He might have been right about stopping America's war machine, ending government secrecy, and promoting civil liberties, but his insanity is easily demonstrated by his failure to grasp the inherent superiority of America's economic system over the last seventy years.

I mean, seriously, even John McCain and Barack Obama agreed last October on the urgent need to prop up our existing economic structure by giving Goldman Sachs' ex-CEO $700 billion in taxpayer dough with no oversight or accountability. Dr Paul voted against that life-saving piece of legislation, just like the raving lunatic that he is.

If shielding wealthy corporatists from negative consequences for any actions whatsoever doesn't justify ever-increasing taxes funneled to our principled politicians and their friends, what does? We need more taxes, and our federal government needs even more power over the financial lives of Americans. They just shouldn't extend that unquestioned power to domestic surveillance, foreign policy and military matters. It's easy to draw the line, right?

Ron Paul is a nut.

...and I can say with authority that, in the absence of a bleached-blond mullet, ubiquitous wraparound shades, and a dream-catcher tattoo on his bicep, this man's claims to be who he says he is are highly suspect.

To read the headlines here you'd almost forget that Americans were not exactly unanimous in clamoring for Mr Obama's almost-trillion-dollar "stimulus" package.

Indeed, a cynic could probably make the case that the second stimulus bill was only passed--aside, of course, from the generous political patronage/pet projects/boondoggles it could generate for Democrats--in order to satiate anticipated public anger once it was realized that the first bailout--you remember, the $700 billion that both Senators Obama and McCain voted to give Hank Paulson and his buddies, with no oversight whatsoever, in order to "save the economy," har har--actually had nothing to do with the overall American economy, but rather was more about finalizing the now-decades-long effort to permanently entrench an "American aristocracy" within our financial/political class. Remember Nixon's short-lived, garishly-festooned "White House Guard"? Well, now they own your mortgage and the entirety of all your children's future labors, from now until we're all long dead, at the least.

I read today that only 8% of the stimulus has been spent so far. And yet everyone in my sphere of observation still arose this morning, breathing and moving...some of them even happy, seemingly.

and my neighbors--as represented by our common elected officials--have no right to stop me.

But only if they can't talk or fight back.

How does an embryo exercise its right to life? The same as you and I do--by living. You know, being alive. That's the only action required to exercise the right to life.

namely that, because the fetus/baby/child can't speak for itself, it doesn't need or deserve any protection from violence by its parents.

Can I just say that all the "but-abortionists-are-only-fixing God's-mistakes" arguments just don't wash with me?

I am well aware of the "social expediency" argument at the heart of all eugenics-based social policies such as abortion: the idea that certain people are too economically inefficient, or too inconvenient to care for, or just plain too undesirable for their very existence to be afforded any kind of protection from utter annihilation.

I don't buy the premise, and therefore certainly not the conclusion, of that argument.

Heh, that was almost alliterative.

The right to life among fellow humans is the most fundamental protection against force (i.e. violence) that people-based societies can hold against their governments. It is, in my opinion, a "natural" right that cannot be abrogated by plebiscite or public opinion, and it is equally vital whether it is held by adult, child, black, white, etc.

...with its own heartbeat and its own functioning life systems, separate from its mother. A fetus depends on its mother for nutrition and shelter--the same as a newborn baby outside the womb does--but it is still a separate living entity.

The preclusion of an action is not necessarily force unless it precludes the lawful use of one's own rightful property--and a child is NOT its mother's property. Laws that protect unborn children from a surgeon's killing scalpel are "forcing" only in the sense that a spotted owl is "forced" to give birth by those intrusive Endangered Species laws which protect the lives of its species.

..so I definitely believe in freedom. But I believe the government does have a duty to protect citizens against two things: force and fraud. Abortion falls into the former category, in my opinion.

..I surrender to your searing wit.

Valkyrie:

Well, as long as he did one (arguably) good thing in his life, I guess he was a hero. My thanks to you and the good folks at Socialist Webzine for straightening me out. I myself once carried an old lady's groceries for her even though I was late for an appointment....donations in my name can be made to your local Red Cross.

People can choose many actions, all of which might be moral or not. I am not intending to commit a wholesale denigration of women who have made difficult choices, even if one was the choice to terminate their child's life in the womb.

I simply find it (very darkly) comical that this man Tiller is treated as some kind of hero or saint by anyone.

...marching lockstep with the grimmest of intensity to angrily protest the tragic and imminent births of thousands of unwanted human children who could have otherwise been exterminated before receiving the chance to interfere with their mothers' busy lives.