“Defensible” is not synonymous with “convincing”. Simply because you cannot be proven wrong is nowhere near proving you right. And skips blithely over the part where your nonsense gets the force of law and mine does not.
Women are not being allowed to bring tampons into the Senate Galley in Texas today. You can bring a hand gun in if you have a concealed weapons permit though. Every other section of the galley is sealed off. Troopers are harassing the pro-choice contingent. Some anti’s are being let in through the back door. Screw defensible arguments.
Officers, make sure to search all the places where they might be carrying them . . .
Good way to exclude armed liberals. 
In my view, your nonsense has the force of law more convincingly than mine: Roe v. Wade is still the controlling case.
But I accept this, because I know that we have a system for determining the law, and I am willing to work within that system, win or lose. You are willing to work within it only as long as you win.
Of course, politics no less than litigation constitutes “working within” it.
You, individually, maybe. The high number of clinic bombings, assassinations of doctors, and other crimes severely indicts your side of the issue.
If the pro-choice side had a similar record of bombing churches and assassinating outspoken pro-life pastors, you might have some kind of argument of equivalency. As it stands now, the pro-life side is the one which has shown itself more willing to go outside the rule of law.
However, yes, I do admit that if Roe were overturned, I would donate money to organizations that arranged travel for purposes of abortion for indigent women so they could take “medical vacations” to pro-choice states. This would, perhaps, be “working outside the law,” although I’d suggest that the right of an individual to travel from one state to another is constitutionally protected and that this right supercedes a state’s right to prevent its citizens from going abroad to have an abortion. I’m afraid we’d need another Supreme Court ruling on that.
I’m not sure these accusations are having the effect you want (assuming you wanted an effect other than trying to get an empty sense of superiority). Didn’t you admit as recently as yesterday that you’d support (with some misgivings that you’d over-ride) applications of the law that were “arbitrary”, “transparent” and “cynical” to get an end you’d agree with?
I wouldn’t quite call that an accepting “win or lose” attitude. More like “win, or find a loophole”.
Bricker is likely ignoring me at this point, which I guess is a self-protective measure against uncomfortable questions.
Who’s trying to work outside of the system? Protesting and the courts are most definitely part of the system.
Because, if such things as souls exist, we have no good reason to suppose that humans have them and animals have not.
Have you been cut off too, BrainGlutton? Bricked up in your chamber, as it were?
Shit. Like he can resist an argument.
For what it’s worth, Bricker once tried the “you would twist or ignore the law to get the result you want” crap on me, in that he assumed in my “liberal heart of hearts” (direct quote) that my sympathies would automatically be against police and for drug dealers because I supposedly supported drug legalization.
I destroyed him and he apologized, and I’m guessing he doesn’t want a repeat. I’d had a promise to myself not to bring it up again because it might seem gloaty and immature (and I have reason to care about my reputation, such as it is), but Bricker’s recent behaviour has prompted me to ask why I would bother to restrain myself.
I’m guessing that he’s not now likely to apologize or retract if confronted with a cogent argument that undermines his direct and implied accusations of hypocrisy - he’ll simply stop talking to that person. I suggest to anyone who finds themselves posting, say, five responses to Bricker and getting none in reply, while seeing him reply to others… you “won”, to the extent winning is possible.
If it scares him.
Yes, I said that.
I didn’t want to answer that, because I have the feeling that some of my opponents do not approach these questions with honesty. It would have easy for me to piously deny the impulse.
But you missed, or ignored, two other aspects of my admission:
- My acknowledgement that it was a weak position, likely readily upended by argument, and
- I admitted the bias and incongruity
What I object to in the conversation above is the uncritical support, without any such admissions.
So… I post a self-damaging admission about how I’d possibly support pre-textual laws, and then AFTER that, I am too ashamed to confront your searching inquiry?
[Bill Cosby]
Riiiiiiiiggght…
[/Bill Cosby]
Actually, I didn’t think the admission was self-damaging on your part, but refreshingly candid. I’d be fascinated if the Republican politicians were similarly open about their motives - “we know making a woman look at an ultrasound has no medical merit - we’re just trying to guilt her into changing her mind. Also, we know hospital-level regulations on hallway-size and such for abortion clinics is unnecessary - we’re just trying to make abortion unavailable by driving the clinics out of business.”
Anyway, if you’re responding to me now, I think I’ve written about ten posts on the issue (including one written specifically to “upend” your position) for you to catch up on, if you wish.
Meaning what, exactly?
Yeah and I see no point in continuing to have the same arguments with him over and over again. If he wants a uterus to control so much, let him grow his own. I grew three of them. What happens in any is really none of his business. If he had one and he did not, it would never occur to me to tell him what to do it in the name of my rabbi or the torah.
I honestly wish he had a few female body parts as mine have been in agony the last few days probably from endometriosis and fibroids. Maybe that would make him a little less sanctimonious and a little more grateful that women cope with the details of reproduction every single day of their lives for decades but I doubt it. I find it preposterous to sit here and listen to him discuss what pregnancy feels like or exactly how miserable one has to be to decide a woman can’t go through with it.
After my first pregnancy when I literally spent three weeks in the hospital hooked up on IV’s because I could not keep food down and pleading for pain relief because the pain was so bad and I was throwing up so much, the very fact that I dared think about ever getting pregnant again was an act of enormous bravery on some level.
I would never tell another woman to explain to me exactly how unpleasant her pregnancy and labor was. I certainly would not dream of legislating based on my thoughts about her pregnancy.
Most people in the United States do not want abortion to be illegal. You anti-abortionists need to get over it. Focus your attention on making pregnancy safer and it easier to care for babies rather than telling a woman what to do when she winds up that way.
My main argument is not with abortion, but with the anti-abortion activists’ actions. They are abomidable. Just watch the Planned Parenthood protestors and you’ll see what I mean. I’ve seen them chase women who’ve told them “no” down the street and grab them by the arms to shove literature in their hands. It’s positively revolting.
If they don’t like legal abortion, let them work to have the laws changed. But stop harassing women, chasing them down like dogs.
ETA: I actually had a “pro-life” person tell me that once a woman is pregnant, her uterus is no longer hers!