The Press-Dispatch
Issue link: https://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/867518
The Press-Dispatch Wednesday, August 30, 2017 D-7 OPINION Submit Letters to the Editor: Letters must be signed and received by noon on Mondays. Email: editor@pressdispatch.net or bring in a hard copy: 820 E. Poplar Street, Petersburg The 1973 Roe v. Wade deci- sion struck down dozens of state abortion laws when I was a col- lege freshman. It was a 7-2 deci- sion that prevailed only with the help of three Republicans appoint- ed to the Supreme Court by Rich- ard Nixon, including Chief Jus- tice Warren Burger. Otherwise the Texas statute would have been upheld by a 5 -4 prolife decision, and the other states would have been allowed to make their own abortion laws instead of obeying the Supreme Court's abortion law. Roe's guardians against re- versal over the ensuing decades were two Justices (Anthony Ken- nedy and Sandra Day O'Connor) appointed by Ronald Reagan and one (David Souter) appointed by George H.W. Bush. Pro-abortion Democrats on the Court never broke a sweat. I could write many pages of crit- icism, but that's not the purpose of today's column. I'd like to address whether the Roe v. Wade decision carried within itself the seeds of its own destruction. I would have been thrilled to see the Constitution amended to protect unborn life, but it hasn't happened in 44 years and that was more than 61 mil- lion dead babies ago. I'm not willing to let another 61 million die before we end legal- ized baby-killing in America. "We need not resolve the dif- ficult question of when life be- gins," wrote Justice Harry Black- mun on behalf of his colleagues in the Court's majority. And they didn't. He wrote that "the judicia- ry, at this point [1973] in the de- velopment of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer." And yet they admitted else- where in the same decision that "if this suggestion of personhood is established, [Roe's] case, of course, collapses, for the fetus' right to life is then guaranteed specifically by the [14th] Amendment." That is the Amend- ment that forbids states to deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law. Who can legal- ly establish the per- sonhood of unborn children, then, if not the Supreme Court? The United States Congress, by a simple ma- jority of both chambers. It's not necessary to amend the Constitu- tion. It's not necessary to overturn Roe v. Wade. It's only necessary to take the Roe majority at its word, and establish the personhood of unborn children—legislatively— from conception. Then apply the 14th Amendment. S. 231, the Life at Conception Act of 2017, was introduced in Jan- One tired expression repeated to ad nauseas is "speak truth to power." First, we have to define: What is truth. Truth abounds in nature, and it helps define reality. We live in a bi- nary world; day/night, hot/cold, good/evil, and male/female. No amount of wishful thinking, laws, or surgery can change this. How- ever, this truism has been discard- ed by the secularists. Civilizations through time cre- ated a way of life [culture] based upon their environmental circum- stances, and scores of similarities can be found. From the beginning of histo- ry civilizations identified, recog- nized, and defined gender, ethnici- ty/nationality, family, and religion. Centuries later natural law em- braced private property, self-de- fense, and the castle doctrine. Western European civilization es- tablished these unalienable rights into common law and was consid- ered fixed. Law was considered im- mutable because it was based up- on a Christian ethnos whose foun- dation was traced to the beginning of time and rested upon an undeni- able Creator. Christianity helped in defining nationality/ethnicity, monogamy, marriage, the family, sexuality, capital offenses, property rights, restitution, sodomy, paternal re- sponsibilities, and the list goes on. That was at one time, truth. For example, west- ern culture expect- ed a man to work; the apostle Paul wrote to the church at Thessa- lonica "any would not work, neither should he eat." That does not square with modern progressivism. The expectation that a man must provide for his family is deep- ly rooted in Western Civilization and again Paul set the tone when he wrote to Timothy: "But if any provide not for his own, and espe- cially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel." Doesn't square with Marxism, does it? Progressivism has dethroned natural law and unalienable rights and replaced it with the whims of pop culture and individualism. The infatuation with individualism has produced a narcissistic culture that continues to erode the cohe- sion of America. The constant demand to do my own thing smacks at our individu- al responsibility to each other. We claim we love our neighbor, yet we live as the man in the parable of the Good Samaritan who tried to define or identify who was not his neighbor. This is evident by the constant defin- ing of those whom the progressives find fault with and then margin- alizes them with la- bels [such as homo- phobic, racist, anti-Se- mitic, misogynist, big- ot, survivalist, and/or a free-speecher]. Science fiction has tackled the question of the many, and our in- dividual obligation to one another as in the movie, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn. In a pivotal scene, the always logical Mr. Spock says, "Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." Whereas; Cap- tain Kirk replies, "Or the one." Modern culture has reversed this truism, and it becomes "the needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many." So then we have no definition of truth, do we? Yes we do! Scores of Easter ser- mons have focused on Jesus stand- ing before the bar of Pilate, the governor of Judaea for His life, and focused upon his [Pilate's] state- ment, "What is truth? " It was Continued on page 8 Continued on page 8 Continued on page 8 Minority View by Walter E. Williams The Weekly by Alden Heuring My Point of View by Dr. H. K. Fenol, Jr., M.D. Charlottesville Donnybrook Points to Ponder by Rev. Ford Bond What is truth? Overcoming Roe v. Wade Lucid Moments by Bart Stinson IRS has rehired disgraced employees Heritage Viewpoint by Edwin J. Feulner Would you hire someone who had falsified documents or been convicted of theft? Probably not. But then again, you're not the In- ternal Revenue Service. Yes, according to an inspec- tor general's report, the agency in charge of collecting your tax dollars and safeguarding your private information has rehired 213 employees guilty not only of the offenses mentioned above, but also of dodging taxes and of making unauthorized use of tax- payer information. Not one or two, which would be bad enough. More than 200. Small wonder that lawmak- ers determined to clean up the agency have faced such an up- hill battle. "Given the substantial threat of identity theft and the mag- nitude of sensitive information that the IRS holds, hiring em- ployees of high integrity is es- sential to maintaining public trust in tax administration and safeguarding taxpayer infor- mation," the report says. And yet between January 2015 and March 2016, the IRS saw nothing wrong with, for example, rehiring 86 employ- ees who had left the agency "while un- der investigation for absences and leave, workplace disruption, or failure to follow instructions." And those are the lighter of- fenses. How do you feel about having your personal data in the hands of employees under investigation for unauthorized access of taxpayer information? These are the best people they can hire? The agency's record of tar- geting conservative groups dur- ing the Obama administration makes even more sense now. So does the fact that past stud- ies have shown that, depending on who picks up when you call to ask tax ques- tions, you can get different answers from different peo- ple. This isn't the first time the IRS has been criticized for doing this. Indeed, early in 2016, four Republican senators introduced a bill de- signed to keep the IRS from re- hiring former employees with disciplinary records. "Common sense would sug- gest that an employee who was fired for misconduct or poor per- formance shouldn't be hired back, but the IRS' outrageous and bewildering behavior con- tinues to defy logic," said Sen. Charlottesville, Va., a city named after Britain's first black queen, was the scene of a bloody riot Saturday, Aug. 12. The fray re- sulted in the death of one woman, who was mowed down by a car; plus, there were many other peo- ple injured. Have politicians and the news media told the correct and complete story about what happened, or have Americans been deliberately misled? Let's look at it. One does not have to accept the racist and nationalist vision of the Unite the Right organization to recognize and respect its First Amendment rights. Moreover, the group obtained a city permit to hold a peaceful rally to protest the lawful removal of the statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee from Emancipation Park, former- ly known as Lee Park. It was the leftist protesters who did not have a city permit to assemble for a ral- ly on that day. Virginia Gov. Ter- ry McAuliffe said: "There has got to be a movement in this country to bring people together. The ha- tred and rhetoric that has gone on and has intensified over the last couple months is dividing this great nation." He denounced "the white supremacists and the Nazis." However, when asked a question about whether he would include the left-wing, pro-violence antifa in his condemnation, he ignored the question and walked out of the room. Here's a question for you: Did the authorities of the city of Char- lottesville have a duty to pro- tect Unite the Right rally attend- ees? The American Civil Liber- ties Union of Virginia said they had a right to rally, saying, "The First Amendment is a critical part of our democracy, and it protects vile, hateful, and ignorant speech." Thus, the ACLU of Virginia de- fended the white supremacists' and neo-Nazis' right to march and rally against the removal of the statue of Lee. Both the Unite the Right organizers and the leftist counter-protesters charged that the Charlottesville police did not do their job. They just stood back and watched the melee. This was documented in sever- al reports. The Daily Caller arti- cle titled "Why Were The Police Held Back In Charlottesville? " re- ports: "Law enforcement was on hand at the dueling demonstra- tions on Saturday, decked out in riot gear and looking prepared for the worst. Except they weren't al- lowed to do their job." According to the ACLU of Virginia, police on the scene were reported to have been ordered to "not intervene un- til given command to do so." That kept them from suppressing the numerous scuffles that broke out (http://tinyurl.com/ycpnrzv7). I'd like to ask any policeman, Since when did the police need a com- mand to intervene when they are witnessing people assaulting one another? In a ProPublica article ti- tled "Police Stood By As Mayhem Mounted in Charlottesville," the authors reported that "state police and National Guardsmen watched passively for hours as self-pro- claimed Nazis engaged in street battles with counter-protesters." ProPublica reporter A.C. Thomp- son, who was! on the scene, reported that "the authorities turned the streets of the city over to groups of militia- men armed with assault rifles" (http://tinyurl.com/yc9al2lk). Instead of owning up to his dere- liction of duty - - by not having or- dered his police force to protect life and limb - - Charlottesville Mayor Mike Signer chose to dem- agogue the situation by blaming the rise of white nationalists on President Donald Trump. Many politicians, racists, hus- tlers and tyrants have an agen- da that consists mostly of making the U.S. Constitution meaningless and giving government greater control over our lives, thereby de- stroying personal liberty. The alt- right and white supremacists seek to achieve their goals through rac- ist propaganda. The leftists seek to achieve their goals by tricking Americans into believing that all they want are brotherhood and multiculturalism. If either group achieves its goals, we Americans will lose not only our liberty but also our civility. Few Americans Football Flannery Round 3- so now we ask our- selves this question. How do we control the escalating cost of health care or how do we go on a reverse course and bring down the cost of health care? I don't have an answer to this but I can see a parallel to the cost of ev- ery item we purchase. Remember those years when cars would cost between $2-3 thousand dollars, or a decent house would cost about $ 38 thousand, and groceries would be about $12-30 per week? Those days are gone. The reason for this everybody says is because prices have gone up, but we never asked why? In my simple mind I think it is because everybody started to say they are worth a lot, meaning their services are worth more, goods have more worth, and more mon- ey is needed to maintain anything. Come to think of it this way- per- son A felt his value or property is worth a lot so he or she charges person B so much, person B then charges the next person we will name C a little more to afford A. Person C tries to catch up with the cost of what person B charged, so he commensurately charges more to afford the uncontrollable cycle and so on and on and on. Multiply this thousands or millions of times Controlling health care cost Continued on page 8 Continued on page 8 For all the time I've spent in football bleachers, I'm really not a fan of the sport. I enjoy many of the things that surround the game: I've casually participat- ed in a few of my friends' fanta- sy football drafts, I've had fun following the rising storyline of a certain red-and-gold-clad football team in the area, and of course, I'm always a fan of con- cession stands... But when it comes to actually sitting down and watching a game? Um, well, I mean, that is to say—anyone want anything from the conces- sion stand? And it seems that my daughter is following the same path of tan- gentially enjoying football. But for her, it's not the statistics or storylines that catch her eye— it's the bleachers. We've tak- en her to three football games so far, and every time it's the same. As soon as we sit down, she wriggles away and drags one of us up for a walk up and down the length of the bleachers. She wants to investigate every wheel- chair ramp, slap every section of chain-link fence, and sneak into the student section. If we stick around long enough for her to get bored of the bleach- ers, she gets an itch to explore. At a scrimmage, we walked half the length of the stadium's out- er track, found no less than half a dozen cool rocks, carried a stick from its tree to the end zone, and briefly joined a pickup game of tag. Flannery may or may not realize there's a football game happening, but she still gets her money's worth and then some out of her free kiddie ticket. For her, it's all about the experience and discovery. I'm sure she'll learn all about first downs and touchbacks eventually—she is an American citizen, after all— but for now, I'm happy to tag along for her weird football wan- derings if we find ourselves at the game on Friday night. As always, you can scream and Continued on page 8