” Of those twenty-five, twenty-one were Republicans, including numerous Republicans who were running for reelection in hotly contested races, as Rick Santorum was. Now it's just possible that in 2006 84% of the most corrupt members of congress were Republicans, but any thinking person can see it's extremely unlikely. To understand why, then, these particular members of congress were named it would behoove us to look in more detail into each individual case.
Since Santorum was a senator in 2006, it is most efficient to look first at the senators (there were also only three senators named compared with seventeen representatives, thus it's a much smaller job).
Senator Conrad Burns (R-MT):
CREW alleged that Burns funneled money for schools on Indian reservations to the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe, a client of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. According to CREW's report, Burns on two occasions joined with Democrat senators to request that funding be given to the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe. CREW further alleged that Burns received close to $150,000 between 2004 and 2006 from Abramoff and his clients and associates, including the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe. Burns subsequently returned these donations.
Senator Bill Frist (R-TN):
Bill Frist is a physician, board-licensed in both general and thoracic surgery. He was elected to the senate in 1995 and served until 2007. During his time in congress he served as the senate majority leader from 2003 to 2007, succeeding Trent Lott. Frist gained prominence when, after two police officers were shot in capitol, he, as the closest doctor, provided medical attention to the officers and the gunman. As a medical doctor who opposed Terri Schiavo's husband's decision to remove her feeding tubes, thus allowing her to die from lack of food and water, Frist came under heavy attack from the left. Frist also stood with Rick Santorum in advancing the Partial Birth Abortion Act of 2003 and opposed exceptions for the life of the mother, since he considered abortion to be hazardous to a woman's health itself. Frist, like Burns, was rated poorly by liberal groups and highly by conservative ones.
Frist promised not to run for election after his second term, and in 2006 he kept that promise, instead throwing his support to Bob Corker, who defeated his Democrat challenger.
CREW claimed that Frist had taken out a $1.44 million loan in the name of his 1994 and 2000 campaigns to repay himself $1.2 million which he had lent to his 1994 campaign but had not been repaid. Until this point the entire matter had remained completely above board. However, in its FEC disclosure forms Frist's 2000 campaign failed to report the only—the only campaign that reported it was his by that time dormant 1994 campaign.
CREW's first allegation—that Frist violated FEC rules—is rather clear cut. The FEC found a rules violation to have occurred and Frist 2000, Inc. had to pay an $11,000 conciliation civil penalty. The case against Frist himself and Frist 2000, Inc.'s former treasurer and vice-treasurer was dismissed. Frist's alleged insider trading is also clear cut, but not in the way CREW would like it to be. Frist claimed from the start of the investigation that his action had been to avoid a conflict of interest when he advanced legislation affecting healthcare, and after an eighteen month investigation Frist was completely exonerated. His exoneration in this investigation was not enough to save his political career, and a man who had been thought to be a leading Republican presidential candidate was forced out of public life.
Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA):
Rick Santorum was elected to the senate in 1995 and served until 2007 and in the House of Representatives from 1991 to 1995. During his time in office Santorum served on the Senate Armed Services Committee and was the third ranking Republican in the senate, the first Pennsylvanian to hold such a prominent position since the 1970s. Santorum was a staunch conservative throughout his career in both houses of congress, routinely receiving high ratings from the American Conservative Union, Concerned Women for America, National Right to Life, and other conservative groups. Although Santorum served on the Armed Services Committee, he was best known for his strong conservative stand on social issues and his defense of the traditional family, attracting the ire of pro-homosexual marriage and pro-abortion activists.
In 2006 Santorum faced a tough challenge from Bob Casey, the son of the former Pennsylvania governor of the same name. Santorum trailed by fifteen points or more throughout the campaign and wasn't helped by CREW's report.
CREW accused Santorum of having his children enroll in a cyber-school paid for by the Penn Hills school district from 2001 to 2005 while he and his family lived in Virginia. Although Santorum was a legal resident of the Penn Hills district, CREW (and the district) alleged that he willfully ignored the further requirement that children enrolled in the cyber-school not only had to be legal residents of the district but also had to spend most of their time there. CREW claimed that Santorum's children had cost the district $72,000 while attending the cyber-school.
CREW also produced a long list of legislative decisions which they believed to be linked to campaign contributions. Among these was Santorum's attempt to break the National Weather Service's government-funded near-monopoly on the dissemination of weather information. CREW points to donations from the founder of AccuWeather, a private weather service, as bribes. CREW also points to donations from the U.S. Tobacco Corporation's political action committee, U.S. Team, after Santorum opposed the regulation of tobacco companies, Santorum's support of equal Medicare reimbursement for hospitals in Puerto Rico, which was followed by donations from various hospitals in Puerto Rico, and Santorum's support of a cutting edge coal-to-diesel plant in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania, which was followed by large donations from the owner of the company that would build the plant (Waste Management and Processes, Inc) and his relatives.
CREW's charge that Santorum willfully ignored residency requirements is flawed on two counts. First, CREW grossly overestimated the cost to Pennsylvania taxpayers. CREW's estimate is at the top of the spectrum of estimates, which range from $34,000 to $72,000. Even given the high cost CREW posits, the cost per student over the five years was actually only $3,600 per year—well under the national average of $8,000 to $9,000 per student per year. More importantly, in fact, the requirements for the cyber-school left it unclear whether all that was required was legal residency—in essence property taxes supporting the school district—or whether actual residency was required as well. When informed of the school district's interpretation of the matter (that actual residency was required) Santorum immediately removed his children and resumed homeschooling them. Incidentally, the ambiguity was cleared in Santorum's favor in 2005 when the residency requirement was explicitly changed to include children of elected officials who did not spend most of their time in the district but were legal residents.
CREW's allegations of taking bribes are far less believable—so little evidence was provided, in fact, that no investigation was ever conducted. In every case there is nothing to suggest the donations were not driven by a desire on the part of the donor to help a politician who stood up for them. It is the natural course of things that people will support those in government who support them—that fact alone is not evidence of a bribe.
In short, CREW took aim at three conservative senators in a move that was partisan politics at its worst. It wasn't an attack based on issues or substance, it was nothing less than libelous character assassination. The political affiliations of CREW's staff and the politicians named cast doubt on the veracity of its report, and an examination of the facts does nothing but confirm those doubts
Labels: Election 2012, Politics
Science: the word itself conjures up a plethora of images ranging from wild-eyed geniuses in lab coats scribbling esoteric ramblings in disorderly notebooks to the wild, rough world of field disciplines such as geology and biology. Science has brought incredible benefits to the world and has become firmly entrenched as the unquestioned best source of truth about the material world. At the same time, perhaps even as a result of this success, the world today has developed a particularly absurd view of science. It is held with an almost religious fervor by many to be the only method of determining truth. The vast majority of scientists, and even, I would guess, a very large percentage of the population, holds to this view, either explicitly or implicitly. While this view seems quite reasonable—science, after all, is the process of applying reason to learn about the world—it holds a fatal flaw. Science, by its very nature, can only address the physical realm. It cannot provide answers about either the existence or nature of the metaphysical realm. It cannot address any question that does not have as its answer some natural process, and those who cling to science alone for truth must simply posit, without any form of proof, that no such question can exist in the real world.
Labels: Christianity, Philosophy, Science, Theology