Obama's positon is as radical as one can get: he opposed protecting viable infants that survive an abortion. He is the sole senator to speak against the Born Alive Infants Protection Act.
From National Review Online:
"Here is what Obama said on the Senate floor that day in opposition to the bill [Born Alive Infants Protection Act]:'There was some suggestion that we might be able to craft something that might meet constitutional muster with respect to caring for fetuses or children who were delivered in this fashion. Unfortunately, this bill goes a little bit further, and so … this is probably not going to survive constitutional scrutiny. Number one, whenever we define a pre-viable fetus as a person that is protected by the equal protection clause or other elements in the Constitution, what we’re really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a — a child, a nine-month-old — child that was delivered to term. That determination, then, essentially, if it was accepted by a court, would forbid abortions to take place. I mean, it — it would essentially bar abortions, because the equal protection clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an antiabortion statute.'The absurd conclusion of Obama’s argument is hard to miss. He implies that “pre-viable” babies born prematurely, even without abortions, are somehow less “persons” than are babies who undergo nine months’ gestation before birth. "
Obama is denying that a living, independent (not attached to an umbilical), human being is a person, just because that might interfere with abortions. This should factor into the fight against him, but the Republicans have also slouched into the abortion arena, and if Leiberman is selected to run for Veep, the differences between the two parties will be in degree, not in substance. The two party system is not just flawed, it is potentially lethal to the survival of the nation.
Addendum:
For Obama, the conclusion that abortion is a Right overwhelms the idea that life is a Right. As NRO points out, the conclusion drives all the premises, a classical example of rationalization. If abortion is an inalienable right, then it trumps the infant's right to live. As an inalienable right, abortion becomes holy. And it negates the concept of rights derived from a deity.
Obama is therefore an Atheist, a person for whom ethics is relative only to obtaining the objective. His Christianity is a lie. And Atheists can and should criticise false "Christians" like Obama.
4 comments:
As an atheist, I am a pro-choice anti-abortionist. What does that make me, besides confused?
From what I can surmise, the christian stance on abortion has little to do with what the bible says, and more to do with what christians believe (as a result of what they have been taught in church by their ministers).
Actually abortion is one of the non-sequiturs within atheism that started me on my pursuit of logic, and rational thought.
There is no rational manner in which a fertilized egg can be called non-human; every human began this way, it is not possible to be a human without passing through this stage of human development. Even as an atheist, this was obvious to me. But virtually all atheists are also pro-abortion, leaving the rationality of atheism in serious question.
I hope you pursue the concepts of logic in your chase for belief. I found that it required a personal rigor and commitment to intellectual integrity far beyond the bounds of atheism. Atheism is too simple and self-indugent; truth is more demanding.
Good luck.
Stan - There is no rational manner in which a fertilized egg can be called non-human; every human began this way, it is not possible to be a human without passing through this stage of human development. Even as an atheist, this was obvious to me.
I don't disagree.
Stan - But virtually all atheists are also pro-abortion,...
Are atheists pro abortion or pro choice, like me? Do you see the difference? We live in a society where we have to interact with each other.
...leaving the rationality of atheism in serious question.
I think you are wrong, that virtually all atheists are pro abortion, but rather pro choice, therefore, rescuing the rationality of atheism from the land of serious question.
Stan - I hope you pursue the concepts of logic in your chase for belief.
I am sure you are serious, but please inform me as to why your God would require me to "pursue the concepts of logic" before believing?
You do know that for the vast majority of bible believers, logic played no role in their becoming believers. Emotions were almost exclusively at fault.
Stan - I found that it required a personal rigor and commitment to intellectual integrity far beyond the bounds of atheism.
Funny. Atheism rescued me from (what I compared Christianity to) the leg irons in the hold of a 17th century slave ship. My faith in the God of the bible made me pretty miserable for 25 years. I didn't even know non belief was an option.
Stan - Atheism is too simple and self-indugent...
Simple, I agree. There is nothing complicated about just plain old non belief.
...truth is more demanding.
Truth demands nothing, as evidence, I submit millions and millions of religious believers the world over.
[I wrote a lengthy comment here which disappeared forever, so I will try again.]
Bob, Thanks for your measured response, it is unusual for an atheist commenter. I appreciate that.
As for pro-choice not being pro-abortion, that is - in my estimation - a dodge in the following sense: I claim to be "Not A", yet I support "A"; this is not a logically sustainable postition.
But that position is weak and now the claim is that abortion comes under a "woman's right to privacy". Of course, if a man has similar rights to do any and everything under the cloak of privacy, then no social construct can stand against it. The proposition is absurd, yet it is said to be truth.
You say,
"We live in a society where we have to interact with each other"
Are there no limits to that which we will compromise? Is compromising one's concept of truth an expectation? Will Muslim Sharia be allowed just to allow us to interact? Are honor killings where a woman who is raped is then beheaded to restore honor to the husband?
If there is no truth as you imply, then there is no conscience and no need for conscience-borne social expectations. Then Nietzscheanism kicks in, and "Will to Power" rules.
As for your concept, "Truth demands nothing, as evidence, I submit millions and millions of religious believers the world over,"
while you seem to reject "truth" as a concept, I think what you might really be rejecting is ecclesiasticism, its false claims, its implied power, its hypocrisies, its attempts at complete control through guilt and otherwise. I reject that also; it is not a reason to reject truth, however.
Please consider this: If it is true that I exist, then truth exists. The idea that it is false that I exist is absurd. Moreover, one can either accept or reject that the first principles are true. If one rejects the truth of the first principles, then all rational existence is denied at the same time, including the discernment faculty inherent in humans. If this were the case, only gibberish would emanate from my keyboard - not to mention my mouth - and rationality would not exist. I find this to be absurd. So the first principles must be what they appear to be: true. And so truth, again, must exist.
If truth exists, is atheism "Truth"? Atheism is of necessity Materialist. And it usually claims the materialism of empiricism as the source for its validity.
But empiricism is not Philosophically Materialist, it is voluntarily functional materialist. In other words, it chooses to limit its activities to material things that it can measure. Empiricism does not limit the concept of reality to a material reality. Empiricism produces contingent "facts" regarding material phenomena. It does not produce, or pretend to produce "truth". It cannot produce logic, math, rational laws of nature. In fact it requires these things to exist "a priori", and uses a knowledge of them to go further down the material knowledge road. empiricism is not atheist, it is agnostic at the most, and oblivious at the norm. Science is not atheist, and atheism is not science.
So if truth exists, and it is not material, and atheism / materialism is not truth, then what and where is truth? This is the problem to be pursued. If you cannot bring yourself to believe that truth exists, then you will very likely have a problem developing a consistent worldview.
I came to believe that truth exists, that I can understand it and its source (at least to a degree), that the pursuit of truth is very important to my worldview, that such a pursuit requires the utmost rigor and intellectual honesty... and requires setting aside all previous bias, prejudice, pre-assumed axioms, and presumed "truths", including whatever my current beliefs are. so in that sense, I adopted a new worldview: pursuit of truth, regardless of the consequences, and regardless of the beliefs of those around me who previously influenced me.
Again,
"Truth demands nothing, as evidence, I submit millions and millions of religious believers the world over."
This is just not the case; truth requires self-discipline in the highest degree; focus; commitment; rigor... and plenty of intellectual mistakes to be corrected. It requires "going it alone" on an intellectual journey, focused on just one thing: truth. Truth is by definition exclusive. It excludes falsity in all its modes, guises, and popular deceptions. It's quite a ride.
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