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Yes, he was pointing out that there is no constitutional problem with implementing it. That's still not the same as suggesting it.

Hahaha... of course not. Why, why dwell on someone explicitly saying what the "legal, constitutional and desirable" methods of population control are if you can throw a tizzy fit over other sections and how they might affect POLICY!!?

I voluntarily had myself spayed. Is that good or bad? I'm so lost now. Someone give me a textbook.

Because no amount of saying "But he prefers if we just ask/encourage people to have fewer children" eliminates the fact that he's also said that it should be legal for the government to forcibly sterilize people if the government feels that is necessary for population control.


Get it? It's really about the scary degree to which he seems to believe the government should be able to go to fix a problem.

Yes. That's exactly what I meant. I didn't say "should be made legal". I said "should be legal", as in "It should be legal for me to ride my bike on the sidewalk". I'm not proposing that the law be changed to allow me to ride my bike on the sidewalk, but expressing an opinion that it is already legal to do so.

The government is restricted by the constitution. So "should be legal" refers to whether or not the constitution prohibits the government from doing so. I'm aware that you *could* interpret that phrase differently, but I used the less definite word "should" specifically to indicate that this would still be subject to constitutional scrutiny. The word "should" indicates probability in my sentence, not a proposed course of action.


To be more complete, their argument is that the Supreme Court "should" rule that these actions do not violate the rights of the people. Better?

Edited, Dec 17th 2009 7:16pm by gbaji

Which is, again, different from actually advocating that course of action which is what you originally claimed.


Funny how this has been watered down to "But... but... He said that maybe it'd be constitutionally okay! Even if he wasn't actually saying we should do it! And we should ignore him saying it was desirable for voluntary programs and never says that about involuntary programs because someone might write a policy!! And you know YOU WOULD BE MAD IF BUSH SAID IT!!!"

Ah, you crazy Pubbies.

I think gbaji owes Ari an apology.

Ari, what the fuck?!

The vast majority of forced sterilization occured under extreme right-wing regime. Unless, like gbaji, someone defines the ***** as "liberals", of course.

China never had an official policy of forced sterelisation. Not saying it didn't happen on occasions, but it was never an official programme.

Sigh... Can't win for trying.

That's why I used the word "should" in there. It denotes an unproven assumption. I "should" be able to walk the dog for you tonight. I "should" be able to fix this car. In that context, it means that I'm not currently aware of anything which would prevent me from doing those things, but leaves in the possibility that something might come up to do just that. I chose that word specifically because I didn't want to get caught making an absolute statement, given that the authors didn't make one themselves.

It's funny to watch the semantic dance on this board sometimes...





It's irrelevant what I think. The point is that the authors wrote that those actions do have sufficient legal justification to be used if the need is great enough. That's the concern here. What things might he suggest to the president are "legally justified" in order to fight something like global warming? It's not about what he advocates personally, but what options he's essentially putting on the table and how those options are defined that is the problem.

Now maybe he just got sucked into a stupid crowd back in the 70s and co-authored a book with a kook. But that at least calls into question his judgment, doesn't it? Of all the people in the country Obama could have picked to be his head adviser on all matters scientific, he couldn't find someone better than this guy?

Truer words never spoken.

Well, it sounds like the Democrats have Vote #60. Cloture vote to be held at 1am EST Monday morning, basically the earliest the Senate can reconvene. McConnell can whine and ***** about the hour but, hey, if the GOP is planning on stalling tactics then you start ASAP to let them stall. They can read the whole thing at one o'clock in the morning if that's what they want to do.

Personally, the bill right now is pretty much what I signed up for when I supported Obama's plan back in spring 2007 (national insurance exchange overseen by the government like what federal employees sign into) so I'm pretty happy with it. Even the parts I'm less happy with are stuff I can live with just to see this step get made.