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Post 02 Jul 2016, 12:37 pm

danivon wrote:
Doctor Fate wrote:Meanwhile, the USSC strikes down laws requiring better doctors for abortions because "right to abortion" is so "sacred."
There was a lot more to it than that. A whole load of extra pointless regulation (such as detailed and convoluted rules on how 'no Exit" signs should look) that often contradicted other ordinances and would have driven clinics to close.

Not that it is really relevant.


It is relevant. Liberals in this country are on a crusade to restrict the rights of law-abiding citizens to own guns. They also want to restrict speech.

However, they are quite certain that abortion should be unrestricted.

Explicit freedoms are being subverted; created "rights" are being protected.
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Post 02 Jul 2016, 4:25 pm

Whether it's a right of not, governments have the obligation to protect people in public spaces. In civilized countries people expect that they can go into public spaces without fear of being massacred. The increased killing power of guns and the fact that since Columbine there seems to have been a permanent lifting of whatever societal/social/imaginative restraints on people carrying out mass stranger shootings in our society means that mass shootings appear to be a recurrent threat that government has not able to counter with any degree of effectiveness. I think there are four potential responses: (1) while there is an emotional need to do something about the shootings they are still not pervasive enough to require any substantive changes in society, (2) allowing and encouraging people to carry guns into public spaces to protect themselves and others, (3) putting more armed police or at least trained armed personnel in places where people congregate in large numbers or at preparing security plans, 4) putting restrictions on the types of guns available for sale and magazines and/or restricting the sale of guns to certain groups of people (people with mental problems or not to people under 21 or who have a criminal record of violence or who have restraining orders).

Look, I'm for option four. But if it is going to cause social upheaval, then it's not worth it. I do believe that the Framers intended that the populace have access to guns to be used against an overreaching federal government, but I don't think putting reasonable restrictions on guns that would make mass shootings either less likely or harmful violates that principle, but again it's not worth social upheaval. Option 2 is a complete nightmare. A lot of gun nuts are for that and I don't care if they have been law-abiding their being armed in public threatens my piece of mind. If people are going to be armed in public then I'm going to be armed. I don't think that's progress. It seems some aspect of #3 should be implemented. Any place that draws a lot of people should draw up security plans in conjunction with their local police department. Guarding everywhere and anywhere to such rare and random events seems impossible to but at least be able to get police there on an expedited basis and think about taking modest, reasonable steps to guard against it. And option 1 is mostly where we are it and while these mass shootings are emotionally very upsetting, they are still relatively rare and random and solutions may impose more societal costs than any benefits.

As for abortion rights I think they should not be subject to the democratic process for one reason: (1) women and men are not in the same position with regard to abortion and therefore it is unfair to allow men a vote on it. Men do not have to carry a child for 9 months, they do not have to go through childbirth, they don't have to breastfeed and they are (typically) not the primary caregiver to a child. It is not fair to allow men to decide democratically a reproductive issue that uniquely confronts women.

Admittedly, the right of privacy argument is a bit fuzzy. On the other hand, try and make an argument that reproductive rights are not universal rights so that governments can regulate them. Could the government restrict a couple to one child? Could the government forcibly sterilize someone it seems not fit ("three generations of imbeciles are enough"). Should government be able to criminalize certain types of sex in private homes? Should government be able to prohibit contraception? I don't think government should have that kind of power unless that is prescribed specifically in a prescribed power or in an amendment. The analysis of how we got to a right of privacy might not be crystal clear but the underlying notion that we have power over our reproductive rights that government may not infringe is clear at least to me.