If being pro-live would be the source for that, it should apply in every society. But the reality is the other way around. Dumb people follow some form of explicit or implicit authority, and in the US it happens to be, that this authorities, which are used to replace own thinking, are pro-live.
And I would be perfectly happy with an non-interventionist not understanding how to assess consequences person in charge of the biggest war machine in history, while some warmonger, who understands how to assess consequences, but doesn't care about human lives in general, would be really troubling. Actually I doubt the assessment of the consequences of a significant military action is seriously possible.
If you need to use Palin's personal family story, in which I can't see anything bad, to portray Palin's incompetence as president, then you haven't much. Luckily Obama is better than that. Actually his attitude has impressed me so much in the last days, that I have a new signiture: Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
You don't get it, do you? It's all about Abstinence-Only Sex Education which the US has been pushing on the rest of the world.
In 2004, U.S. President George W. Bush announced his Five-Year Global HIV/AIDS Strategy. Also known as The President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), the plan committed the U.S. to provide $15 billion over five years towards AIDS relief in 15 countries in Africa and the Caribbean, and in Vietnam. About 20 percent of the funding, or $3 billion over five years, was allocated for prevention. The program required that, starting in fiscal year 2006, one-third of prevention funding be earmarked specifically for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. Global AIDS prevention advocates have criticized the funding restriction, and in 2006 a report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) also criticized the earmark, outlined the challenges that the funding restriction posed to countries hardest hit by the AIDS epidemic, and urged Congress to reconsider how this funding should be spent. A Congressionally authorized three-year evaluation of PEPFAR by the non-partisan Institute of Medicine in 2007 also criticized the earmark. In preparation for PEPFAR's reauthorization, bills have been introduced in both houses of Congress that would drop the earmark
However, Palin's daughter hasn't HIV, she has a baby. What the hell is wrong with that? Babys are good. Planned or unplanned, a baby is always good. You can bring up the inefficiency of Abstinence-Only education to fight AIDS, you can ridicule the American obsession with sex references and education any time. But it is not decent, to do that with using existing babys. You imply that this baby is a problem. It isn't. It's just a baby. Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
I'm not fully sure what Abstinence-Only, really means as sex education. Seems to me not very, uhmm, educated. However, Palin's daughter hasn't HIV, she has a baby. What the hell is wrong with that? Babys are good. Planned or unplanned, a baby is always good.
However, Palin's daughter hasn't HIV, she has a baby. What the hell is wrong with that? Babys are good. Planned or unplanned, a baby is always good.
Or so the theory goes.
The Palins provide a poster case for the failure of Abstinence-only sex education to prevent unplanned teenage pregnancy. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
Well, but they don't provide a poster case for the negative consequences on live quality an unplanned baby can have.
And now you are using the girl, Bristol Palin, not Sarah Palin, for a political purpose. You portray a major decision of her live as a failing. Whatever you think about this case being poster case for whatever, this is simply bad style. Sure, what you are doing may be common, on, uhmm, fox news... Nothing else I'm saying. Is that the way politics is discussed in Spain or UK? Would be disappointed to hear that. Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
I didn't say anything negative about the decision to carry the pregnancy to term. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
No, abstinence is the strategy advocated by her mother.
Which is the strategy being criticised here.
You could claim that the daughter is just a rebellious teenager and the mother's strategy is still the best, if you really wanted. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
The abuse of family members, especially of children, of political opponents for political gain is something, which I condemn. And it is not something which is excusable by say people from the other party are doing this, too. Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
No, you have to pick one explicit, underaged girl, who is not asked, if she wants to be picked by you as an example. Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
Also, it is the mother who is being criticised, showing her methods didn't produce what she's claiming to achieve ; I don't give a damn about her daughter, beyond wishing her happiness. I hope she was informed enough about the consequences of sex. And that the shotgun wedding isn't due to her mother's decision to run for VP. Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères
Frankly, I think this insane. Maybe they do it for easier fact checking possibilities, but it is insane. Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
Another point : I think it makes Palin look even worse, that she accepted McCain's proposition, knowing the kind of scrutiny it would put on her family, and what it would do to her kid daughter. Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères
You conflate American statistics and my purely German experience.
You don't have a purely German experience. You have a European experience where the authoritarian Catholic church collided with secular social democracy in a series of battles which lasted centuries, and eventually social democracy won - at least for the moment.
In other countries - especially in Africa - that battle is still being fought, and the results are as predicted. I.e. lives are laid waste to, and the consequences are even more horrific than they are in the US.
Martin:
Dumb people follow some form of explicit or implicit authority, and in the US it happens to be, that this authorities, which are used to replace own thinking, are pro-live.
Pro-life authorities in the rest of the world aren't known for encouraging independent thought.
Can you name a pro-life organisation anywhere in the world which supports original scientific and philosophical enquiry and doesn't operate from a 'Because I said so' moral foundation?
Quibble here but that's not completely true in areas where Catholics weren't the majority. Witness the rather different nature of the Catholic political movement in Bavaria and the Rhineland during the Kaiserreich and Weimar.
Of course the only pro-live organisations I'm aware of, the churches in Germany, do support original scientific and philosophical enquiry in nearly every fields. Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
