Category Archives: government, law, and politics

Ron Paul Coming to Pittsburgh!

The Hope for America Tour is coming to Pennsylvania!

“Ron Paul is scheduled to make four stops in his home state over the next week and a half. This Thursday, April 3rd, Dr. Paul will visit his family in Pittsburgh and host a Freedom Rally at Indiana University of Pennsylvania at 2:00 PM ET and the University of Pittsburgh at 9:00 PM ET.”

Read details and RSVP here.

Addendum: The Pitt News reports on Dr. Paul’s visit.

AMERICA’S LOOMING FISCAL CRISIS: AN ELECTION WAKE-UP CALL

Before I drop off the web for the rest of the Triduum, here’s a free, public event in Oakland. More info is here.  I also call your attention to the good things that “Paulites” are accomplishing on the local level here.

AMERICA’S LOOMING FISCAL CRISIS:
AN ELECTION YEAR WAKE-UP CALL

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What do Pro-lifers Want?

On a webpage somewhere (sorry, I can’t remember where) someone asked, “What do pro-lifers really want?” He was skeptical that pro-lifers (PL’s) really knew what they wanted.

This struck me as strange. I would think it odd that the actions of PL’s (the sane ones, you know, the non-bombers) don’t speak for themselves. We silently protest with prayers outside abortion clinics and Planned Parenthood (usually the same thing). We vote for pro-life politicians. We march on Washington (DC) every year on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade.

PL’s want abortion, just like murder, to be made illegal. PL’s don’t want anyone to be able to eliminate zygotes, embryos, fetus, or babies. PL’s don’t want embryos from test tubes to be destroyed (ones from IVF and laboratories). PL’s want women to be given choices of how they are to bear and raise their children, not how to destroy their children.

Yes, abortions will still take place. However, murder and rape are also illegal and still happen everyday. PL’s also don’t want hit men to be permitted to have a room into which they lure their victims for blood-cash.

Ultimately, what PL’s want is for society to view all people as precious and sacred and to be safeguarded in the fact that all human people are to be defended. What abortion does (in addition to euthanasia) is to make society as a whole accept that some people are to be used or eliminated for other’s benefit.

Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap., Archbishop of Denver puts it very well.

The first principle of Christian social thought is: Don’t deliberately kill the innocent, and don’t collude in allowing somebody else to do it. The right to life is the foundation of every other human right. The reason the abortion issue is so foundational is not because Catholics love little babies—although we certainly do—but because revoking the personhood of unborn children makes every other definition of personhood and human rights politically contingent.

Continuing the Revolution

Okay, odds are pretty good that Obama will be president. Unlike Dean’s flash-in-the-pan campaign of 2004, Paul’s presidential campaign has a genuine political philosophy powering it. I have been amazed at how folks have turned onto his ideas when they are presented well–however, the “presented well” part is the catch, and cutting through the prejudice and bad assumptions takes work. So we need to be patient and keep pushing through. Here are some ideas about what we can do.

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