Immigration, World Poverty and Gumballs

Bishop E.W. Jackson: Exodus Now! Blacks, Christians, Godly Must Leave Democrat Party

Pay for My Contraception or Else!

In case you can't read the lettering on the cartoon image at left, here it is:

"If you don't want women to get abortions, don't oppose coverage for contraceptives that would keep them from getting pregnant."

In other words, nobody should have to pay for their own contraception. And if any girl or woman gets pregnant and doesn't want to be, it's your responsibility. (Funny how these same people who want free contraception don't want anybody regulating their bedroom activities!)

The old-fashioned "wait until you're married" rule for having sex (which at least most girls used to enforce) is so passe now, in fact, it's so passe that it's cause for mockery and off-color joking directed at anybody stupid enough to utter the thought. If a celebrity, heaven forbid, is foolish enough to make such a promise out loud, the press waits to see if he or she can keep that promise and if he or she doesn't, you can bet the snide remarks will escalate. Further more, there's not a smidgen of slack given to a celebrity who pledged virginity until marriage if that celebrity ends up divorced. BAM! Get a divorce and the mockery doubles should that person dare to date again.

Among the noise makers who occupy many of the voice boxes of our nation, the concept of virginity has lost its classification as "noble and good" along with heroism, patriotism and other virtues adults used to promote in their youth. Their ideas about what is "noble and good" include gay marriage, rights for Islamics, "green" technology and doling out other people's money to help the poor. Does anybody ask why virginity and heroism and patriotism were considered "ideals" for centuries and why they were promoted? Nope. Us moderns is smarter than you passe folks. (Most teenagers are smarter than their parents, after all, they were born more recently.)

In practical terms the basic attitude seems to be: the sex drive is so overwhelming that nobody can control themselves, so why bother? It's normal. Rutting is normal. So, go forth and rut. (Am I using hyperbole?)

If evolution is true, then rather than moving forward (after centuries of promoting virginity and the other passe virtues which our predecessors thought were "noble and good") toward a population of more advanced beings, we've slipped back into a more animal-like state where hormones take over and a male or a female lose control when the sex drive flares up. Give me contraception now! I've got to do it right now! And I don't want to do any yard work to pay for it!

Anybody who's ever owned a pet knows that when the animal goes in heat, there's no stopping that burning urge to make or get pregnant! The animal roams about howling, seemingly in pain, until a beast of the opposite sex in the same species arrives and then let the coitus begin! Don't care where and don't care who's watching! Male animals in the wild go berserk and practically kill each other fighting to collect and retain the most females. Human males are encouraged to adopt a lower version of that model, just rut and move on. More like how insects do it--except women don't often kill their sexual partners.

The pill didn't clarify anything or free anybody. Since we have contraception and that present day "last ditch" alternative, abortion, the whole business is ten times more muddled than it's ever been before in history. The sixties idea that, "The pill is great! Now we can have all the sex we want with no consequences," has turned out to be worse than a pipe dream, it's turned into a nightmare. Generations of kids whose progenitors thought they could fool around without having to take responsibility for their actions now darken the doors of public schools. Some don't know who their sperm donors were and might be on their fourth or fifth male in the house sleeping with their mother. Many are ignored and ill-fed, barely able to interact with other human beings because they've had so little socializing with Mom and Dad, some of them are hardly able to speak beyond the most infantile utterances! Young males growing up without fathers roam the streets beating each other up and killing one another in drive-by shootings or trapping each other in drugs and crime because there's no mature male to show them what it means to be a man. What a great society all this "free" sex has wrought! Give them welfare!

Of this group, the lucky ones that sprang from the loins of parents who bought into the "free sex" lie are those whose progenitors recognized the folly of their ways and tried to do better. Of this group, the more highly evolved try to make a marriage and raise their kids. Other offspring of this newly enlightened group are farmed out to be raised by mature grandparents, some are lucky enough to have both genders of grandparents living with them. But far too many of these children conceived by a male who wanted to have sex and a female who believes she's supposed to let him have ended up dead before they could even take their first breaths!

Sex is way more important than almost anything!

But, let's face it: once conception occurs, the only difference between the initial ball of cells and a baby is time and the proper conditions! Everything that will make that mass of cells into a baby is there at the moment of conception.

We're talking about a human being.

A human being who was invited into the universe, not an invasion force to be repelled at all costs!

Despite all the years and years of sex ed with the bananas and the condoms and the graphics provided by Planned Parenthood, somehow or other many people of all ages don't seem to recognize that the sex act is an invitation to a potential human being to come join us here on planet earth. It's not about the boy "getting off" and the girl feeling loved--it's about making babies. The pleasure part is just the anesthesia to bond parents to each other and lull them into happy mode before the baby is born and keeps them up all night for months, years on end.

Back-alley abortions used to be the dread of females who made a stupid mistake, or who were trapped in abusive relationships, or forced into sexual relations. Abortion rights advocates used the gruesome portrait of the victimized pregnant woman suffering a coat-hanger abortion as their clarion call for legalizing the barbarous act.

Fine, legal abortion is better than back alley coat hangers, but the abortion promoters didn't stop there! Abortion has become a millions-of-dollars profit industry in the United States, subsidized by tax dollars, with lobbyists in Washington who work to make sure the abortion industry remains legal and lucrative.

Arrive at a Planned Parenthood clinic and not only will the employees dispense contraception, but if a woman thinks she's pregnant, they will administer a pregnancy test and help her get an abortion. Adoption is not on their list of services. (Neither are mammograms though Planned Parenthood labels itself a "health" provider.) And they don't want anybody lurking around outside suggesting to their customers that adoption might be a viable alternative nor do they want any states making laws that require the woman see an ultrasound of the mass of tissue they're about to murder before they go through with the deed. It would interfere with their profits.

These days, abortion is promoted about as much as contraception and both are pushed almost as much as rutting!

Abortion advocates wailed about the evils of back-alley abortion clinics, but women going into abortion clinics today aren't treated much better than they were in those bad old days. Recently, a woman in Chicago died after a botched, second trimester abortion performed in a Planned Parenthood clinic. Here's a link discussing it: Woman dies after botched abortion. or if this link is a dud, google "botched abortion," an article about one is certain to turn up. While you're at it, google "second trimester abortion" and click on the "image" link. A page full of those photos should make your heart ache and cause you to lose your dinner. If it doesn't you're well on to your way to becoming one of the walking dead like the living heart donors who do this kind of thing for a living.

Why, if the woman was going to get an abortion anyway, would she wait until the second trimester boggles the mind.

But the point is, having legal abortion clinics doesn't necessarily result in fewer deaths for women or less grief and agony for women.

Planned Parenthood has no love for these women seeking abortion, why should they? The "mother" wants to kill someone and they're more than happy to be paid to do the deed. The woman walking in is just an opportunity for profit. The respect level by default is going to be pretty dang low.

It doesn't matter what rationalizations are trotted out. Nobody willing to commit murder will have respect for someone who wants to have the murder done, unless that someone has the power to kill the hired murderer themselves. There's no respect in the "dog-eat-dog" world of killing other human beings except for the biggest, meanest dog and that only as long as he's the top killer.

People today argue that rutting is just human nature, well, so is lack of respect for someone willing to hire someone to kill--especially who kills by extracting a human life from inside another person's body. The one paying for the extracting didn't have respect for life to start with, why should the extractor have respect for either the life of the being who will be extracted or the one from whose body he or she is removed?

Which leads us back to the beginning: a culture that casts off old mores without understanding why generation after generation promoted those mores will create for themselves and their progeny a disastrous mess. Disastrous mess, here we come!    
    

Marilyn                           

Isn't It Ironic?

Oil Company subsidies/deductions

President Obama recently proposed eliminating certain subsidies for the oil industry with the claim that as they are making billions in profits they do not need subsidies from the government.  The industry countered that they were legitimate deductions recognizing real, if difficult to explain, needed expenses.  Congress blocked the whole thing, but what were the real issues? 

The question of whether a particular deduction is a legitimate expense or a government subsidy is frequently a matter of opinion. 

Profitability is another question.  Profitability is determined by percentage Return On Investment (ROI).  It does not matter if the return is in billions of dollars or is mere pennies.  A profit of ten cents on an investment of one dollar is an ROI of 10% and a profit of one billion on an investment of one hundred billion is a ROI of 1%. the one dollar investment is ten times as profitable.  ROI is a signal to the market that more or less investment is needed in that particular area.  Investment, and therefore, activity and research will move away from low ROI and toward high ROI.

Except (yes, in economics there is always an except) for the factor of risk.  High risk activities require a high ROI.  Low risk activities require a lower ROI.  Since WWII, the oil and gas industry has been a relatively low risk business in the aggregate (which is the primary concern of large multinationals) and a high risk business in specific locals (which affects small independents more).

The subsidies/deductions were put in place at a time when the fledgling industry needed encouragement  and the Government saw a need for more oil.  Whether they are still needed today is a technical question that depends primarily on what is desired for the future of the industry.  There are some good arguments both for keeping and for phasing them out.  (NOTE: Phasing them out is not the same as simply ending them as was proposed by the Obama administration.)

So what happens if they are phased out or ended?  Over the long run eliminating these subsidies/deductions will mean a higher effective tax rate on the industry which is a rise in cost and will result in higher prices for all oil products.  The existence of these breaks is built into the current price and a change must cause a response.  If such an elimination is phased in over several years, with some reasonable warning, the change would simply be absorbed and adjusted for with appropriately higher prices on all oil and gas based products. (Which means pretty much everything else will rise in price also.)   

If these deductions are suddenly ended it has other effects.  In addition to the above it would also produce some important short term results.  One would be a small increase in Federal revenues.  A second would be a (probably large) decrease in domestic drilling.  This would happen because if a sudden change in profitability occurs it would force businesses to reexamine current plans before going forward.  If the government chooses to inflict a sudden change on businesses, the costs of risk have to be recalculated.  The most important things businesses need are stability and predictability.  If rules that have been in place for a century can be suddenly obliterated without even an opportunity to adjust, then the whole issue of risk must be reconsidered. In climates of unpredictable change, the cost of risk would need to increase, thus Oil Company profits would probably also increase over the long run as a higher ROI was demanded by risk averse investors.

The environmental lobby has made it very clear that they believe the cost of energy should rise.  This is a consistent position they have held for more than 30 years.  They have reasons.  I disagree with those reasons, but that discussion is for a different post.  The Obama administration has consistently supported the environmentalist position.  I respect that position even though I disagree with it. The proposed action of removing subsidies/deductions in the oil industry is entirely consistent with an effort to increase energy costs specifically in the area of fossil fuels.

What I do not respect is the effort to hide the fact that this action would increase energy costs and the fact that such an increase is specifically the reason for the proposal (plus the usual political jockeying).  One of the primary things holding down the economy is uncertainty over potential future governmental regulations. (As I stated earlier, business needs stability and predictability.)  Such sudden and dramatic changes in major rules are a threat to an economy that is already near frozen with fear of what the government will do next.

If this post causes you to have even more questions, good.  Maybe you need to ask more questions.

Dan