Alito, Terrorists, Whales, and Unborn Babies

"It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish."
-Mother Theresa

With the exception of Zac Taylor, very little good has ever come out of Oklahoma. That being said, I was very impressed with Tom Coburn, a Republican senator from the Okie state, when I heard his remarks in Monday's opening round of the Biden, Durbin, & Kennedy Three Ring Circus, err, I mean Judge Alito's confirmation hearings. For most of the day on Monday, I thought Kennedy had just brought a tape-recording of his testimony during the Robert Bork confirmation hearings. Mark my words, between now and the end of the hearings, Kennedy will issue a statement about "Samuel Alito's America" consisting of predictions about women's rights being taken away, African Americans being sent back to plantations, cats and dogs living together, and Democrats, women, the disabled, and minorities having their birthdays taken away if Alito is confirmed.

But, back to the distinguished senator from the great state of Oklahoma (did I really just write that?). A complete transcript of his opening remarks is available here. But, this is the part that really caught my attention:

As I've listened today, we've talked about the unfortunate, the frail. The quotes have been "fair shake for those that are underprivileged." We've heard "values, strong, free and fair, progressive judiciary." We've heard "the vulnerable, the more unvulnerable (sic), the weak, those who suffer… the fact is that you can't claim, in this Senate hearing, to care for those that are underprivileged, to those that are at risk, to those that are vulnerable, to those that are weak, to those that suffer and, at the same time, say I don't care about those who have been ripped from the wombs of women and the complications that have come about throughout that.

First of all, I was pleasantly surprised that a politician would be so forthright and bold in addressing this issue. You can't really read his comments any other way, and it's refreshing to see a senator take a position that there is no way they can back away from.

As far as the substance of his remarks, again I was impressed by his candor. Sen. Coburn is a practicing physician, so he understands what he is talking about. He stated that he's "had the unfortunate privilege of carrying over 300 women who've had complications from this wonderful right to choose to kill their unborn babies," so he speaks as one who has seen, firsthand, the destruction that abortion can bring about. Another to-the-point remark from the senator:

It is a real issue, a measurement of our society, when we say it's fine to destroy unborn life who has a heartbeat at 16 days post-conception. Thirty-nine days post- conception you can measure the brain waves and there's pain felt. The ripping and tearing of an unborn child from his mother's womb through the hands of another, and we say, "That's fine; you have a constitutional right to do that."

How is it that we have a right of privacy and due process to do that but you don't have the right, as rejected unanimously by the Supreme Court in 1997, to take your own life in assisted suicide?

You know, how is it that we have sodomy protected under that due process but prostitution unprotected? It's schizophrenic. And the reason it's schizophrenic is there's no foundation for it whatsoever other than a falsely created foundation that is in error.

And, if you would try to characterize his position as being his own personal, religious beliefs, or as "out of bounds" because they are merely religious preferrences that have no place in medical and political discussions, Coburn had this to say:

What is life? The Supreme Court can't figure it out or doesn't want us to figure it out; the fact that we know that there is no life if there's no heartbeat and brainwaves. We know that in every state and every territory. But when we have heartbeat and brain waves, we refuse to accept it as the presence of life — this lack of logic of which we approach this issue because we like and we favor convenience over ethics. We favor convenience over the hard parts of life that actually make us grow.

Scientifically, brainwaves and a heartbeat unequivocably equal life. You need to rely on philosophy or personal religious and moral beliefs that fly in the face of science to believe anything else.

This double-standard (read: hypocrisy) of claiming to care for the weak, the underpriviledged, the needy, and yet abandoning the weakest, most helpless citizens in our society has characterized the left for a long time. It may be crass, but "Save the Whales, Hug the Trees, and Kill the Babies" would make a great bumper sticker for many on the left. It would be funny, but it is unfortunately true. We have congressional investigations on what went wrong in New Orleans after Katrina hit. We have Barbara Boxer and the ACLU throwing fits to make sure terrorists have more religious freedom while in our custody than American citizens do, and throwing fits to make sure a woman's right to "reproductive choice" (i.e. killing children for the sake of convenience) remains sacred. I've made the joke before that it's unfortunate that more pre-born children don't engage in acts of terror. Otherwise, they might have a chance. I know, it's not funny. But, it's painfully true.

It seems that the left has made a living on being the party that is there to help the "little guy," whether that be minorities, the poor, the disabled, whatever. But, like Sen. Coburn points out, they have no regard for the safety and welfare of the people that really need help these days: unborn children. I tend to believe the symbiotic relationship between "bleeding heart" liberals and those who depend on their entitlement programs is an unhealthy one. Both sides of the equation are in a dysfunctional co-dependent relationship. Basically, it seems that most, or at least many, liberal democrats have become welfare whores; they're willing to "put out" through welfare and entitlement programs as long as those who benefit from them keep paying them back in the ballot box. It's a shame unborn children can't vote. If they could, maybe Ted Kennedy would be interested in protecting their rights.

But, back to the matter at hand. Durbin, Kennedy, Schumer, and the like have the audacity to sit in these hearings and demand that Alito commit to protecting the rights of women, the rights of minorities, and the rights of the individual, but then they go off the deep end at any hint that he might overturn or even partially negate an erroneous ruling that has led to the slaughter of millions and millions of unborn children. "Settled Law" is thrown around like RU-486 at a Planned Parenthood rally, even though more than 200 decisions by the Supreme Court have been reviewed and overturned, at least in part, by subsequent Courts. In other words, the courts can and do get things wrong, and the Courts should reconsider past decisions, overturning them if necessary.

The point is this: Alito is qualified. The duty of the Senate is to keep unqualified nominations off of the court. Ginsberg was qualified and, though most of the Republicans in the Senate disagreed with her openly liberal, pro-choice stance, they confirmed her with a 96-3 vote out of deferrence to the mandates of their office.

Don't expect such gentlemanly conduct from the Democrats. They like double-standards.