fpb | (no subject)

British media, including the supposedly conservative ones, are supporting Obama and (especially) hounding Sarah Palin, with a ferocity unknown even to their American counterparts, and looking more like the Daily Kos than anything, so to speak, human. This is appalling in itself, and may well end up being disastrous if by any chance McCain and Palin win. These creatures are planting poisonous ideas in the average British reader, which will take decades to weed away. And incidentally, it does nothing to disprove my view that at the roots of all serious modern political conflict in the West there is abortion; for the British media and establishment, including the so-called conservatives, are completely sold on the practice, and anti-abortion forces are marginalized to an extent unknown and hard to believe in Italy or America. This goes back a long time - Margaret Thatcher always voted in favour of abortion. Now, Sarah Palin, simply by being who she is, is a living rebuke to all the abortion-is-necessary crowd; and this explains the ferocious hatred and the avalanche of pathological lies with which this attractive, polite, competent female politician has been welcomed. Find me another explanation that makes sense! It also accounts for the complete silence that has been enforced on anything that might make Obama, the most pro-abortion candidate in history, look bad or even moderately dubious. It is not about race; if Judge Clarence Thomas were running for President, he would be treated like Palin has been. It is not even about party; if Condoleeza Rice had run and got the Republican nomination, you can bet your life that she would have had a much smoother ride than Palin. She, after all, has no children. You cannot underrate the power of repressed and concealed guilt feelings, crawling under the skin of all the career women who got rid of unwanted babies in order to please bosses and boyfriends, and indeed among all the men who were complicit in their crimes or even demanded them; when faced with a brilliantly successful career woman who not only had five children, but opted against aborting even the disabled one. (I don't suppose it helps that she is beautiful and looks ten years younger than her age. The sheer unfairness of the distribution of beauty is salt on any open wound, and the wound in question is painful enough in the first place.) Sarah Palin is a mirror who tells them the truth about themselves; and it is a truth that they cannot bear to see.

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Well, go on trusting it, then. Meanwhile, I am tired of this nonsense and declare this thread closed. You are welcome to insert any comment you think proper on your own blog, but mine will not receive them.

Pres. Bush's judicial choices (barring the Meiers debacle, which boggles the mind) are all stout respecters of the constitution, having no truck with penumbras and emmanations.

So long as an unlimited right to an abortion, even a very late term one (which is an atrocity) is enshrined by the U.S. Constitution, no politican of any party can pass a law banning it.

To the extent that Republican governors and Presidents continue to propose judges who respect the U.S. Constitution, the Republican Party can be said to be "owned" by the far-right (i.e. the anti-abortion rights crowd). Because only then can Roe v. Wade be successfuly challenged by a Republican lawmaker.

To my shame, I am more exercised by the mutilation of our Constitution than I am by the culture of death. But there you are.

I am sorry, but I declared this thread closed. And while your response certainly does not displease me, I have to have one law for everyone. Please do not post on this subject again.

Perhaps they are reading the post as a kind of Bulverism? As if you had written "you are only saying "X" [that Gov. Palin's character flaws, moral failings, and areas of incompetence are not nearly as egregious as her myriad detractors claim] because you have "Y" personal flaw.

If so, they're right to ignore the "Y" [the guilt over and lust for the power of infanticide] and stick to the claim of fact: Governor Palin is every bit as vile as her detractors claim.

But since it would be hard to compare being tempted by one's family ties into using your power to fire a man who is thoroughly deserving of being fired (even if no-one you knew had ever crossed his path); or making two or three poor appointments out of dozens, (which you then correct, when it becomes clear you erred) to the record of nearly every other U.S. Governor; Republican or Democrat... it's clear that, indeed, something is warping the perspective and the judgments of those calumniators. Unfortunately, in addition to having this modest perspective drummed out of any news anyone is likely to have consumed (most newspapers, magazines and television) there are very many people who believe that having certain policy positions (anti-abortion, pro-gun rights, etc.) automatically makes the holder thereof a person of egregious character, probably both hateful and stupid.

Thus your post would appear to have discovered what "Y" is, and is enlightening, and worthy of being addressed on it's own merits, is very unlikely to be appreciated by anyone at all--!

Since you think the report is untrustworthy, I'm curious what inaccuracies or spurious claims you found in the report when you read it.

I do not accept the police investigating itself, on principle. Anyone who accepts it is a moron. End of discussion. And if you insist, just study the events about the murder of Jean Chafles de Menezes.

*shrug* Suit yourself.

Fine. There's someone out there with a bridge for you to buy, too.

Poking my nose into an old discussion. I'm curious on the research on bonding- I'd thought that it had been concluded that it depended on the age of the child - if newborn the bonding could be equivalent, over six months there would most likely be problems.

I fully agree that there are strong benefits to an open adoption where the adoptive and natural families maintain contact with each other.

An maternal aunt&uncle of mine have adopted two children (one private at birth and one through Canada's Children's aid at about three years of age) and the extended family has done it's best to maintain at least some degree of contact to both natural families (save for the birth mother convicted of child abuse). The main consequence seems to have been a larger safety net for the one cousin during his rocky teen years.

Research in these fields is a strange beast. My understanding is that the child knows its parents, especially its mother, pretty much from birth, which suggests that any bonding that takes place - and I do not underrate the bonding between adopted parents and children, which has often proved a strong and enduring one - is still going to lack one element. And then there is the phenomenon of genetically controlled sexual attraction. People separated at birth ought, according to the presuppositions that underlie current adoption laws, to be as strangers to each other. However, experience shows that they are not: they ofte develop a violent attraction to each other which as often as not turns sexual. Whatever this means, it does not mean that family links are only a matter of nurture and can be altered at will. With respect to the case you mention, of course children ought to be taken away from proven child abusers. But that something is necessary does not mean that it will be easy or pain-free. I do not really want to get into this in detail, but I have very good reason to say that a natural bond exists even with an abusive parent.

Incidentally, thanks for the courteous and thoughtful tone in which you picked up a fairly incendiary subject.

I agree that even when it's necessary to severe the child from their natural family due to abusive parents it's not easy or pain free, quite the opposite- there's a reason why it was that cousin who had a particularly rocky time of it during his teen years. At least he was able to maintain some contact with his paternal relatives(his natural parents weren't together at the time of the abuse).

I'd read about genetically controlled sexual attraction but not thought about it's implications on bonding. I admit I've thought more about the inverse - children who are raised together from a very early age rarely form sexual bonds even when they are not actually related (such as in Isreali communes). The interaction of nature and nuture does have strange results sometimes.

Your opinions match mine fairly well so it was easy to be courteous.

Now if I was discussing the state of the children's aid and fostering system where I grew up ...... but I'll save you the rant.

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