SCOTUS

[kramerica.inc]

kramer constantly conjures images of "babies being dismembered and sucked out" in the most gruesome example possible of what the whole of the abortion issue presents. Are there any "libruls" here that support late-term abortion?

What happened to the discussion about "when is what is in that womb viable" as a human being?

For me, once that "human being" starts to form as such, it's probably too late to realistically consider abortion. That's the rub though, isn't it? What is that point at which there should probably be no thought of abortion? Sentience? Consciousness? Viability outside the womb? I would hope "the science" could enlighten us about this sort of thing...

..

You speak to the realities of abortion for the same reason you teach any topic to the letter of the law. Those are the potential realities. What happens on an individual basis may be different, but the possibility is real.

Want to address my last paragraph, Kramer? At what point after insemination is it still OK to abort the pregnancy, in your mind?

..

I don't think it's ever "OK" to abort a pregnancy.

[CU77]

False. According to the Unborn Victims of Violence Act:

"Child in Utero"

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1841

The text of one particular law does not change thousands of years of human history and practice, including religious practice.

Fetuses who die in utero are not given funerals, or burials, or graves, or tombstones.

Fetuses do not count in the census.

Fetuses do not count as dependents for tax purposes.

We celebrate our Birth days, not Conception days.

Your age is computed from Birth, not Conception.

When you die, your Birth date will be on your tombstone, not your Conception date.

On and on.

Life begins at birth, and always has.

[dislaxxic]

OK, fine. Your position, genuinely held. You might say however, that there are (regrettably) abortions that DO NOT involve the "dismemberment and sucking out of baby limbs", right? That you may think of them both as more or less the same is instructive though...thanks.

..

[wgdsr]

interrupting this week's abortion debate, manchin is off the filibuster and packing train.
unless alaska and georgia run a sweep, those will have to wait:
https://mobile.twitter.com/Sen_JoeManch ... 2145883138

[MDlaxfan76]

interrupting this week's abortion debate, manchin is off the filibuster and packing train.
unless alaska and georgia run a sweep, those will have to wait:
https://mobile.twitter.com/Sen_JoeManch ... 2145883138

He's been off it from the get go. So has been Joe Biden.

People just didn't want to listen.

[cradleandshoot]

You fellas need to do a little more research on what the procedures involve and who can do them.

The bill allows for Doctors, PAs and Nurse Practitioners to do them, not RNs.

Would You Let A Nurse Practitioner Do That Procedure On You? "I would—depending on the procedure, of course."

Your own post clearly said that nurses were allowed to do first trimester abortions. You got yer facts wrong here my friend, not I.

" Nurses can now perform first trimester abortions, but that's it. What makes you think they're not qualified and trained and certified to do so?"

[cradleandshoot]

False. According to the Unborn Victims of Violence Act:

"Child in Utero"

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1841

The text of one particular law does not change thousands of years of human history and practice, including religious practice.

Fetuses who die in utero are not given funerals, or burials, or graves, or tombstones.

Fetuses do not count in the census.

Fetuses do not count as dependents for tax purposes.

We celebrate our Birth days, not Conception days.

Your age is computed from Birth, not Conception.

When you die, your Birth date will be on your tombstone, not your Conception date.

On and on.

Life begins at birth, and always has.

Not if you are a devout Catholic like POTUS elect Biden. The last time I checked the Catholic church still said that life begins at conception. I don't know for certain, maybe Pope Francis has stated otherwise?

http://www.catechism.cc/articles/life-b ... eption.htm

[wgdsr]

interrupting this week's abortion debate, manchin is off the filibuster and packing train.
unless alaska and georgia run a sweep, those will have to wait:
https://mobile.twitter.com/Sen_JoeManch ... 2145883138

He's been off it from the get go. So has been Joe Biden.

People just didn't want to listen.

lol. ok! anyhoo... alaska does not look good for gross, but they remain optimistic. new count starts today.

[holmes435]

You fellas need to do a little more research on what the procedures involve and who can do them.

The bill allows for Doctors, PAs and Nurse Practitioners to do them, not RNs.

Would You Let A Nurse Practitioner Do That Procedure On You? "I would—depending on the procedure, of course."

Your own post clearly said that nurses were allowed to do first trimester abortions. You got yer facts wrong here my friend, not I.

" Nurses can now perform first trimester abortions, but that's it. What makes you think they're not qualified and trained and certified to do so?"

Cool

Are Nurse Practitioners nurses?

[CU77]

Not if you are a devout Catholic like POTUS elect Biden. The last time I checked the Catholic church still said that life begins at conception.

http://www.catechism.cc/articles/life-b ... eption.htm

That's what it says in documents, but that's not actual Catholic practice.

My Mom was a devout Catholic all her life. She had 3 miscarriages, all after I was born.

There were no funerals. There are no graves. They were never given names.

And after that, for all her life, my Mom said that I was her only child.

I wasn't with her when she spoke to our Priest after each of her miscarriages, but apparently he was down with the idea that there should be no funeral Mass and no grave in Consecrated ground.

That's what real Catholics do in practice. In their hearts, Catholics know, like everyone else, that life begins at birth.

[youthathletics]

Not if you are a devout Catholic like POTUS elect Biden. The last time I checked the Catholic church still said that life begins at conception.

http://www.catechism.cc/articles/life-b ... eption.htm

That's what it says in documents, but that's not actual Catholic practice.

My Mom was a devout Catholic all her life. She had 3 miscarriages, all after I was born.

There were no funerals. There are no graves. They were never given names.

And after that, for all her life, my Mom said that I was her only child.

I wasn't with her when she spoke to our Priest after each of her miscarriages, but apparently he was down with the idea that there should be no funeral Mass and no grave in Consecrated ground.

That's what real Catholics do in practice. In their hearts, Catholics know, like everyone else, that life begins at birth.

A miscarriage is not a choice. Why do 38 of our 50 states consider Unborn Victims of Violence?

[Carroll81]

Not if you are a devout Catholic like POTUS elect Biden. The last time I checked the Catholic church still said that life begins at conception.

http://www.catechism.cc/articles/life-b ... eption.htm

That's what it says in documents, but that's not actual Catholic practice.

My Mom was a devout Catholic all her life. She had 3 miscarriages, all after I was born.

There were no funerals. There are no graves. They were never given names.

And after that, for all her life, my Mom said that I was her only child.

I wasn't with her when she spoke to our Priest after each of her miscarriages, but apparently he was down with the idea that there should be no funeral Mass and no grave in Consecrated ground.

That's what real Catholics do in practice. In their hearts, Catholics know, like everyone else, that life begins at birth.

I am Catholic, but maybe not a "real" Catholic like you.

I have a 28 week still born daughter, named Carly NIcole. She is buried in a Catholic cemetery, with a head stone. Local priest was present for the burial.

I have a brother and sister that were still born over 50 years ago (Rh factor). Both buried in a Catholic cemetery in Rochester NY. Both have head stones. Sister was named Martha Mary. Brother, simply Baby Boy. Priests for both burials.

Fortunately there are "real" Catholics like you to tell us all how we should be Catholic.

[jhu72]

about 15.7% of pregnancies end in abortion in the US.
about 14.2% of pregnancies end in a child in poverty in the US.

So basically the pro-lifers what to double the number of children in poverty, because they lose all interest in the child after they are born. "Its the parent's responsibility, if they can't afford them, they should not have had them", is their claim. It's all about responsibility. It's always the same. They entire movement is filled with hypocrites.

They have no answers. Just push the problems around and blame someone else.

[wgdsr]

Not if you are a devout Catholic like POTUS elect Biden. The last time I checked the Catholic church still said that life begins at conception.

http://www.catechism.cc/articles/life-b ... eption.htm

That's what it says in documents, but that's not actual Catholic practice.

My Mom was a devout Catholic all her life. She had 3 miscarriages, all after I was born.

There were no funerals. There are no graves. They were never given names.

And after that, for all her life, my Mom said that I was her only child.

I wasn't with her when she spoke to our Priest after each of her miscarriages, but apparently he was down with the idea that there should be no funeral Mass and no grave in Consecrated ground.

That's what real Catholics do in practice. In their hearts, Catholics know, like everyone else, that life begins at birth.

I am Catholic, but maybe not a "real" Catholic like you.

I have a 28 week still born daughter, named Carly NIcole. She is buried in a Catholic cemetery, with a head stone. Local priest was present for the burial.

I have a brother and sister that were still born over 50 years ago (Rh factor). Both buried in a Catholic cemetery in Rochester NY. Both have head stones. Sister was named Martha Mary. Brother, simply Baby Boy. Priests for both burials.

Fortunately there are "real" Catholics like you to tell us all how we should be Catholic.

don't expect him to reply.

[CU77]

Why not?

Stillbirth vs. miscarriage

Both stillbirth and miscarriage are forms of pregnancy loss. In the U.S., a pregnancy loss before the 20th week of pregnancy is referred to as a miscarriage, while the term “stillbirth” refers to the loss of a baby after 20 weeks’ gestation. Not all doctors agree worldwide on these terms; for example, the WHO (World Health Organization) recommends a stillbirth to be defined as a baby born with no signs of life at or after 28 weeks gestation.

https://www.medicinenet.com/stillbirth/article.htm

We've all had tragedies in our lives. I'm sorry for everyone's losses, as I hope you are for mine.

If discussing these issues upsets you, please stop reading here.

I'm not telling anyone how to be a Catholic, I'm saying that miscarriages are not treated the same as births, including stillbirths.

And my question is, why the difference if life truly begins at conception?

My claim is that all human societies, in practice, treat life as beginning at birth. Headstones of stillborn babies usually show only a single date, the date of both birth and death. There is no outward indication that life began before that date.

I've listed before some of the many ways that our society, like all human societies, does not treat unborn fetuses like people: not counted in the census, not listed as dependents on tax returns, etc etc etc.

It's not hard to imagine what a society that truly believed that life begins at conception would be like. There has never been such a society, anywhere at any time in human history.

[MDlaxfan76]

I think it would be fair to say that there is substantial diversity of practice and belief within all large religious groups, certainly the Catholic Church. Though hierarchical, it is far from monolithic.

CU77 is certainly correct about the bulk of Catholic practice in America, but it's not universal.

Let me also join in wishing all peace in their grief. We had two miscarriages, each traumatic, as these were badly wanted pregnancies. It's hard. We were blessed to have one make it, now 27 years old.

CU77 is also correct that our society, in all sorts of ways, does not treat life as equivalent with conception as at birth, nor am I aware of any society anywhere in the world at any time which has done so.

If there's an example of such, it would be interesting to learn about.

[cradleandshoot]

I think it would be fair to say that there is substantial diversity of practice and belief within all large religious groups, certainly the Catholic Church. Though hierarchical, it is far from monolithic.

CU77 is certainly correct about the bulk of Catholic practice in America, but it's not universal.

Let me also join in wishing all peace in their grief. We had two miscarriages, each traumatic, as these were badly wanted pregnancies. It's hard. We were blessed to have one make it, now 27 years old.

CU77 is also correct that our society, in all sorts of ways, does not treat life as equivalent with conception as at birth, nor am I aware of any society anywhere in the world at any time which has done so.

If there's an example of such, it would be interesting to learn about.

I can't speak for society in general. I do know I spent 4 years in a Catholic HS. There was never any ambiguity in what we were taught in that Catholic school. That was back in prehistoric times you know them as the mid 70s. I have not been a practicing Catholic for many years. There are some folks here that are informing me that the Catholic Church has become more "enlightened" on its view of when life starts. It sure as hell not was a debatable topic in my school. I guess that is the good thing about religion. If you don't agree with what your religion tells you, then just change it and mold it into something that suits you better.

[seacoaster]

An essay on Sam's whiny speech:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... story.html

"You might think, given that the Supreme Court’s conservative majority has just been buttressed with a sixth conservative justice, that the mood of the keynote speaker at the Federalist Society’s annual convention would be jubilant. Triumphant, even.

Not Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., who helps anchor the conservative end of this very conservative court. Alito’s address — one of several he has delivered to the conservative lawyers group, but this time done via streaming video — was, instead, suffused with grievance.

About efforts (unsuccessful) to prevent federal judges from belonging to the Federalist Society. About politically correct pressure on law school campuses that exposes students to “harassment and retaliation if they say anything that departs from the law school orthodoxy.”

About a friend-of-the-court brief by five Democratic senators suggesting that the court might need to be “restructured,” calling it “an affront to the Constitution and the rule of law” — comparing it to a tank pulling up outside a courthouse in an authoritarian regime.

He lamented that the Second Amendment had been treated as “the ultimate second-tier constitutional right.” He asserted that “you can’t say that marriage is the union between one man and one woman. Until very recently, that’s what the vast majority of Americans thought. Now it’s considered bigotry.”

He suggested a gay couple that sought a wedding cake from a baker who opposed same-sex marriage had nothing to complain about: They got a free cake from another baker and “celebrity chefs have jumped to the couple’s defense.”

It was a distillation of conservative victimhood, perhaps unsurprising from a talk-radio host, remarkable from a sitting justice, even if it did not particularly depart from his written work. And even more remarkable because it was delivered at precisely the time when legal conservatives, through ghoulish good luck (the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg just before the election) and unbridled hardball (preventing Merrick Garland’s confirmation in 2016; ramming through Amy Coney Barrett’s), are in the ascendance.

Last year’s Federalist Society keynote, before a cheering, packed audience, featured Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh. His anodyne theme, in his first public remarks since the confirmation battle, was gratitude. “I will always be on the sunrise side of the mountain,” Kavanaugh pledged. “I will always be not afraid.”

Alito saw no sunrise, and much to fear, in particular about how “the covid crisis has served as a sort of constitutional stress test.”

He warned ominously that “the pandemic has resulted in previously unimaginable restrictions on individual liberty.” Alito wrapped that caution in caveats: that his message should not “be twisted or misunderstood,” that “I am not diminishing the severity of the virus’s threat to public health,” that “ saying anything about whether any of those restrictions represent good public policy.”

But he was, inescapably.

For Alito, the pandemic response illuminates the unfortunate “dominance of lawmaking by executive fiat rather than legislation,” in particular the emergence of a powerful administrative state. “Every year, administrative agencies acting under broad delegations of authority churn out huge volumes of regulations that dwarfs the statutes enacted by the people’s elected representatives,” he complained. “And what have we seen in the pandemic? Sweeping restrictions imposed, for the most part, under statutes that confer enormous executive discretion.”

To which I say: Thank goodness. As Alito himself acknowledges, “broad wording may be appropriate in statutes designed to address a wide range of emergencies, the nature of which may be hard to anticipate.” And where he is taken aback by what he describes as “the movement toward rule by experts,” I think most of us, watching the flailing pandemic response and the alarming current trajectory, are grateful for such expertise, not fearful of it. We need more Faucis, more empowered, not fewer.

Alito also perceives, as part of the pandemic response, a disturbing disregard for religious liberty. “It pains me to say this, but in certain quarters, religious liberty is fast becoming a disfavored right,” he said.

Alito cited pandemic “restrictions that blatantly discriminated against houses of worship.” I wouldn’t defend every rule governors or state health officials have adopted — for instance, Nevada’s seeming indulgence of casinos over churches, which the Supreme Court let stand. The difficult question is whether and how much courts are going to second-guess this kind of line-drawing in the face of an undoubted emergency.

But Alito’s suggestion that “religious liberty is in danger of becoming a second-class right” is inconsistent with reality. In particular, it is inconsistent with the reality on his own court. Notwithstanding Alito’s accusations, the majority has been extraordinarily and increasingly solicitous of claims of infringement on religious freedom — and with Barrett’s addition is poised to become even more so.

In three of three cases last term, the court ruled solidly in favor of religious institutions — carving out a broad exemption from federal anti-discrimination laws for employees of religious institutions, requiring that state aid to private schools must include religious ones and upholding a Trump administration rule that exempted an order of Catholic nuns from having to arrange contraceptive coverage for employees.

Justice Alito, your side is winning. From my vantage point, that’s the constitutional stress test that should worry us all."

Here's the speech; Alito starts around the 15:30 mark. Sam is unhappy that gay folks get to marry like anyone else. Sam is unhappy that Americans can't gather in superspreaders. Sam thinks it's OK for me to have a drink while watching.

[kramerica.inc]

Not if you are a devout Catholic like POTUS elect Biden. The last time I checked the Catholic church still said that life begins at conception.

http://www.catechism.cc/articles/life-b ... eption.htm

That's what it says in documents, but that's not actual Catholic practice.

My Mom was a devout Catholic all her life. She had 3 miscarriages, all after I was born.

There were no funerals. There are no graves. They were never given names.

And after that, for all her life, my Mom said that I was her only child.

I wasn't with her when she spoke to our Priest after each of her miscarriages, but apparently he was down with the idea that there should be no funeral Mass and no grave in Consecrated ground.

That's what real Catholics do in practice. In their hearts, Catholics know, like everyone else, that life begins at birth.

Sorry for your family's loss.

But that is not always true or a standardized practice. I have a very good friend who had her miscarried child buried at her family plot and still celebrates her due date every year. I think much of it was to help her with the grieving process. So, no hard and fast process/rules on this issue.

[seacoaster]

Here we go:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/16/us/s ... e=Homepage

In recent months, churches in California and Nevada asked the Supreme Court to lift government restrictions on attendance at religious services meant to address the coronavirus pandemic. The churches lost.

The vote in both cases was 5 to 4, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. joining what was then the court’s four-member liberal wing. One of those liberals, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, died in September. Her successor, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, joined the court last month.

It will not take long to assess the significance of that switch.

On Thursday, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn filed an emergency application asking the Supreme Court to lift restrictions imposed by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York. The case is broadly similar to the earlier ones. The outcome, even as the pandemic is worsening, may be quite different.

The general question in all of the cases is whether government officials or judges should calibrate responses to the public health crisis.

One view, expressed by Chief Justice Roberts in a concurring opinion in the California case, is that officials charged with protecting the public “should not be subject to second-guessing by an unelected federal judiciary, which lacks the background, competence and expertise to assess public health and is not accountable to the people.”

A few hours after the diocese filed its application, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. delivered a slashing speech to a conservative legal group that expressed the opposite view. He had dissented in both of the earlier cases, and his speech echoed points he had made in the one from Nevada.

“Whenever fundamental rights are restricted, the Supreme Court and other courts cannot close their eyes,” Justice Alito said on Thursday, rejecting the view that “whenever there is an emergency, executive officials have unlimited, unreviewable discretion.”

The court is likely to rule on the dispute from Brooklyn in the next week or so. The case may be the first in which Justice Barrett’s vote changes the court’s direction.

The restrictions in Brooklyn are severe. In shifting “red zones,” where the coronavirus risk is highest, no more than 10 people may attend church services. In slightly less dangerous “orange zones,” attendance is capped at 25. This applies even in churches that can seat more than 1,000 people.

The measures were prompted in large part by rising cases in Orthodox Jewish areas. But the restrictions applied to all houses of worship.

Even as he ruled against the diocese, Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis of the Federal District Court in Brooklyn praised it as “an exemplar of community leadership” that had been “enforcing stricter safety protocols than the state required.”

Lawyers for Mr. Cuomo agreed, telling an appeals court that the diocese “has introduced laudable social-distancing and hygiene measures.”

The diocese has said it intends to continue to limit attendance to 25 percent of its churches’ capacities and would accept other limitations, such as doing away with singing by congregants and choirs.

Judge Garaufis, who was appointed by President Bill Clinton, said the case was a difficult one. But he concluded that he would defer to the governor. “If the court issues an injunction and the state is correct about the acuteness of the threat currently posed by hot spot neighborhoods,” the judge wrote, “the result could be avoidable death on a massive scale like New Yorkers experienced in the spring.”

In refusing to block the governor’s order while the diocese’s appeal went forward, a divided three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit drew on Chief Justice Roberts’s concurring opinion in the California case. Since the restrictions on churches were less severe than those on comparable secular gatherings like theaters, casinos and gyms, the majority wrote in an unsigned opinion, they did not run afoul of constitutional protections for religious freedom.

The members of the majority were Judge Raymond J. Lohier Jr., who was appointed by President Barack Obama, and Judge Jed S. Rakoff, who ordinarily sits on Federal District Court in Manhattan and who was appointed by Mr. Clinton.

Judge Michael H. Park, who was appointed by President Trump, dissented. He said Governor Cuomo’s order discriminated against houses of worship because it allowed businesses like liquor stores and pet shops to remain open without capacity restrictions.

In asking the Supreme Court to step in, lawyers for the diocese argued that its “spacious churches” were safer than many “secular businesses that can open without restrictions, such as pet stores and broker’s offices and banks and bodegas.” An hourlong Mass, the diocese’s brief said, is “shorter than many trips to a supermarket or big-box store, not to mention a 9-to-5 job.”

Lawyers for Mr. Cuomo said gatherings like those at churches and theaters were different from shopping trips. “The state’s limits on mass gatherings have consistently recognized that the risk of transmitting Covid-19 is much greater at gatherings where people arrive and depart at the same time and congregate and mingle for a communal activity over an extended period of time,” the governor’s appeals court brief said.

Judge Park, the dissenting appeals court judge, twice served as a law clerk to Justice Alito, once on the federal appeals court in Philadelphia and once on the Supreme Court. His dissent anticipated the remarks his former boss delivered on Thursday.

“The pandemic,” Justice Alito said, “has resulted in previously unimaginable restrictions on individual liberty.”

“This is especially evident with respect to religious liberty,” he added. “It pains me to say this, but in certain quarters religious liberty is fast becoming a disfavored right.”

Judge Park doesn't see a little difference between church services and visiting the liquor store for a fifth of amber fluid?