The jokes just write themselves, but the Republican Party is increasing its involvement in a crusade on behalf of 'people' who are literally without brains. And when I say 'literally,' I mean literally - I'm not using it as an intensifier, nor as a misguided substitute for 'figuratively.'
No, the GOP is fighting to give full rights of personhood to 'people' who are literally without brains.
I refer, of course, to the bills in Virginia and elsewhere that would bestow personhood on an embryonic human being from the moment a sperm cell bonks into an egg cell. (Some of you have commented on the Virginia bill in the previous thread, so you know what I'm talking about.)
Now I happen to think that at what point the onset of personhood occurs is actually the correct debate with respect to the abortion issue. I think I passed the "if I hear the question 'when does life begin' one more time, I'm gonna scream!" point about two decades ago: the newly fertilized egg is alive; it's just a stupid and irrelevant question.
The personhood debate, I should add, is a very complex debate. Is my cat a person? I've got three of them, all with very distinct personalities; if they've got clearly formed personalities, then why aren't they persons, other than not possessing homo sapiens DNA?
I'm sure the fetal personhood advocates would simply regard that DNA as a necessary condition for personhood. But it would still give rise to the question: DNA aside, at what point does a developing fetus become more of a person than my cats are? Whenever that point might be, it's surely very late in the game.
A sincere effort to debate the beginnings of personhood would get very complex, and hashing through all those complexities isn't what I have in mind for this thread. However, one part of the personhood debate should be quite simple: the locus of personhood is the brain.
I am still I under many changes to my body: amputation of limbs, heart, liver, or kidney transplants, blindness or deafness - if any of these things should happen, I am still I, though changed of course in the ways that major changes in our circumstances inevitably change us.
But scoop out my brain, and there is no more 'I', at least not in this world. No brain, no person.
Unless you're a Republican, apparently.
Because the fertilized egg doesn't have a brain. The embryonic human body has no brain at all during its first several weeks of development. And absent a brain, there is nowhere for personhood to reside - not even such personhood as a cat, or a mouse, or even a flea might have, let alone the sort of personhood we associate with fellow members of our species.
So the Republican insistence that personhood begins when sperm and egg meet is an insistence that one doesn't need a brain at all, let alone a functioning brain, to be a person.
Somehow taking a position that one literally doesn't need a brain to be a person seems quite in keeping with the nature of today's GOP, doesn't it?
Let the jokes begin.
Brains are highly overrated.
Posted by: Paula B | February 17, 2012 at 12:24 PM
Which reminds me, I really should have figured out a way to work in this golden oldie from Dan Quayle:
"What a terrible thing to have lost one's mind. Or not to have a mind at all. How true that is." -- addressing the United Negro College Fund, 5/9/89
Posted by: low-tech cyclist | February 17, 2012 at 12:54 PM
As long as the brainless have a photo ID they will be allowed -- nay, encouraged -- to vote.
Posted by: Sir Charles | February 17, 2012 at 02:54 PM
I don't see how anyone can determine the exact date/time of conception unless it occurs in a Petri dish. Will uteri be made obsolete? Will all our little persons develop -- protected from whatever it is they need protection from -- in a lab, until they're ripe? Will adults need to get licenses to procreate? The possibilities are endless.
Posted by: Paula B | February 17, 2012 at 03:04 PM
Somebody should have enlightened Rene Descartes, who may be most famous for the philosophical statement: cogito ergo sum, or in English, I think therefore I am.
Will VA, ND or OK schools replace that basis for a multitude of philosophical arguments with this one: I am when or if they say I am?
Posted by: Paula B | February 17, 2012 at 03:32 PM
Paula - you're overthinking it. They don't need to know the exact date or time of conception; as long as certain means of birth control have at least the possibility of killing one of these 'people', then it can be outlawed. That's all they care about.
But Petri dish conception does highlight the problems inherent in the whole idea. If a fertility clinic has a whole freezer full of fertilized eggs, and someone accidentally pulls the plug on the freezer, are they guilty of manslaughter? If someone grabs one of those Petri dishes and deliberately tosses it out the window, did they commit murder?
Figuratively brainless GOP legislators 'protecting' literally brainless 'people' results in brainless unlogic.
Posted by: low-tech cyclist | February 17, 2012 at 04:07 PM
"O brave new world
That has such people in't!"
Posted by: oddjob | February 17, 2012 at 04:08 PM
Think of the business opportunities -- could be a new cottage industry created in VA for installing time clocks in all the master bedrooms -- every sexual encounter to be recorded with a punch card, time and date stamped, for state purposes, to be produced in order to document each possible moment of conception. Too many time cards punched with no conception resulting -- well here come the bedroom police.
Oh I forgot. The rhythm method always works. And coitus interruptus -- that's the ticket.
These people are off their rockers. Also very seriously scary.
Posted by: nancy | February 17, 2012 at 05:12 PM
I think you're giving these folks too much credit. IMHO the opposition to birth control that is shown by most of the anti-abortion groups gives the game away. If it was really abortion they cared about, they'd be handing out contraceptives on the streets, since all the research shows that the most effective way of limiting abortions is to provide contraception. Instead, they're always looking for ways to limit access to contraception too. This is about controlling women's sexuality and punishing "slutty" women. Period.
Posted by: beckya57 | February 17, 2012 at 05:37 PM
If I were handing out one of Prup's suggested flyers today, it would be copies of this editorial, a one-pager from the newest TNR . This game is well on, but in case someone has missed that, this piece is a one-page guide to the game plan.
What's at stake of course might look like mainly a womens' issue. However, I'd like to see what your struggling-to-make-ends-meet sexually-active male would make of these plans for his and his partner's future. We're all in this together when the right to obtain and use contraception is bandied about casually by these reactionaries, some cynical, some zealots and some, as noted above, just plain witless.
Posted by: nancy | February 17, 2012 at 06:33 PM
Sorry. I always forget to add this: The editorial headline of that piece is "The Increasingly Disturbing War Against Women's Rights".
Posted by: nancy | February 17, 2012 at 06:49 PM
A very good piece, Nancy, for us to read -- particularly the part about Liberals deliberately back-burnering social issues. (Seems like somebody else has been complaining about it too, no?)
But just misses as a pamphlet -- and (grrrrr! ;-) you wouldn't be 'handing them out' merely taking them to a store that has agreed to display them for customers.
There is an extremely fine line between 'Look at what your fellow Republicans have done' and (even by implication) "look at what you've done as a Republican.' But that line has to be observed -- particularly if you insist on imputing motives to the actions.
If you accuse a person himself of waging war on women, he will probably and sincerely claim that such a thought never 'entered his mind' and will immediately ignore everything else you say. (There is a difference between describing the unavoidable results of an action and accusing someone who performs the action of desiring those results. People don't always think things through, don't, usually, act on what they see as 'unworthy motives' and resent being accused of them.)
You can show the person that 'inevitable result' but only if you treat him as innocent of desiring it -- and 'pushing off the blame' on to where it belongs, the ones who may, in fact desire a "War on Women' the 'party as a whole.'
Posted by: Prup (aka Jim Benton) | February 17, 2012 at 09:10 PM
Speaking of great pieces worth circulating -- here's one from an Arizona-based blog Rum, Romanism and Rebellion. Very personal, very powerful family testimony leading to this:
Posted by: Prup (aka Jim Benton) | February 18, 2012 at 10:58 AM
nancy and Jim,
I think that it is time for the Democrats to willingly fight the culture wars. I think we win this time around.
And Jim,
The attacks on Hispanic culture in Arizona seem to grow increasingly shrill and desperate. In the end, though, these people are making a suckers bet. They should talk to members of the Republican Party in California.
Posted by: Sir Charles | February 18, 2012 at 11:57 AM
Sir Charles:
Okay, we agree on that, obviously. Now let's try and figure out how it's going to happen.
Is President Obama going to come out swinging, defend8ing abortion as a right, attacking Republican homophobes the way he once (meaning one time) attacked homophobia among black ministers, publicly and loudly attacking Republican bigotry at stops in the 'Heartland' outside minority 'ghettoes;' or just behind closed doors at meetings of Minority Advocacy Groups?
If it were a close, hard-fought election, would he reach out to these voters -- the many minority groups in every district in the country, in every state in the country? Or would he continue the habit of taking them for granted, even then. And this year, when his re-election is all but assured, barring some unforeseen and unplannable for disaster, will he 'fight harder because he can take the risk' or will he listen to the advisors who tell him, "Don't rock the boat?
Okay, maybe we can at least hope that he will remember to call himself a Democrat, put the word on his posters, and not make it a 'point of pride' to run away from his party. Even that is hoping a lot.
Okay, what about the DNC? Has D W-S relearned the '50-state strategy?' Are we going to contest every district? Are we going to run at least some progressives in 'deep red' districts, if only to remind the Progressives there we know they exist -- and maybe to help with state races? If so great, and I can get back to my library and tv, and only pop out occasionally. But evidence, please?
Or will the state parties be the leaders of the New Progressivism that actually attacks the Republicans instead of weakly hinting that well, maybe Republicans might consider a candidate that's really almost a Republican, like Mike McIntire or Joe Manchin? Will the DNC or the White House even take people who make suggestions like this 'to the woodshed"?
But there's the blimp, eager to shift our focus from the horse race aspects of the Presidency, leading us to focus on Congress, on the Supreme Court problem if we slip more in the Senate? (Y'know, somebody other than a Brooklyn hermit could have been saying this as early as February 2010. All they had to do is look at the seats coming up this election and the next, and they would have seen how vital those Senate races were. Think they've learned their lesson? Any evidence backing that up?)
And the blimp -- at least the actual professionals there -- are invested in the horse race, because that's what reders start out looking for. If they start talking about the other 500 key races this year, will they be abandoned for others more willing to play 'race-track tout'?
The 'big-name' bloggers. There's where the impetus will be coming from, right? Only, if it was, wouldn't we be hearing more about something like CREDOMobile PAC?
CREDOMobile is a Progressive politically-oriented corporation which has a policy of donating $1 from every bill, plus any money received by customers 'rounding up' to Progresive causes. So far it's given $70 million. It tends to go for environmental causes (wolf-killing in Canada and factory pollution in Georgia as well as global warming) but it has worked on everything from Komen and Iran through SOPA, even leading the fight to get TLC to cancel SARAH PALIN'S ALASKA.
Now it has, while fighting Citizens United agreed with President Obama that as long as it exists, we can use it too. So it has started its own SuperPAC, dedicated to removing the ten worst members of Congress -- stressing those who either are in a District Obama won, or who have been redistricted into a less Conservative District. They've already picked Steve King, Joe Walker, Allen West, Frank Giunta, Sean Duffy and Chip Cravaack (of Minnesota -- and he's a new name even to me). The other four will be selected by a vote of contributors and supporters.
Gee, think about all the stories you've read about the company and the SuperPac -- which claims to have both assets and a mailimg list second only to Colbert's. Remember all those widgets every single progressive blog put up to support them?
It must have been just my blindness that missed them, and only discovered their existence by tracking down a Missouri-oriented story and finding a ground-hugger blog called The Arch Pundit -- think St. Louis for the name. He's near Joe Walker's district, and trumpeted the CREDO News.
But all those other pieces on the SuperPAC, or even on CREDOMobile -- even posts finding some reason why they aren't quite politically correct enough and attacking them -- somehow they are invisible to the Norton Search. They don't turn up on the sites either, not C&L, not TPM, even Steve Benen has never mentioned them.
Okay, so the big-name bloggers are calling us to arms differently, right? They aren't just expressing their outrage, finding new and clever ways to say things against Republicans, but at a loss to give suggestions about how we can change things. They too 'think its time...'
Okay
[I didn't mean to rant this much here, but that line was just too tempting. Sorry, Sir Charles.)
Posted by: Prup (aka Jim Benton) | February 18, 2012 at 06:15 PM
One quickie before I leave for cat feeding and some tv watching. One problem is the sheer number of Repblican policies that keep turning up. If we keep focusing on just the ones that are too big to ignore, well, I hate to use the analogy -- and insist I am referring to policies, not people -- but it's like fighting a cockroach infestation by swatting one bug at a time. It just don't work.
Latest case in point -- if I need a quick example, I can ALWAYS turn to Arizona.
Lots of stuff on Blog for Aizona, including where the bill came from and a full text of the bill -- in a screen shot or I would have included some of the jucier parts. Elsewhere... *crickets*
Posted by: Prup (aka Jim Benton) | February 18, 2012 at 06:32 PM
Are we going to run at least some progressives in 'deep red' districts, if only to remind the Progressives there we know they exist -- and maybe to help with state races? If so great, and I can get back to my library and tv, and only pop out occasionally. But evidence, please?
And
One problem is the sheer number of Repblican policies that keep turning up. If we keep focusing on just the ones that are too big to ignore, well, I hate to use the analogy -- and insist I am referring to policies, not people -- but it's like fighting a cockroach infestation by swatting one bug at a time. It just don't work.
Therein lies the conundrum. The latter reality makes the first effort less likely. Whack-a-mole is exhausting as it's intended to be. I think it's time to start pointing fingers and asking 'rude' questions face to face, instead of taking the bait.
I want my 'respectable Republican' congresswoman, daughter of a wealthy apple- orchardist [operation entirely dependent on migrant Mexican labor], and whose name is now being tossed around for VP consideration simply because she's not nuts and is a good narrative-photo-op, to start having to answer direct difficult questions about what happens and how much it will cost, in the real world, should all of her party's 'proposals' actually get enacted. This woman excused herself from the vote on the DREAM act btw.
That's the exercise that needs to get started and repeated ad infinitum with all of these small-caps 'very serious people'. Primary season has given them a lengthy pass, now expired.
And Prup -- I could easily run off copies of that TNR editorial I mentioned above on my printer and show up at her next town hall 'meeting'. I think women will be the swing vote coming up, and down-ballot that might be decisive.
Posted by: nancy | February 18, 2012 at 08:56 PM
Jim,
Gee, it seems to me that you might cut the President who oversaw the repeal of DADT and withdrew Executive Branch legal support from DOMA a little slack. (I am guessing that at some point in the near future his thinking on marriage equality will have evolved.)
And the Democratic Party that you are attacking has also been the party that has gotten through marriage equality now in New York, Washington, Maryland, and New Jersey (but for that asshole's veto) in the last nine months.
I think we need to occasionally give credit where do, not just castigate their shortcomings.
Posted by: Sir Charles | February 18, 2012 at 09:15 PM
"And where is that soggy plain?"
"In Spain! In Spain!
Not that you are an Eliza, but it felt that way. Exactly! (In fact your response gave me so much encouragement that i will not only list the 3rd Campaign tonight but I just wrote the e-mail necessary to start collecting the information I need for it. If there's time, maybe you can tie that in too.
But the key is making every Republican, even the (comparatively) sane ones take a stand on the craziness of their party as a whole. (And something else for you to research -- or if you give me a link, I will -- is the Republican State Platform. These almost always have some really juicy roten fruit to throw back at Republicans -- as do quotes from many State Chairmen and Committeewomen.)
Again be careful to use only major quotes from important Republican officials, not just freak statements from unimportant crazies. Thus, as Congresscritters, Bachman and Paul are 'duckable' but now they are/were candidates, they are usable.
But if you run off the copies, run a lot. It isn't as easy to define a 'feminist-oriented' or owned store as it is to define a gay one, but you may know of some. Talk to the owners and ask them if they'd be interested in displaying the editorial -- and maybe more material, more designed than this to make the point powerfully.
If so, that's the sort of start we need -- and it is a good way of showing these tactics can work.
Posted by: Prup (aka Jim Benton) | February 18, 2012 at 09:56 PM
Sir Charles:
Sorry, you miss my point, which has nothing to do with what they have done, but with how they attack Republicans and attract supporters so they can keep doing it -- with less trouble, and with less danger of being in a position where they have to fight desperately to even keep these steps.
We can't talk about what Obama's done unless he's willing to talk about what he's done -- and run on what he's done. If he'll campaign on repealing DADT, not in NY but in Iowa, Indiana, even North Carolina -- and in doing so put the Republicans on the defensive, make sure the audience sees the Republicans as bigoted villains, force them to defend their homophobia against attack -- then I'll cut him some slack.
When Democrats who have passed marriage equality run campaigns against those who voted against it -- using their votes against them, and trusting the people are less bigoted than Republicans try and make us think -- then I'll cut them some slack.
(And, my apologies, but the idea -- in ordinary times -- of considering campaigning for a candidate while 'waiting for his views on marriage to evolve' in today's environment makes me put my face in my hands.)
Posted by: Prup (aka Jim Benton) | February 18, 2012 at 10:07 PM
BTW, I finally got the third campaign up over on the same Friday Open, in case the recent comment column gets too long and kicks it out. Still think you'd all find some of them interesting and worth doing -- if you can plow through them.
Posted by: Prup (aka Jim Benton) | February 18, 2012 at 10:50 PM
Jim,
I think Obama (and Hillary too) should have left themselves more wiggle room on the marriage issue -- instead of outright opposing it as they quite cynically did, I think that they should have said it was a matter for the states. I think that they were both afraid of the issue and did not foresee the rapidity with which public opinion would shift.
In short, I think he engaged in a cynical calculation here and is, I suspect, looking for a way to announce a change. Sadly, I suspect that this will not occur until after November.
Posted by: Sir Charles | February 18, 2012 at 10:53 PM
Prup -- in the immortal words of Travis Bickle, slightly altered -- "you talkin' to me 'bout this?" :)
Posted by: nancy | February 18, 2012 at 11:26 PM