Republicans branching out to old Dem stronghold.

I haven't heard of unavailability and mouse cells.
Don't go off hunting, but if you ever run across it, bring back a link, please.
Not doubting you. Just want to read.

I guess I'm sort of Talibanish, too. If it puts me with Bush on this issue. For some people, it is a real and painful thing to imagine babies pulled out of their mothers and thrown in the trash. I have had to get used to this fact, because nothing will change it--and sometimes, there are worse fates for those babies.

But to imagine someone carving parts out of them, and then throwing the rest away is even worse.

I think there can be such a thing as sanctity of human life. And, I already hear the arguments about the illnesses of those waiting on cures. Each to his own. I'm all for donors and living wills. These people make their own decisions to give. I just can't stand harvesting from babies our society killed. But, I do understand the other side's arguments.

edit--I do need to concede to you, au, he stopped shorter than I initially thought/said.

Sofia
Last word and I will go away. But who is suggesting the harvesting of babies or carving parts out of them, and then throwing the rest away? You have been listening to anti abortion propaganda.

Don't go on my account.

Au, where do the stem cells come from? It is harvesting a part from what would have been a person. I think that fact is pretty straightforward.
Embryo shmembryo. I realize people hold differing views, but that is/was/should have been a human life to me.

Sophia

is/was/should have been a human life to me.
But it will never be these are excess and will be destroyed

Sophia
Much Information about stem cells and research can be found at this link. Captioned stem cell debate.

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/stemcell/

Your vision of a modernised, individualist, tolerant Republican party sure sounds enticing. Glad to hear some in the party are working towards such a goal. But there'll be a lot of water under the bridge before that time comes, no?

The Eighties brought the religious "fundys" into the party, and with the changing political demographics, the party has also come to be dominated more by southerners, less by the traditional 'maine' conservatives. Thats led to a cultural seachange, hasnt it? Just to compensate for that infusion of populism, religion and nationalism with a new emphasis on the individualism-free market-cautious pragmatism nexus would be a herculean task ... let alone bringing the party into some new dawn of libertarian modernism. Especially considering those gradual changes in political demographics are still making the morally conservative states in the deep south and the plains & mountains ever more important, and the more libertarian-minded rest less important, in the Republican vote totals ...

It kinda reminds me of Stephen Norris, the Conservative candidate who didnt at all do badly in battling Ken Livingstone in the London mayor elections. He emphasises the Tories should be multicultural, open, tolerant, modern, and make no-nonsense politics their platform when fighting the centralist and suppopsedly bureaucratic Labour logic - rather than relying on evoking the fear and suspicions of the narrow-minded. But he seems to fight a hopeless cause, for now, with the election of IDS as the successor of Hague symbolising what he's up against. The only way he'll get a chance is if the Tories again massively fail in the next general elections, and the need for drastic change finally sinks in.

That goes for the Reps, too, I think. As long as the Reps are doing fine in the polls as they are, with patriotic fervour rather than gay rights reaping in the votes, they wont move much in that directions. You're right - this kind of evolution of the GOP "doesn't rest with the current administration" - if it'll happen, it'll happen in a next generation, most probably after some major defeat has shown the necessity. And, yeh, itll be ALL for the better, sure ...

Meanwhile, its such a pity that there is no place for a party thats modern and tolerant as well as free market-minded and, say, assertively patriotic in the two-party systems of US and UK. Its like you have to accept the religious zealots with the freemarketeers, or the bureaucrats with the open-minded, if you have views like yours. Such choices must suck.

Thats one of the reasons why I love multi-party systems. In Holland, for example, if you feel the Bible should be the basis of political decisions, you can vote Christian Union or SGP. If you want all the market, none of the taxes and all the cops - but have no truck with the Bible, you vote VVD. F course all those different parties are going to have to hammer out their compromises with each other eventually anyway, but at least you can send someone into these negotiations of whom you know he shares your views, not just some 'lesser evil' ones - and through your vote, you can determine exactly how much clout which line of thought will have in the negotiations. Whereas, if you're an open-minded Republican (or Democrat, for that matter) in, I dunno, Tennessee, the only way to have the same kind of impact is some crafty party activism, I guess ...

Interestingly enough, the "new" right-wing party here of course is the List Pim Fortuyn - anti-tax, anti-state, pro-law&order, anti-foreigner ... and combatively hedonistic, let's say. And they have made Pim Fortuyn's strident and most explicit homosexuality into a veritable banner for their party. They counterpost it to the suggested danger of fundamentalist Mullahs indoctrinating the immigrant masses. Kinda like, "dont touch our gays, you foreigners!".

Interesting, that. Suddenly, tolerance for homosexuality apparently is a "Dutch tradition", characterising the "modern, open" character of the Judeo-christian/Protestant civilisation in opposition to "backward" Islam. Now one can go mock this kind of thing with a reference to how gays were treated here just fourty years ago, but on the other hand, hey - thanks to Fortuyn and Bin Laden, acceptance of gays has apparently suddenly become a combative characteristic of our culture! Lets count our blessings ... something good in everything, huh? But I digress (scandalously).

Republicans use the "don't ask, don't tell" philosophy of the Clintonian model in their approach to issues involving homosexuality.

I have never asked, so I would never tell the tale that Dubya and Sen. Rick Santorum have given each other a "Monica Lewinsky" in the Oval Office on many occasions.

Word has it, too, that Laura Bush and Hillary Clinton have spend the night parties in Sen. Clinton's home in New York. They read to each other from Hillary's Living History and show off their latest purchases from Victoria's Secret to each other before lapsing into a lustful sleep.

Meanwhile, Matt Drudge and Ann Coulter are doing an exclusive photo layout of the big boys who are Log Cabin Republicans. Their shoot will appear in National Review this fall. Dubya is reportedly inviting these guys to sleep over at the White House, and Santorum is jealous.

And, <BTW> does anyone other than me see a strong resemblance between Sofia's avatar and Michael Jackson? Perhaps she really is Jackson and thinks she's fooling all of us at A2k. After all, Jackson is a fundy and kind of opinionated just as she is. And, Sofia had her avatar photo color enhanced to take away the caucasian skin color of Jackson. She thinks she's fooling everyone. :wink:

The reason that Bush agreed to the sixty stem cell lines, was because they had already been harvested. How long do you think that they will last? In order to accomplish any heavy duty scientific work re: stem cells & disease, medical science will constantly need fresh sources of cells.

Bush is not willing to do this, cause it is counter to the fundamentalist agenda. Maybe when he realizes that he can get more votes from people who believe in the advancement of science, and the curing of disease, he may just relent.

nimh

What an interesting digression! Tolerance for homosexuality a 'dutch tradition'! Wonderful! Clearly what the Republican Party needs is a vigorous and vocal Taliban presence within the US. Just imagine what the Republicans could claim about themselves!

Breath of fresh air, nimh's post. Thanks.

nimh--Some hilarious moments in your post.
"Don't touch our gays, you foreigners!"

Why so anti-foreigner? I know you've talked about the difficulty getting in. But, why? Employment? Concern for influx of poor, ethnic? Non-gay? :wink:

I was wondering myself if this tolerance resembled the tolerance shown the Moluccans a few years back . . .

setanta care to clarify your point? cause it seems mistargeted somehow. because no, tolerance for foreigners/immigrants etc is at an ultimate low here, obviously, whether they be moluccans, turks, antillians or moroccans (especially moroccans), i thought that point would have been clear enough from my post.

hence my satirising about how, thanks to the icon Pim Fortuyn, tolerance for gays has suddenly been hauled up onto the shield of dutch identity - its at least partly a pretty transparent move to use it against the muslim bogeyman.

(there are some valid points in their arguments as well, of course, about gay teachers in the big cities suddenly being afraid to come out for their sexual identity again, for example - but its the hypocrisy of it that gets to you)



Blatham, pretty much, huh? <grins>

Its an "invented tradition", obviously, but i guess, as invented traditions go - if theyre gonna come up some new pretentions about dutch culture's superiority, we're relatively lucky that its stuff like tolerance for gays and womens emancipation that they come up with ...

you gotta take the good where you can find it, i guess ... thats what i was being tongue-in-cheek about (hey, its been a frustrating year or two).



oh, long story ... the political expression of xenophobia has gone up in waves, subsiding then increasing to a new high, ever since the seventies ... change is scary, and since the big cities are now 40-50% non-white the change since, say, 1975 (when only 5% was), has been drastic enough, so theres a lot of scared people ...

theres a new high whenever economic crisis hits (early 80s, early 90s), global politics resound at home (9/11), or some politician picks up on the topic and makes a homerun with it (the vvd in 94, the list fortuyn last year). the hysteria about asylum-seekers and family reunification has weighed in, too. More details, I'm sure, were in my Netherlands thread.

(the new government has again adopted some new drastic measures on the reunification thing again, btw ... if you want to marry a girl/boy from abroad (your country of origin, for example), apart from all the other stuff also your partner-to-be has to learn dutch in his/her own country, by whatever means (s)he can find there, and pass a language test at the dutch embassy before (s)he is allowed to join you. <shakes head>.)

william henry, what in heavens name are you talking about with that avatar-stuff?

Well, Boss, i was only indulging in a little irony there, nothing to take personally, and no reason to read anything into it . . .

For continuing news and views about tolerance, I suggest www.tolerance.org.

nimh

Vancouver (population about two million) is now very close to 50% Asian ethnicity. I don't have the stats to hand, but I believe the trend accelerated markedly only over the last two decades, and particularly since the turnover of Hong Kong.

For this amount of change occuring in such a short space of time, there has been surprisingly little conflict. Were I to make a surmise about this, it would be that the immigrants have largely been from the professional classes bringing a lot of investment money with them. Thus, the sorts of folks who might otherwise have thrown beer bottles from their rusting pickup trucks at passing Asian-looking pedestrians, have not been badly affected by the change.

It's a great big joke; trying to recruit the gay community to win elections, then work against legislation that provides equality to gays. Who are they trying to kid? c.i.

Within the past hour, c.i., I have heard on CBS Radio News that Sen. Bill Frist, the Senate majority leader from Tennessee, plans to introduce legislation calling for a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriages. Yes, that's correct, a constitutional amendment!

Sen. Frist is concerned that last week's ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court which struck down Texas' sodomy law will ultimately lead to legalizing same-sex marriages, and he wants to end that legalization before it ever starts.

Same-sex marriages do, of course, present all kinds of legal dilemmas for the parties involved. Those could be worked out through the years if
indeed gay marriages should ever be legally sanctioned in the United States. Sen. Frist is scared that if enough people of the same sex decide to legally marry, then the family unit will eventually be broken down and eradicated, as if it is not already being done so by the heterosexual community.

Here is another example of Republican folly. A constitutional amendment is not needed regarding same-sex marriages. It would take years to get it approved by the states.

Meanwhile, homosexuality is not going away. Like it or not, gays have made important contributions to our society. They are not going to stop their sexual orientation because of a constitutional amendment.

If anything, Sen. Frist's amendment may quicken the legalization of gay marriages in the United States. Here is another issue where on the one hand, Republicans say they want to put more gays in their party, yet on the other hand, the party continuously conspires against them.

I am not sure what I personally think about the righteousness of gay marriages. My immediate thought would be that two adults have the right to enter into legal marriage should they wish to.

My second thought is that the GOP is really not trying to broaden its base.
It is consistently trying to interfere with the private lives of citizens of the United States as evidenced by the passage of the recent Patriot Act which some Republicans (John Ashcroft for one) would like to make even more subversive.

I believe that as the decades pass in the United States, same-sex marriages will become legally acceptable. Meanwhile, it has only been in the past few years that a law forbidding marriage between men and women of different ethnicities in Alabama has been abolished.

The old-fashioned law in Alabama was directed mainly against unions between caucasians and African-Americans. The law was not enforced for decades before it was abolished.

It seems that the marriage ban between gays is just as prejudicial as that old Alabama law.

Calling for constitutional amendments is grandstanding:

"The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; . . . " -- Article V, United States Constitution

Essentially, Frist would need secure a two-thirds majority in both houses to get an amendment proposed; were by any stretch, such an amendment proposed, it would require the ratification of 38 of the states (3/4), and likely would be subject to an expiration date. The Equal Right Amendment came very close to ratification, but some states rescinded the ratification, and while this was in court, the time limit expired. Frist is grandstanding for the right-wing christian and the just-generally-hateful-sobs crowd, because he knows full well, it ain'ta gonna happen.

it is often called dramaturgic..Frist puts on a dog and pony show for the mighty righty holiest of holy's (freakin' idiots) then Bush comes back with some sort of compromise to show he's a uniter not a divider. the snake handlers feel vindicated by the show, nothing changes, the liberals breath a sigh of relief as if they won something and the beat goes on...scripted and choreographed by Karl Rove...