Via Jezebel...
Given how often Paul Ryan said he rereads Ayn Rand, I wonder how he could have missed Rand's position on abortion:
An embryo has no rights. Rights do not pertain to a potential, only to an actual being. A child cannot acquire any rights until it is born. The living take precedence over the not-yet-living (or the unborn).
Abortion is a moral right-which should be left to the sole discretion of the woman involved; morally, nothing other than her wish in the matter is to be considered. Who can conceivably have the right to dictate to her what disposition she is to make of the functions of her own body? [Ayn Rand, "Of Living Death" The Objectivist, October 1968, excerpted at AynRand.org]
Ayn Rand is right. Embryos and fetuses are not people. A woman's right to have an abortion takes precedence over the rights of non-persons imagined by Paul Ryan.
Ryan's obsession with Rand, which ran deep and hard long after his adolescent years when most folks set aside works by Rand and vampire fantasy authors, is an unfortunate but entertaining distraction from Ryan's and now Romney's biggest liability: The Ryan GOP House Caucus Budget and their war on senior citizens and children.
Opinions, opinions, opinions. I have no clue as to whether or not a fetus is a living being. Only God knows that ... and She hasn't told me Her verdict.
Abortion won't define this election, anyway. The economy, gasoline prices, jobs, the debt, taxes, Medicare -- these factors will define the election.
That said, I reckon we the little people stand to lose no matter who wins.
Stan, it will be a relief to me if the election does hinge on a serious discussion of economic and foreign policy. Obama and Biden will clobber Romney and Ryan in that discussion, thanks largely to the GOP ticket's inexperience and the bad medicine of the Ryan budget. But if Romney and Ryan retreat to social-issue hysteria, Obama and Biden will beat them there, too.
Wait, Romney is pro-life? I remember when I lived in Boston and he was pro-choice.
Is he still Mormon or not?
Integrity is not ever being afraid to say I believe that if you will vote for me, I guess.
Justin, Romney's "serious problem telling the truth" may be related to the Mormon doctrine of "Lying for the Lord." Says one ex-Mormon, "Lying has become an institutionalized method of administrative control with the church.... Every Mormon grows up with the idea that it’s OK to lie if it’s for a higher cause..." [source: Jamie Reno, "Exclusive: Brigham Young’s Great-Great-Granddaughter on Mormonism and Mitt Romney," The Daily Beast, August 7, 2012].
CH,
You are just a Randian. Why are you criticizing Ryan?
Ooooo, I feel an interesting wrestling match coming on.
I wanted to be a Randian in the 1990s. I read The Fountainhead, thought it was good fun, put lots of asterisks in the margins. But then I realized that her assertions and my wishes about rugged individualism were all wrong. Most of the fun of existence doesn't happen unless we act in the context of a healthy social contract. We live inevitably in community.
(Did I read the bait right, Troy?)
The Preamble of the constitution says that we are to"secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity". Posterity are those yet to be born. Ayn Rand is wrong. So are you Cory.
--may be related to the Mormon doctrine of “Lying for the Lord.â€
Until reading this, I was willing to give you the benefit of the doubt when it came to religion, but this assertion about a Mormon "doctrine" can only be described as ignorant and bigoted.
I'm not a Mormon. I do not want to be a Mormon. It's one thing to believe such things about faiths you do not know or understand, but it's quite another to put it in writing.
If you have any political aspirations Cory, or wish to retain any sense of beliebavility down the road, you need to retract it.
You're comment is bigoted. I'd like to believe that this was mistake. Without a retraction, we can only conclude that you are bigoted.
Come on--you're better than hiding behind some Daily Beast bizarro-world depiction of that "weirdo" religion.
It's one thing to be critical of religion--it's quiet another to spew hateful musings about "doctrines".
Retract it Cory. You're not a bigot.
"Julie:" yer an idiot.
No, Julie, my comment cites testimony by two people who know about Mormonism than either of us. (You keep trying to get us off course by accusing speakers of being bigots or other bad people. You do it on nearly every post, as if you are reading from some Web-troll propaganda guidebook handed out by some conservative organization determined to turn every web discussion to its preferred talking points. As usual, it fails.)
Steve, we secure no liberty to our posterity if we tell them the state has authority over their wombs.