I wanted to discuss the abortion question with Rep. Erik Paulsen, but he refuses dialogue under any circumstances, still. Since Paulsen won't disclose his opinions to me, how might I find someone with similar viewpoints, whose opinions likely mirror those of the shy candidate? It occurred to me: Find a Republican state representative whose district lies within CD3 and whose Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life (hereafter MCCL) rating is the same as Paulsen's.
In short, Rep. Steve Smith (R-Mound) seems the ideal Paulsen stand-in on matters relating to abortion. If you average out Smith's MCCL rating, you find that over the past six years, he's agreed with MCCL 98% of the time. So he's nearly as pro-life as Erik Paulsen, who MCCL gives 100% for each of the last six years. I wanted to learn what pro-lifers really want.
If you seriously believe that embryos = babies, then the implication is inescapable: Abortion = murder. If you believe that abortion = murder, you would be rational to seek to expand the existing anti-homicide statute to include people who perform or seek out abortions. Okay so far?
In chatting with the charming, smart Rep. Steve Smith, I asked if people of his point of view would be made happier were Minnesota's statutes expanded to cover abortion under existing anti-homicide laws. Rep. Smith said that yes, this would represent an improvement over the existing legal situation. 'And then allow the courts to enforce it,' he quipped.
Try to imagine that you seriously believe both that 'embryos are babies' and its corollary, 'abortion is murder.' So you want the state to treat abortion precisely as it treats ax murder. I would like to explore this with Erik Paulsen: What if your side won, and abortion was covered under existing anti-homicide statutes? Here's the hypothetical:
After your law has been enacted, a woman gets pregnant, decides she would prefer not to be pregnant and goes to an illegal abortion clinic for you-know-what. In other words, the woman has voluntarily, premeditatedly entered the clinic with the goal of having an abortion. The abortionist has voluntarily, premeditatedly come to the clinic to perform the abortion. It would seem unusual to me--assuming a democratic majority had included abortion within the existing law proscribing murder--to consider one party more culpable than the other. Indeed, one party has considerably greater ability to prevent a voluntary induced abortion from occurring: the pregnant woman. (If the abortionist refuses, the pregnant woman can go elsewhere.)
So you might be interested to learn that MCCL views the matter quite counterintuitively. Scott Fischbach, MCCL's Executive Director, emailed me saying, 'We...do not believe that women undergoing an abortion are criminals, but rather, they are victims. It is the actual abortionists that are killing the innocent unborn child and it is the abortionists that should be stopped by law.'
Why do you think MCCL, which says it believes non-hypothetically that abortion = murder, would prefer the law to treat the abortionist as the murderer and the woman voluntarily choosing to undergo the abortion as a victim? There's a rather obvious answer to this: MCCL doesn't believe women are psychologically equipped to be full citizens.
Today I tried to find more information about the misuse of public property which the City of Edina has now acknowledged took place at the CD3 GOP convention in Bloomington on Saturday. Who at the Republican Party requested the use of the vests? The City of Edina says that Linda Presthus was the person who secured the public property for unauthorized use. I'm not a lawyer...does anyone know whether that's against the law?
3 comments:
You are right you are not a lawyer but you might want to consult one about taking unwanted pictures of citizens, like Jerry Paar. I am surprised that you are so concerned about Linda Priestus breaking laws when you do so continually by invading people's privacy.
Apparently, twice blessed is a republiCon.
I say that, because republiCons take video of EVERY EVENT THEY CAN.
So it's no surprise that they would complain when what they routinely do, is done to them.
This is but one more reason why GOP now stands for GreedOverPrinciples.
Public citizens at public events are not able to scream privacy. Period. Sorry twice blessed. If these people didn't want their photos taken they shouldn't have gone to public conventions.
Use of public property improperly is a question that should be answered. Did she lie to the City of Edina or did someone not even bother to ask and they are trying to cover their tushies when they found out what she used the vests for? Frankly, I'd probably bet on the latter. She probably didn't lie. She probably didn't have to. Most likely some Edina employee was asked and just handed them over.
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