Life is Cheap

As anyone who has children knows, having kids is expensive, from the cradle to the altar. That's life.


Yesterday, Obama backed off his contraception mandate, at least somewhat. Religious organizations, such as hospitals and colleges, will not be required to provide contraceptive services to employees. Instead, the cost will be passed on to the insurer through a separate arrangement with the patient, though the Administration is not clear just how an insurance company is going to deal with the cost.

According to The Bergen Record (of N.J.), Obama was quoted as saying, "he spoke as a Christian who cherishes religious freedom and as a president unwilling to give up on free contraceptive care." Who is going to bell the president and inform him that he can't have it both ways?

Health insurance costs have risen dramatically precisely because of all the freebies doled out to Obama's premier constituents. Insurers must bear the cost of doctor's office and emergency room visits for every little sniffle and cough that could easily be treated by inexpensive, over-the-counter remedies. Minding sales and clipping coupons, even the poorest families could bear the cost.

Just what this "emergency" in women's reproductive health is hard to define. The Liberals would have the public believe we will be returning to the (pre-birth control pill) era of back alley abortions, rather than the nice, neat prescription option. The lower-level methods of pregnancy prevention are hardly a strain on anyone's budget. There is, of course, the old-fashioned way as well. But no one wants that anymore than they want to return to manual transmissions or roll-down windows on their cars, even though they're cheaper to maintain and repair, and eminently safer.

No, the Liberals want their electric windows and their emergency hammers, too. The Bergen Record is quick to note that the administration was not targeting houes of worship themselves, but the organizations operating under those religions: hospitals, colleges, and so forth.

"Administration officials say providing birth control is going to save money in the long run for insurers, because it's a lot cheaper than the costs of labor and delivery. They also say the government has the power to order insurers to do so under Obama's health care overhaul law.

"That may not sit well with the industry. Insurers point out that unless drug makers stop charging for pills, and doctors decide to prescribe them pro bono, birth control coverage isn't free."

Excuse moi? That's the administration's justification for providing free birth control? Because it's going to save money in terms of labor and delivery costs for insurers (notice how Obama scruples not to make the insurers the heavy here). The only real labor costs are those of paying unionized health care workers. In other words, because it's cheaper to prevent children from being born than it is to deal with them once they've arrived. You can't exactly "return to sender" the government is telling us.

That's what our world has come to. This is progress. Life is cheap, but birth control is cheaper.

Robert Attlee, Deputy Leader of the House of Commons in Great Britain during World War II, said of the Germans at the Supreme War Council in Paris, "The British people now realize the danger with which they are faced, and know that in the event of a German victory, everything they have built up will be destroyed. The Germans kill not only men, but ideas."

The same could be said of Obama and the Progressives. In throwing out the babies with the U.S. Constitution, they kill not only babies, but the idea of individual freedom and responsibility.

The Fight for Liberty

We are witnessing, in the debate over the Obamacare mandate forcing religious organizations to subsidize medical procedures and medications that are against their religious principles, a battle for freedom and liberty itself.


Obama has frequently denounced the Constitution as a “Constitution of negative liberties.” That is, to say, no liberty for the government. The Constitution is all about limiting what the government can and cannot do. Article I, Section 8 enumerates the government’s powers, and Section 10 further lists what the states cannot do, that the federal government can. Mostly, Congress’ powers are limited to coining money, laying taxes, dealing with foreign governments, and maintaining the armed forces.

That’s it. The very First Amendment forbids the government from interfering with religion. The Liberals have used the Supreme Court to twist that meaning around to allow the government to absolutely interfere with First Amendment religious rights.

Judges around the country are increasingly interfering with First Amendment rights. Glenn Beck, on his program, cited a Texas judge who went so far as to install a federal marshall at a high school ceremony with orders to arrest any student who mentioned the name “Jesus.” Not only would the student serve a harsh sentence but they would wish they’d never been born.

The bars of bureaucracy are clanging down around us. On his program, Rush Limbaugh noted that it is against the law to throw a football or a Frisbee on any Los Angeles county beach. Volleyballs only. No doubt that’s because Frisbee tossing is an individualistic sport - someone throwing a Frisbee for their pooch. Football, of course, is team oriented but much too violent.

The government is taking liberties with our liberties, taking those liberties away from us and granting that freedom to themselves. The individual, consequently, feels increasingly isolated and powerless to do anything about it. We must then resort to their tactics, gathering into collectives, like the Tea Party, ourselves, in order to protect our freedom.

That is why, however, there is no national Tea Party, per se. The Tea Parties work on a community level, and occasionally a state level, but they are largely autonomous groups. They will consult with one another certainly, and sometimes combine efforts. But no Tea Party group tells another Tea Party group what they should do.

Some of us are the ultimate non-conformists and don’t join anything at all, or remain at the fringes, gladly attending the local Tea Party meetings, but carrying on the fight for freedom in our own, small way. We don’t like anyone telling us what to do. Still, most people are naturally social and friendly and gladly combine their talents and resources to form groups to defend freedom. In fact, they love it.

This Obama mandate is a serious problem that does, indeed, extend beyond the issue of birth control and abortion. This is a threat to our fundamental First Amendment religious rights. The government is putting itself above God and that is certainly not right. The U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment not only protects our right to worship God but also protects our right not to be compelled to worship the government in His stead.

Conscientious objectors were everywhere during the Vietnam War. They fled to Canada to dodge the draft, ostensibly because they believed killing was immoral. Except, in seems, in the case of unborn babies. Now the Old Testament does speak of ‘crushing the abomination out of Israel,’ that is to say, a euphemism for aborting the illegitimate children of adulterous relationships. However, Jesus came along and fixed all that. To our modern ears, it sounds horrible when you put it that way. The draft dodgers happily stood by the biblical commandment that says, “Thou shalt not kill.”

Friends of the draft dodgers pressed for amnesty for their crime. Conscientious objectors to subsidizing abortions or birth control, or any other medical procedure which the government deems passable, such as euthanasia, may be fined and even face imprisonment. Meanwhile, Americans stand by passively, fearing to infringe upon the rights of wrathful women demanding the right to decide whether to abort their pregnancy.

Conservative pundits almost have it right when they say the issue is not about abortion or birth control, but about our First Amendment rights. Americans realize there is a difference between birth control and abortion, between right and wrong, and between First Amendment rights and reproductive rights. They know the difference between individualism and collectivism.

They just need to be reminded that when you force someone else to take on the financial obligations of your individual decision, you’ve crossed the line from individualism and collectivism, and have abrogated your right to bray about your individual liberty. You also lose your individual rights when you allow the collective to intimidate you into silence.

Speak up, America, while you still have the right to do so.

Constitutional Football

The two-minute warning has sounded and the Liberals are in the huddle.  The key to winning the game is to destroy the United States’ legal foundation – it’s Constitution.  The quarterback (Obama) tells his team the code word for the play is “irrelevance.”  The youth, meaning anyone up to the age of 35, are crucial to winning.  If the cheerleaders portray the U.S. Constitution as ancient and irrelevant, they score the winning touchdown for Communism.

As the cheerleaders go all out to encourage that team spirit, enlisting the aid even of half-time star Clint Eastwood, Supreme Court Jusitce Ruth Bader Ginsberg goes out wide for the pass – all the way to Egypt, in fact, where she tells the nascent revolutionary movement for “democracy” that they should not use the U.S. Constitution as their model for a new government.  

“I would not look to the U.S. Constitution if I were drafting a constitution in the year 2012,” she says in an interview on Al Hayat television.  “I might look at the constitution of South Africa.  That was a deliberate attempt to have a fundamental instrument of government that embraced basic human rights, have an independent judiciary.  It really is, I think a great piece of work that was done there; much more recent than the U.S. Constitution.”

Ginsburg, who was traveling during the court's break to speak with legislators and judges in Egypt as well as Tunisia, spoke to students at Cairo University, encouraging them to enjoy the opportunity to participate in the “exceptional transitional period to a real democratic state.”

Ironically, Bader attended James Madison High School, whose law program later dedicated a courtroom in her honor.   Pres. Bill Clinton nominated her to the Supreme Court on Flag Day (June 14), 1993.  She was careful to note that the U.S. was fortunate to have a constitution authored by “very wise” men even though no women were able to participate in the process and slavery still existed in the U.S.  There’s a bit of a flag on the play there; women were able to vote in the early United States.  Second First Lady Abigail Adams was very much a participatory First Lady in her husband’s career and presidency.

Bader caught the pass from Obama, who first introduced the play early in his career as a state senator.  The press ran interference for her but the judges are still examining the playback video.  A current Supreme Court justice denouncing the very Constitution she’s sworn to uphold seems like a foul.  Let us take a closer look at the preamble for the 1787 U.S. Constitution and the 1997 South African Constitution.

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

So how “irrelevant” is the 1787 Constitution?  “We the People of the United States” is certainly in keeping with modern definitions of democracy; it’s all about the people – the very first words in fact, are we the people, not we the government.  “To form a more perfect Union” indicates the Founding Fathers’ intentions to continually improve the process.  “Establish Justice” somewhat belies Ginsburg’s contention that the document does not deal with justice.  She, and the South African Constitution preamble, which we will examine directly, deals with something called “social justice.”  “Insure domestic tranquility” is 18^th Century for “peace.”  Yes, with today’s lower educational standards, modern citizen might not recognize “tranquility” as a synonym for “peace.”  “Peace” is a monsyllable word whereas “tranquility” contains four syllables.  Team Obama scores some points there.

“Provide for the common defence.”  First of all, the Founders used the antiquated British spelling of defence.  Gee, were we trying to split with Great Britain or not?  Well, eventually the word came to be spelled with an “s”.  Not matter how you spell it, defense means arms, military, weapons, wars, and march music.  War has been out of vogue since Vietnam.  In any case, the Liberals and the rest of the Communist are of all of one mind, so where is the need for conflict?  It only exists in the minds of those Constitution-quoting Conservatives.

“Promote the general Welfare.”  This phrase is not nearly specific enough.  The Liberals want more than roads and bridges in good working order.  In fact, they’d rather there were fewer roads and thus, fewer cars.  The interstate highway system was originally developed by Republican Pres. Dwight D. Eisenhower to facilitate military transportation.  Figures, coming from an Army General who led World War II.  The Liberals would like to see a more specific, binding phrase that absolutely commits the government took using all its resources to support its citizens, rather than having them depend upon an unreliable, “self-serving”, Capitalistic free marketplace for jobs.

“And secure the Blessings of Liberty.”  Liberals hate and despise freedom.  They’re not terribly fond of the word “Liberty” either.  “Liberty smacks of individualism, which certainly has no place in their notion of the modern world.  One must surrender to the good of all.  That’s probably the most hackneyed of all the phrases in the Preamble and the least relevant to a modern society.  “Most people will submit to anything for a salary.”  [Jane Eyre].  Just ask any employed worker (although they’re becoming fewer in number) and they’ll tell you just how free they feel.

Finally, there’s “our Posterity.”  Clearly, the Founding Fathers were thinking of the future.  Benjamin Franklin, in particular, had very keen insight into that future.  He knew that once the people could be bought off, the 18^th Century version of democracy would be history.  How right he was, too.  It showed great sagacity on his part.  The 99 Percent are that Posterior – er, Posterity and they don’t much care for the federated republic version of democracy.

They don’t like the idea of having representatives, nor are they enthralled with the idea that in an election, they might lose.  That’s too risky for their sensibilities.  This generation of self-gratification wants instant and satisfactory results, which can be gotten much more easily and effectively by breaking windows, beating up innocent people and burning the flag, than by ancient Parliamentary procedures and Roberts Rules of Order.

The only people who like the idea of representative government are working people, who don’t have time for anything else.  The wandering mobs of Egypt have nothing better to do with their time than to decide every issue instantly and unscientifically.  You don’t win a game by playing by someone else’s rules.  Children make up their own rules as they go along.  That’s how you win:  by writing in all the advantages for yourselves and all the disadvantages for your opponent.

The Liberals will probably take these arguments seriously and run with them.  They no more understand the definition of “sarcasm” than they do “tranquility” or only claim such things as their own right, not someone else’s.

Now let’s take a look at the South African Constitution’s Preamble:

The government’s website declares:  The Constitution is the supreme law of the land. No other law or government action can supersede the provisions of the Constitution.   South Africa’s Constitution is one of the most progressive in the world and enjoys high acclaim internationally.

Here is the actual preamble:

We, the people of South Africa,

Recognise the injustices of our past;

Honour those who suffered for justice and freedom in our land;

Respect those who have worked to build and develop our country; and

Believe that South Africa belongs to all who live in it, united in our diversity.

We therefore, through our freely elected representatives, adopt this Constitution as the supreme law of the Republic so as to :

• Heal the divisions of the past and establish a society based on democratic values, social justice and fundamental human rights;
• Lay the foundations for a democratic and open society in which government is based on the will of the people and every citizen is equally protected by law;
• Improve the quality of life of all citizens and free the potential of each person; and
• Build a united and democratic South Africa able to take its rightful place as a sovereign state in the family of nations.

May God protect our people.

Now, past the “we, the people” clause, the South African Preamble’s wording resembles, albeit vaguely, the latter portions of the U.S. Declaration of Independence than the preamble to a Constitution.

At last, the South African Constitution declares that “through our freely elected representatives, adopt this Constitution as the supreme law of the Republic, so as to…”  We’ll get to the “so as to” momentarily.  There are some words that must be kept in mind, however:  “freely elected representatives” and “law of the Republic.”  Remember, Constitution fans, a Republic is not a democracy.

Their Constitutions promises to “heal the divisions of the past.”  The details must be somewhere in the main document.  They must have some interesting remedies for that operation.  Time is usually the best healer, and a forgiving memory the best agent.  But that’s South Africa’s problem.

They then declare that they will establish a society based on democratic values, social justice and fundamental human rights.  The U.S. Constitution provided for democratic values and fundamental human rights.  Social justice, on the other hand, is indeed, a modern conception.  Just what it means is the problem to study.

Evidently, in South Africa, although apartheid was abolished, people are to be classed into separate groups and treated accordingly, based on past history, the divisions of which this Constitution claims to heal.  Social justice is to be that remedy.  Classes of people who are the successors of those who were once repressed will apparently be given the right to demand financial redress from the successors of those who once did the repressing.  This will ensure generational reparations, guaranteeing that the divisions will always be remembered, even while no longer existing, but never healed so that the delivery of social justice can continue in perpetuity.

“Lay the foundations for a democratic and open society in which government is based on the will of the people and every citizen is equally protected by law.”  Equal protection of the law had to be amended into the U.S. Constitution, it’s true; but the U.S. Constitution was designed to be amended, not always to beneficial effect or even the will of the people (i.e., Amendment 17).

Calling for a democratic and open society means that anyone can enter the country at will.  Whole hordes of strangers can cross the border.  That apparently doesn’t bother the South Africans.  How will the Egyptians feel about writing such an amendment into their Constitution; they’re about to write a prohibition of all non-Muslims into their document.  That hardly bespeaks an “open society,” tolerant, liberal, and just.

“Improving the quality of life of all citizens and freeing the potential of each person” should never have to be a point in a Constitution.  Nor should it be the job of the government.  Frequently, it is the government that disturbs its citizens’ quality of life and inhibits their potential.  The U.S. Declaration of Independence put it much better, guaranteeing everyone “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”  The Liberals would call for the ref’s decision on this one; is the Declaration a true, legal document?

Finally, there’s “Build a united and democratic South Africa able to take its rightful place as a sovereign state in the family of nations.” A noble addendum to the preamble that neither adds nor detracts from the intention of its Constitution and gives the Constitution a certain claim to international eclat.

Let’s hear it for the U.S. Constitution, freedom fans; a positive, forward-looking document that, by protecting individual rights, protects everyone.  Stand up and cheer for James Madison’s work.  Get the ball away from Obama and his team before they cross the goal line with it and shred it to pieces.

USA!  USA!  USA!

Right Actor, Wrong Message

As an art form, Chrysler’s Super Bowl Clint Eastwood ad was perfect.  A grizzily actor, fantastic production values, a moody introduction, a great build-up, plenty of Go-Team spirit, and an energetic finale, with the words, “Hear our engines roaring!”

This was a case, however, of the medium overriding the message, which was all wrong.  First, there was the technicality.  Although Detroit was supposed to be the setting – you know, “Motor City” – the bulk of the commercial was filmed in Los Angeles and New Orleans. Certainly, New Orleans was a besieged city during Hurricane Katrina, but what does that have to do with making Chrysler cars in Detroit, Mich.?

The ad tells us Detroit has pulled through because we’ve all pitched in.  Yessir, we were all standing there on April 15^th waiting to “donate” our taxpayer money to bailing out the Big Automakers, who mismanaged their companies and whose unions put them into the bankruptcy.  These are the workers we’re supposed to be take into our hearts as the emblem of American spirit?  We're all supposed to be one big, happy collective, when we should be celebrating the individual initiative and creativity that really made America great.

Many fans were annoyed with the Super Bowl game because (I’m told) it was basically a bad game until the last few minutes when the Giants threw what is called a “Hail, Mary!” pass.  They won on a gamble.  That’s the nature of football, of course.  But in American business, companies’ fortunes shouldn’t rise and fall on Hail Mary passes thrown by Big Government quarterbacks who’ve rigged the game.

Eastwood is certainly emblematic of the moderate-leaning Republicans who’ve allowed themselves to be duped into propagandizing the left-wing Liberal message:  Go for the Bailout!  Hold back the Defense!  Do your worst! Let the other guy win!  Trophies for everyone!  Get your carrot sticks here!  Fresh carrot sticks!  No beer – a bottled water and pass the weed, please!”

The score:  Government: $15 trillion.  Taxpayers:  Zip!

It’s Half-Time in America, and Madonna and her back-up singers are giving Americans the finger – and they’re laughing.  All in good fun.   We’re doing so well that the company being promoted, Chrysler, is actually owned by Italian car manufacturer Fiat.  We see the glory of the Giants, celebrating their well-earned victory at their stadium, after their ticker-tape – er, confetti parade in Lower Manhattan.  But we’re blind to the economic fiasco of Xanadu (named after the summer capital of Kublai Khan’s Yuan Dynasty before he decided to move the seat of his dynasty to the Jin Dynasty capital of Zhongdu, which he renamed Dadu, the present-day Beijing.) right next door.

Rush Limbaugh, wanting to give Eastwood, a Conservative, the benefit of the doubt, produced a parody of the commercial, inadvertently adding to the confusion.  The clip was so well done, listeners thought that was the real commercial.  If only.

Caveat voter.  Let the voter beware.

Obama is a Pill

Obama and the Liberals just don’t know when to quit.  The FDA approved the Birth Control Pill for use by married women, formally and scientifically known as the combined oral contraceptive pill (COCP), in 1965, and all women in 1972.  The Catholic Church and other Conservative religious organizations disapproved of all contraceptives, but as the Pill’s popularity grew, they still disapproved but looked the other way.

Then along came a new abortifacient drug, the Morning After Pill.  If a couple used one of the many various contraception methods and it failed, this abortifacient, RU-486 was available as an extremely early-term pregnancy abortifacient, though it could be used at any point.  Many women were relieved.  The Conservatives and their Churches were alarmed, and rightly so.

Obama has mandated that all contraceptives, in all their forms, be included in the taxpayer funded universal health care plan, as well as the abortifacient.  Make no mistake, ladies.  RU-486 is an abortifacient.  You can ease your conscience by saying that no doctor has confirmed a pregnancy, but you’re taking this drug on the assumption that you are pregnant.  Once the little sperm and the little egg meet up, wishful thinking won’t undo the truth.  Life has begun its journey.  It may not be ready for primetime, but it’s there.

As long as you understand that, what you do after that is your decision.  Whether you and your man decide to abstain, use traditional contraceptive methods (the kind you can purchase in a drug store), prescription contraceptives, permanent surgical methods (tubal ligation, etc. – men aren’t crazy about the et cetera), or go further, is between you, your man, and God.

The government would have us leave God and the man out of it.  Both are wrong.  God and the man concerned should be involved in this decision.  One party who should absolutely not be involved is the government, and when contraception becomes a legislative matter for the government, that involves the rest of us.  You’ve just invited some 250 million people into your bedroom and asked them to pay for the solution to your problems.

Obama needs to get out of our medicine cabinets and out of our bedrooms.  It’s one thing if people want to engage in family planning; it’s another thing to ask the taxpayers to foot the bill.  If you don’t want the stork on your doorstep, that’s okay.  If we adhere to Obama’s mandate, the U.S. Postal Service will be, all delivery charges paid care of your neighbors.

Most of us don’t have a problem with contraception, although not enough research has been published about how effective it really is or when or if it actually prevents a pregnancy or is apt to terminate one after it has commenced….   Maybe that’s a question we don’t want answered.  We do our best not to make mistakes.

With all those options, it’s hard to understand why, in this day and age, abortion is necessary.  That’s why people are increasingly opposed to it.  Call it by its right name – murder.  We don’t need to hear about a woman’s “right to choose” when so many earlier options were before the woman seeking an abortion.  Except in extreme cases, this hideous operation should be banned.

A ban would satisfy the wacko Pro-Lifers who bomb abortion clinics and threaten doctors.  Doctors would probably be more willing to perform the operation knowing that the patient wasn’t in his or her office for a “cosmetic” abortion.  It’s long past time we reversed Roe v. Wade.  RVW was a decision that need never have been inflicted upon our society, given that practically in the same year, the birth control pill became widely available.

The conventional Pill may not be the greatest option as far as Conservatives or Liberals are concerned.  But it is the most humane choice between two extremes, as long as the parties involved take the ethical and financial responsibility upon themselves and not burden others with it.

To Be Or Not To Be - That is the Choice

Last week, Obama took another step towards his apotheosis when he declared that private charities most provide birth control for their employees as part of their health care plans.  This especially upset the Catholic Church, which holds an immutable stance against abortion and abortifacient drugs such as RU-486, commonly known as “The Morning After Pill.”  (Too bad there isn’t a morning-after pill for sore losers of the Super Bowl, who riot in the streets because their team lost.)

The Catholic Church doesn’t believe in contraception but has looked the other way because The Pill has been so popular since its introduction in the 1960s.  Preventing a pregnancy is one thing; terminating one chemically is another, in the Church’s view.

The administration’s mandate that will force Catholic colleges, hospitals and charitable groups to cover contraceptives in the health insurance they provide for students or employees.  On the heels of this ruling comes the news that Susan Komen Foundation, which raises funds for breast cancer, has stricken Planned Parenthood from its donor list due to Congressional investigations.  The Pro-Choice movement banded together in a campaign to force Komen to apologize, which it did.

Choosing to have a family is a very personal choice.  The married woman who chooses to take The Pill should be no more guilty of sin than the woman who opts for a tubal ligation.  It’s none of anyone’s business.   The Lord wants happy families.

Still, the Church has the right of free association. It’s their club and their rules.  If you don’t like the way Catholics do things or don’t believe in their doctrine, go find another church that does.  Non-Catholics would say the Church has no business telling women whether to have children or not.  They should say the same of the government.  The government shouldn’t be telling women to have children or not have children.  But, whatever the decision, they also shouldn’t be sticking a church with a very strict pro-life doctrine with the bill for a morning-after pill, one whose purpose is without a doubt to induce abortion, albeit very early in the term and usually before a doctor can confirm a pregnancy.

The government is not supposed to make any law respecting religion, and initially, there was a conscience clause in this section of the bill.  Obama has decided to ignore it (we’re shocked – shocked to find Obama bypassing a law – his own law, at that!).  The Catholic Church and other Pro-Life organizations have every right to be upset.

Candidate Rick Santorum, an openly Christian Conservative, has taken heat for his Pro-Life stance.  Reporters have peppered with questions about whether, as President, he would ban The Pill (the traditional contraceptive pill).  Nervous moderate voters have swerved away from this otherwise perfectly viable candidate for that reason alone.  Average couples fear the heartache and  medical costs of possibly giving birth to a mentally or physically deformed child.  Not everyone is as brave (or wealthy) as Sarah Palin or Santorum and his wife. 

Yet, if we begin aborting babies for such reasons, where will the discrimination end?  We can rationalize aborting a deformed fetus.   Advanced technology has, or will have the power, to determine an unborn baby’s intelligence, physical features and any medical problems, treatable and non-treatable; doctors have been able to determine the baby’s gender for decades now.

The pro-choice door must be open to unfortunate parents and victims of rape who must make a wrenching choice.  Who will follow them through the doors remains the problem.  Callous couples seeking the ideal child (such people should not be parents at all)?  Careless teenagers whose lust was greater than their virtue or common sense?

Pro-life must have its voice, too, though.  In this day and age of The Pill, the question is beggared:  why is abortion even necessary? 300,000 abortions are performed every year on the premise that the fetus is not yet a life.  Pro-Choicers are horrified that the film, “The Silent Scream” was ever produced and vehemently protest its showing.

If life does begin at conception, it’s an inconvenient truth Pro-Choicers and most Moderates would rather not avow.  We’re not willing to err on the side of caution but rather convenience and prudence.  And to err is human.

One could go on about the social costs of that personal decision not to have children, whether by preventing through abstention, tubal ligation, The Pill, The Morning After Pill, or an abortion.  Do you notice how the choices become more dreadful the closer you come to the accepted definition of Life?  Yet millions of married women regularly take The Pill as the preferred and most convenient means of birth control.  Family sizes are smaller, and as they are reduced, so is our work force and our military, our means of defense against an increasingly tyrannical world. 

Oddly, women commonly state their desire to go to work as one of the reasons for not having more children; working is less work than raising children.  We will be like Norway in World War II, so sparsely populated that America won’t even be worth the cost of vanquishing.  No wonder they termed the American family the “nuclear family.”

Yet this is America, and freedom of choice is tantamount.  Once the government intervenes, as the Catholic Church has seen, there will be no more choices.  The same will happen, despite Liberal promises, with gay marriage.

It’s up to you how many children to have, if any at all.  Just be aware that the Liberals have traditionally regarded the traditional family as the enemy of the state. 

The Sports Jinx

I will not be watching the Super Bowl this evening. In my household, I have been officially banned from watching all professional sports. My mother invited me over for the Super Bowl today and I had to remind her of the ban.


Since elementary school, team sports and I have had a very bad relationship. I was one of those awkward, gangly kids with no coordination, or comprehension of the scoring rules, who was always picked last for any team. I was an expert dandelion counter, cast into the nether regions of the outfield where there was never a danger of any ball dropping.

It’s not exactly because I don’t enjoy sports. As long as I didn’t have to participate, I always enjoyed a rousing game of football in high school. Just as exonerated by fellow musicians in the high school band as I was by any team, I was left to myself to watch he game from the upper bleachers and paying more attention than my more social-conscious band mates, I always knew what was going on.

We had a good team that went on to the finals in my senior year. It was after that that I became afflicted by jinxitis. We’d be watching some football or baseball game on television when I began to notice that whenever I was in the room, the favored team took a nosedive. As soon as I left, they recovered.

Some years ago, when the Mets were playing in the World Series, my mother and I were at Big Brother’s house to watch the game. Luckily, we’d come in separate cars. I wasn’t at all interested in the game and wanted to go home. They were insistent that I stay, however. So I warned them that I was a jinx against the Mets; if they didn’t let me go home, the Mets would magically start losing.

They scoffed at such superstitious nonsense. So I stayed and what happened - the Mets started losing. Big Brother was in his Thirties but I thought for certain he would have a coronary. As baseball fans are wont to do, he started jumping up and down, red in the face, cursing at the television.

“I told you so,” I remarked.

“What?!” he bellowed. He looked from me to the television. The Mets were losing badly. Baseballs were rolling right between the Mets’ legs, as though they were some Little League team in their first season.

“Get out! Get out, get out, get out! Go home!” he thundered. “Get out of my house! Go home! Don’t turn on the radio on the way home and don’t even turn your TV on when you get there!!”

Not only was I allowed to leave and released from the misery of watching a game in which I had no interest, but I was actually thrown out of my brother’s home (his then-wife wasn’t at home at the time; when she found out, she was furious until I told her I wanted to go home but they wouldn’t let me go).

Telling my supervisor, he banned me from even watching the commercials. He was nice about it, but he said, “Watch the commercials on the Internet; don’t watch the game itself.”

So I agreed that I would. The game is about to start soon. I have to call Mom and Big Brother to make arrangements this week for a car ride as one of the windshield wipers broke on my car. I must call them soon, since the game will be starting in a little over an hour.



I’m going to tell them if they don’t promise to give me a ride to and from the car dealer that I’ll turn the game on tonight.