My Political Post for the Season

Nov 04, 2008 00:29


Originally published at The Mouse's Tale. You can comment here or there.

So this is how liberty dies. With thunderous applause.

Thinking about the election tomorrow, this quote jumped into my head and won’t go away. From where things stand right now, it seems almost a foregone conclusion that Barack Obama will be the next President of the United ( Read more... )

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Comments 13

nathanbp November 4 2008, 05:04:21 UTC
So, from a limited government perspective, do you honestly think that McCain would do much better?

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joshlamont November 4 2008, 05:13:22 UTC
I don't know about Rob, but I'm honestly displeased about both candidates. We're given a poor choice this election year. Better than it could have been, but by that same token, much worse than it could have been.

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countalpicola November 4 2008, 14:22:52 UTC
I do. If you look at most of what McCain wants to do, the changes he has in mind relate somehow back to selective modifications of tax policy. In general, McCain's plans work by giving selective tax benefits to groups and policies he favors. This is different in kind from what Obama proposes, which are government programs and new bureaucracy to funnel money directly to performing Obama's preferred work. Between the two, McCain's is obviously the more limited approach ( ... )

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tanetris November 4 2008, 16:33:26 UTC
Out of curiosity, from the same perspective, what do you think of the second-stringers?

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haibane_rachan November 4 2008, 20:33:46 UTC
Preach on, brother. Preach on.

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kalium November 4 2008, 22:37:41 UTC
Since when do courts belong as the "least dangerous branch"? Contentious and controversial issues routinely land in courtrooms to be resolved by judges. Segregation, anyone?

By taxing “the rich” to fund Obama’s pet projects, Obama does as most Democrats do in believing that they know better than I do what is and isn’t the right thing for me to buy.

Do I really need to go into the benefits of collective bargaining, and how it yields better prices when the purchasers cooperate?

Ayn Rand's "night watchman state" is a fantasy. It's not even an interesting one, not anymore.

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countalpicola November 5 2008, 00:11:47 UTC
> Contentious and controversial issues routinely land in courtrooms to be
> resolved by judges.

And judges routinely make the mistake of believing that they should be the ones to solve them. The catch is, most of the time, if an issue is truly contentious, it doesn't actually belong in a court.

The job of a judge is a fairly simple one. "Say what the law is." Contentious issues normally only exist when there is no law or when people believe that the law needs to be something different. In neither case will saying what the law is resolve the conflict ( ... )

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kalium November 5 2008, 00:38:44 UTC
>The job of a judge is a fairly simple one. "Say what the law is ( ... )

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countalpicola November 5 2008, 02:52:37 UTC
> lacking any anti-abortion laws, is it murder?
> Is a fetus legally considered human?

This isn't hard. In a total vacuum of abortion law, the second question doesn't matter (though the answer is "no"), and the answer to the first depends on the law.

In general, a fetus is not, and has never been, considered a person under the law. This is evidenced by the fact that, in the law, when protections are assigned to the fetus, the fetus is called out separately by name. This special handling is a strong indicator that the fetus is not included in the general definitions for the rights of and crimes against people.

As to whether or not killing a fetus is murder, well, Michigan's MCL 750.322 considers it manslaughter. That's technically different than murder (MCL 750.316, 317), but probably close enough.

> Because all of them were better than nothing

Is any decision made by a court better than no decision ( ... )

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garran November 5 2008, 17:43:33 UTC
Interestingly, you may be the only person I know who doesn't see a baffling contrast between the presidential results and the several anti-marriage acts that seem to be succeeding in various states.

-Garran

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