ABORTION

Some people are so preoccupied with the topic of abortion that they talk of little else on social media and elsewhere. Nearly every political and cultural conversation gets hijacked onto this topic, due to the tunnel vision of the abortion-obsessed, and I am tired of continually taking that detour, so I have written this statement of my position on this issue. From now on, every time someone tries to wrestle a conversation from the price of cilantro at my local market to THE HORROR OF ABORTION, I am posting a link to this blog entry and moving on without further comment.

I do not like abortion

I am not in favor of killing babies. I do not "support abortion." Abortion is horrible. DUH.

Nor will I abandon every commandment of Christ in order to vote for people who say or insinuate that they will make abortion illegal. Making abortion illegal was never a successful method of eliminating abortion. When you make it illegal, you only make it less safe. Because abortion has always been available to women and they will resort to it if pushed.

If we really want to eliminate abortion, we could make our country more family friendly and follow the examples of the rest of the industrialized world by making maternity and paternity leave available as well as free child care. Instead, we behave as if each one of us is in competition with every other American. We behave as if we hate one another and must fight each other to the death for limited resources.

We do not have limited resources. It is just that all the resources have been handed over to a tiny number of people while the wages of the workers that create the wealth are suppressed. When asked, women say that they get abortions because of MONEY. They can't afford to raise a child. It is IMPOSSIBLE. Most workers in our country do not receive a living wage.

The right wing uses abortion as a lure to capture voters when their real agenda is to accelerate this enrichment of the wealthy while they torment, starve and further impoverish the poor.

For instance: In the two years Donald Trump has been in office, Planned Parenthood, the biggest abortion provider in the U.S., has been funded by the government something like 9 times. He's seated one truly wretched supreme court judge, whom I firmly believe DID sexually attack Dr. Ford during a party. (In addition to my customary research, I watched all the videos of the hearings.)

The GOP treated Dr. Ford shamefully and, indeed, as I watched the debacle on television, I felt I was witnessing a second rape.

Watching Kavanaugh sputter and riot his way through a decidedly partisan, voluminous defense, his puckery red mouth, wet with the spittle of his outrage, made me want to retch. I vowed never to vote Republican ever again, when everything was said and done. Will Kavanaugh deliver the promised abolition of abortion? He is dishonest enough to renege on his subtle promise in that regard, but he WILL likely save Trump from being thrown into prison for criminal wrongdoing. The whole vile mess makes me sick.

Catholics are not required to vote Republican

The Republican Party, as it is currently constituted, stands for positions that are directly in opposition to everything Jesus advocated. The only quasi-Christian position on their platform is the supposedly "pro-life" position, which actually boils down to a very weak anti-abortion position that only makes it illegal, when illegality has never prevented abortions. It only prevented SAFE abortions.

Anyone that claims that Catholics "have" to vote Republican is lying.

Pope Benedict clarified this during his term as Pope. (See the quote below his picture.)

A catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation

in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for holy

communion, if he were to deliberately vote for a

candidate precisely because of the candidate's

permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia.

when a Catholic does not share a candidate's stand

in favor of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes

for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered

remote material cooperation, which can be permitted

in the presence of proportionate reasons.

~Pope Benedict~

My opinion: Criminalizing abortion does not solve the problem

There is no corroborating research or statistic that supports the idea that making abortion illegal is a working method because, as history has borne out, women get abortions, whether legal or not.

American laws, generally speaking, reflect the will of the majority of the people, in concert with the guiding principles laid down in our Constitution.

Abortion is legal, but it is not mandatory. This isn't china, where parents are only allowed to have a certain number of children and are thereafter forced to abort subsequent children.

If no one wanted an abortion, we could have an abortuary on every street corner and they would be empty, and this fact relates to my central position.

The remedy must address the needs of both mother and child.

Pro-lifers and pro-choicers are equally vehement in their insistence on the rightness of their respective positions. Pro-lifers are advocating for the babies. Pro-choicers advocate for the mothers. It is a furious pitched battle between them, which is why we need a nuanced approach that advocates for BOTH.

How can we do that? Well, first of all, stop obsessing about whether or not abortion is legal. Even when illegal, is it STILL available, and pretending otherwise is just naive and unrealistic.

We must evangelize the culture

As religious people, we need to stop behaving as if we can (or should) try to force other people to obey our moral laws when it comes to sexual behavior.  Sexual immorality and the pregnancies that may result from it are beyond the pale of what Christians can expect to manipulate. We need to remember that Jesus did not force anyone to follow him. He invited them.  We should do the same by working to evangelize the culture to gain the hearts and minds of a majority, which is absolutely within the mandate given us by Jesus.

Thirdly, we have to be realistic about the limitations of the American legal system when it comes to impressing Christian norms on it. The separation of church and state has been a fundamental criterion from the very foundation of our country and, while I agree that the founding fathers probably did not anticipate that many Americans would one day belong to non-Christian religions (or no religion at all), the overriding conception of individual freedoms can't be ignored.

In the arena of abortion, even if the law were to recognize the rights of the unborn child, you cannot divorce the baby from the mother until it is born. The law will never again allow the rights of the unborn baby to circumvent the rights of the mother, regardless of whether or not we believe that an abortion murders a child. That ship has sailed.

If you want to make laws, enact laws that support moms and babies.

It is not logical to stand in the way of legislation that financially supports poor moms and their babies, either through direct money or services such as free day care, and at the same time pretend that we care about the babies that suffer because its parents are poor and we refuse to fund their relief.

Babies need food, shelter, utilities, clothing, transportation and day care. If a young woman does not have the income to give a child those basic things, abortion will be the only way out. Forget adoption. Most women know they couldn't give up their child, once they've given birth, and if they don't have the money to support a child, they don't have the money to get themselves through a pregnancy either.

Women do not "want" to kill their children, either through abortion or, in the alternative, through poverty, illness and disease. They are forced into this decision because financial difficulties are the primary reason women cite for choosing abortion.

Legislation doesn't solve every human issue

People who resent tax dollars being earmarked for the poor are resentful because they are selfish, first of all, but in the case of the American Christian, it is often the mistaken belief that supporting illegitimate babies will 'encourage" young women to have lots of children they can't afford. There is no proof of that and, even if it were true for some, the number would be quite small.

I would remind my fellow Christians readers that if there are a few "extra" babies in the world, it's not a bad thing. Right?

Hear this: There is nothing you can do about anyone else's larcenous heart or grifter tendencies. There will always be a small percentage of people who are like that. You can't do anything about it.

There is also nothing you can do about lazy people. I know a young, healthy woman, only 20 years old, who refuses to get a full time job. She says part time is "enough." When I ask her what she'll do if she has an emergency, she asserts that her mother will have to pay the bill! I wonder if she got her mom's agreement to that? (I know her mother. She has one full time job and one part-time job. I'm guessing she's not happy about any of this.)

In any case, nothing is perfect, and we cannot sacrifice a great good because it can't be perfect. Someone will take advantage of our generosity. Someone will steal. Someone will lie and cheat. We have to do the best we can. Here is what Saint John Chrysostom says about it:

"The poor man has one plea, his want and his standing

in need: do not require anything else from him; but even if 

he is the most wicked of all men and is at a loss for his

necessary sustenance, let us free him from hunger."

~St. John Chrysostom~

Obviously, a baby is entirely innocent and, even if I agreed with you that it is a bad thing to encourage immorality by supporting moms who are having sex outside of marriage, for instance, we would still have to support the babies, right? Part of supporting the babies necessitates supporting the mothers. You can't separate the two.

Don't scream at me.

Now, I can hear people screaming at me already, and I haven't even posted this yet. There are some of you who are singularly focused on the fact that abortion is murder, and you can't SEE anything but that, you can't HEAR anything but that, and you can't TALK about anything but that. Just know that, as long as you refuse to see, hear or discuss anything but the fact that abortion kills a baby, you will be a miserable failure in your attempts to win people over to your way of thinking. You cannot sway people over to your side by hitting them over the head with a hammer. That approach does not work.

Stop spreading superstitious lies about pro-choice advocates and talk to them instead.

I am sick of watching the right and the left fling insults at one another and lie about each other. The right says the left just "wants to kill babies." The left says the right "just wants to control women." They are both off base. Instead of imagining the motives of the other side, it is time to listen. Get on the same page somehow and start using the same language to have the discussion.

At present, the pro-choice people are just as disgusted with you as you are of them, and it isn't because they are, supposedly, evil. it is because the anti-abortion people refuse to see the issues that bother those on the left.

The peculiar quandary in which we find ourselves is that both sides think they are arguing for the greatest good and that the other side is malicious. This is an impossible impasse that we must overcome if we are to make any progress in lessening the numbers of abortions.

Somehow we have to arrive at solutions that respect and dignify every human person. The rights of the mothers and the babies have got to be supported at the same time. At present, the pro-choicers advocate for the rights of the moms while the anti-abortion crowd speaks for the babies. We need a comprehensive approach that supports both.

God save us all

Silver Rose

LET'S STARVE THE POOR

I think I'm going to have a heart attack if the news continues in this vein. Every day is a fresh horror. When I read the latest sadistic method that Trump and his Nazis have devised to hurt the poor, sick, disabled, elderly and marginalized, my heart starts to race, and I seriously wonder if it is damaging my heart.

Donald Trump's new budget slashes food to the poor, ESPECIALLY to the unemployed. That's right, Donald, kick them while they are down.

Further cuts will be made by forcing people to eat what the government provides, in the form of canned food delivered in government boxes, paid for at cut rates, with no fresh fruits or vegetables. It may have calories, but anyone who has watched television for more than a few months in their life has surely absorbed enough information about a healthy diet to know that this diet would make people sick. Canned food has almost no nutrients whatsoever, and the older one gets, the less able one is to digest many things. Everyone seems to have their own special diet after age 50 or so.

I have no dog in this fight. My Social Security income is slightly too high to qualify for food stamps or any other assistance that our government is slashing right now, except perhaps for a small reduction in rent, if I were to sign up for HUD housing vouchers during the two weeks a year that they are available. I would then have to wait 3 to 5 years before getting a voucher and would have 30 days to use it or lose it.

No, I am one of those older disabled people who fall through the cracks. My illnesses create a lot of (expensive) needs, but my income falls just over the cutoff line because I worked for more than 30 years to support myself, and my Social Security is about the same as the income of someone living on minimum wage. If I was WORKING, I would qualify for food stamps and Medicaid and other programs, but because my income is (supposedly) "unearned," I don't get anything. Thank God for kind Catholic friends who help me, otherwise my survival would be in question.

Anyway, I am not hysterical with grief over Trump's hatred of the poor because he is cutting programs upon which I rely, because I don't. No. I cry every day for the poor people who are being smashed into the dirt. I cry every day at the gross, disgusting prejudice and hatred for the poor that is being cultivated by the well fed. I cry every day that these well fed people consider themselves Christian but they will surely go to Hell for participating in making the lives of the poor an abject misery.

On some level, these people must know that when they blame the poor for their conditions that they are lying and giving false witness. I have to believe that one day they will wake up and realize how cruel they have been, repent and change their ways.

In addition to prayers for the poor, which are needed now more than ever, I ask you to pray for the hard hearted, well fed, hateful Americans who take the bread out of the mouths of the poor while impugning their character at the same time.

Silver Rose Parnell
(c) copyright 2018
All rights reserved.

THE TRUTH ABOUT ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS AND WELFARE

Hispanic men at a homeless shelter in Los Angeles

ABC News report

2446  "Not to enable the poor to share in our goods is 

to steal from them and deprive them of life.  The goods 

we possess are not ours, but theirs.  The demands of 

justice must be satisfied first of all; that which is already 

due in justice is not to be offered as a gift of charity."...

"when we attend to the needs of those in want, we give 

them what is theirs, not ours.  More than performing 

works of mercy, we are paying a debt of justice"  

Catechism of the Catholic Church

It never fails when I prove someone wrong in this never-ending slander against the poor, I am told that I am "entitled to my opinion," when I have actually demolished someone's lies with facts.  It has become obvious to me that a great number of people do not know the difference between opinion and fact, so I start my post with a short tutorial:

The primary definition of "opinion," at least the one with which I am dealing here, is:

"A view or judgment formed about something, 

not necessarily based on fact or knowledge."

The definition of a "fact," for the purposes herein, is:

"1.  a thing that is indisputably the case; and,    

2.  a piece of information used as evidence or 

as part of a report or news article"          

The peculiar North American definition of "Welfare" is:

"financial support given to people in need."

Notice that "opinion" isn't necessarily based on the truth of a thing, while a "fact" IS. Therefore, if someone says:

"I am tired of illegals getting welfare,"

they are expressing an opinion (being "tired of it") based upon the supposed fact that "illegals get money from the government."

This opinion is based on a lie and is promoting that lie to other people, whether in social media, mass media or private conversations.  I am going to make yet another stab at providing the factual information about undocumented immigrants in our country.  

"Undocumented immigrants do not qualify 

for welfare, food stamps, Medicaid, and most 

other public benefits.  Most of these programs 

require proof of legal immigration status and, 

under the 1996 welfare law, even legal immigrants 

cannot receive these benefits until they have been 

in the United States for more than 5 years."  

CNN Money Article (1)

[Emphasis added.]

The above quote presents the factual circumstances of this issue, which facts are repeated by countless credible sources that can easily be found on the internet, yet scores of people have argued with me incessantly, vigorously and loudly, claiming that undocumented immigrants are given welfare as soon as they enter the country. 

I suspect that something that confuses these people is the fact that, if a person is born in this country, they are American, which means that, if the illegal aliens have babies in our country, then those babies are Americans and they are entitled to a small amount of government assistance.  These children are sometimes referred to as "anchor babies" that serve to allow the foreigners a tenuous foothold in this country.  Even so, the amount of money given to these children is so small (about $550 each, plus food stamps), it is a marvel to me how much certain people begrudge the food that goes into the mouths of these little ones.

What I hear continually from angry Americans, is that they resent their taxes being spent on the poor because of this false impression that illegal aliens are raking in big bucks.  They also accuse the disabled of faking their injuries, but that is another topic for another day.  The angry Americans are widely under the mistaken impression that they are spending huge amounts of money on "welfare" for illegals and other poor people.

As of 2012, a person who earns $50,000 a year only pays $36.82 in taxes for food stamps and $6.96 in taxes for welfare per year.  It seems like an awful lot of squawking for $43.78 PER YEAR IN TAXES EARMARKED FOR WELFARE AND FOOD STAMPS, especially when you compare that figure to the $4,000.00 a year they spend on corporate subsidies.  Below is a tax breakdown using $50,000 per year income for one tax payer. These tax figures are provided by the White House and government agencies, collected by commondreams.org. (3)

If we step back and look where all of the entitlement monies are spent after you have paid your taxes, the elderly, the disabled and the working poor account for the majority of it. Using the above model of the tax payer who earns $50,000 a year, his taxes for unemployment insurance, food stamps, welfare, retirement and disability to government workers and Medicare amount to $346.25, per year, added to which would be approximately $3,500 per year of Social Security taxes, making a grand total of $3846.25 paid into so-called "entitlement programs."  These monies are spent out in the following percentages:

These figures were obtained from the U.S. Office of 

Management and Budget, the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, 

the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the 

US. Dept of Labor, and the U.S. Census Bureau.

According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities [February 2012] "more than 90 percent of the benefit dollars that entitlement and other mandatory programs spend go to assist people who are elderly, seriously disabled, or members of working households - not to able-bodied, working-age Americans who choose not to work.  This figure has changed little in the past few years."

"Federal budget and census data show that, in 2010, 91 percent of the benefit dollars from entitlement and other mandatory programs went to the elderly (people 65 and over), the seriously disabled, and members of working households.  People who are neither elderly nor disabled - and do not live in a working household - received only 9 percent of the benefits.

"Moreover, the vast bulk of that 9 percent goes for medical care, unemployment insurance benefits (which individuals must have a significant work history to receive), Social Security survivor benefits for the children and spouses of deceased workers, and Social Security benefits for retirees between ages 62 and 64.  Seven out of the 9 percentage points go for one of these four purposes."

The remaining 2% include able-bodied people who "choose" not to work (many of whom are suffering from undiagnosed and/or untreated mental and emotional illnesses): hardly the vast conspiracy of fraud and corruption that uninformed and angry Americans claim are bankrupting our country.

In the past, I have heard the angry Americans discount facts by falsely labeling them "statistics," rather than raw data, and claiming that statistics can be skewed to suit the situation.  While that perception of statistics could be true, I would point out that I am not providing "statistics," but raw data instead.  The definition of statistics is:

"The practice or science of collecting and analyzing numerical 

data in large quantities, especially for the purpose of inferring 

proportions in a whole from those in a representative sample."

The definition of "raw data" is:

"Raw data (also known as primary data) is a term for data

collected from a source.  Raw data has not been subjected 

to processing or any other manipulation."

The information I have provided consists of raw figures provided by primary sources from which no inferences of proportions have been made.  No manipulation of the data has been done.  These are simply the facts of the law and the direct numerical (monetary) figures of the matters discussed.

I present these facts in an effort to curtail the cruel myths that are circulating throughout the internet and to begin to direct the attention of the angry Americans to the truth of this portion of the discussion about welfare in America.

Helpful sources:

(1)  CNN Money Article

(2)  LIFE BEFORE SOCIAL SECURITY
(3)  COMMON DREAMS
(4)  CENTER ON BUDGET AND POLICY PRIORITIES

God bless us all,

Silver "Rose" Parnell
(c) 2015