Does this make me a political vegan?

This, from an article about Sen. Specter’s efforts to acknowledge existing Constitutional principles within the recent torture bill, shows what’s wrong with Congress:

But for at least some Democrats involved in lobbying on the bill, the defeat of these amendments — plus Specter’s — was not entirely an unhappy result. Some lawyers representing detainees told lawmakers before the vote that they were convinced the Supreme Court would strike down Bush’s version of the bill.

They argued against a compromise — such as Specter’s unoffered amendment — on grounds that it could make the outcome more difficult for the court to reject, a senior Democratic aide said. “We were hearing from some of the constitutional experts that . . . it is better to leave the pig ugly than put lipstick on it,” the aide said, explaining why Democrats did not propose a habeas corpus amendment that might have won.

I understand the logic, but it’s a sad indictment of the hacks in Congress that everyone can just leave the mess to the Supreme Court. That’s certainly no guarantee that the President will be held to his Constitutional limits.

Do it for Thomas Jefferson

Should any polls suggesting that Virginia’s same-sex marriage ban will fail needs to focus on stories like this one from Manassas:

In the past three years, the Manassas City Council has received two applications for home-based massage therapy businesses, and members have approved both. Then Howard Daniel, who is gay, applied.

The backlash against Daniel’s request began last month when nearly two dozen people, many of them members of a local church, spoke in opposition to it at a public hearing. When it came time for the city to decide on Daniel’s application the next week, council members balked and voted instead to consider changing the city’s zoning laws.

The city’s response and the community opposition have blindsided Daniel and his supporters, one of whom had an anti-gay message written on his car.

Manassas should be familiar to anyone who cares about individual rights.

Questions of discrimination are already sensitive in Manassas, which is currently under federal investigation for housing policies that allegedly target Hispanic residents, a violation of the Fair Housing Act.

It’s all okay in this case, though, because the members of the council are principled:

If the council votes on Daniel’s application at next Monday’s meeting, at least three of the council’s six members said they are likely to vote against it. One is Jackson H. Miller, the Republican candidate for the 50th District of the House of Delegates, who introduced the motion to approve another massage therapy business a year earlier.

“I’ve had a mixed record on home businesses,” Miller said. “I’m opposed if neighbors are opposed. That’s been my standard,” he said, noting that he voted with the council earlier this year to reject an application for a home-based optometry clinic.

This majoritarian belief that individual rights are subject to the review of others must stop. Until it does, it just reveals bigotry. It’s that simple.

I am not a right-wing economist

I haven’t read the associated study, but the way The Observer reported the findings lacked what I think is the correct assumption about the flat tax. Consider:

Flat taxes fail to boost revenues, as their advocates claim, and are likely to be abandoned by the countries that have introduced them, according to research published by the International Monetary Fund.

But the IMF analysts who carried out the research cast doubt on the main advantage claimed for flat taxes: that they increase revenues by allowing people to pocket more of their hard-earned cash, and thus persuade them to work harder.

That’s not really the point. Tax equality is the main advantage because income redistribution is ethically wrong. The government shouldn’t be punishing anyone through its tax policy, which is the core result of progressive income taxes. The government should set the tax rate to generate the necessary revenue to meet its (legitimate) expenditures. Ultimately, the flat tax is a means, not the goal.

The report is here.

Love is the family value, not gender distribution

I find this news interesting:

Former U.S. Rep. Gerry Studds, the first openly gay person elected to Congress, died early Saturday at Boston Medical Center, several days after he collapsed while walking his dog, his husband [Dean Hara] said.

Mr. Studds has been in the news lately for something that happened more than three decades ago. (Read the story if you don’t know what it is, or why it’s relevant.) But that’s not the interesting part. That last part, his husband, is the key.

A major newspaper can report that as part of the story without including sidebar’s about the deteriorating state of Massachusetts as a result. That’s instructive. But the accompanying fact of Mr. Hara’s involvement in making decisions prior to the death of Mr. Studds shows how vital marriage equality is to America. In any other state, Mr. Hara would be left out of such decisions. It’s possible, perhaps probable, that the person he loves would have died alone had the highest court in Massachusetts not acknowledged that the state must treat every citizen the same. That would’ve been the tragedy, not the equal exercise of civil rights.

Gender myopia and sexual violence

I don’t want to imply any less seriousness surrounding these findings, because they’re worth noting and correcting:

Nearly 60 percent of women in Ethiopia is subject to sexual violence by a partner, a new UN report revealed yesterday.

The report said violence against women persists at high rates around the world, and governments are not doing enough to prevent it.

This is a real issue, and stopping it is a legitimate government task. However, given the UN’s misguided stance on equality, this makes me angry:

At a news conference launching the report, Undersecretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs Jose Antonio Ocampo called violence against women “a pervasive phenomenon- it’s really a global problem that has to be addressed.” “According to the quantitative estimates, which certainly underestimate the amount of violence that occurs, at least one out of three women experiences violence at some stage of their lives,” he said. “The report states that the major form of violence takes place at the domestic level, in the households … and it takes place in societies throughout the world.” In addition to spontaneous violence, the report also condemned what it found to be high levels of institutionalized violence, such as female circumcision, estimating that 130 million girls and women living today had undergone this practice.

I’ve made the distinctions between male and female genital mutilation before, mostly to explain that it’s a difference in degree, not kind. I stand by that. The UN rightly addresses female circumcision as institutional violence, yet promotes male circumcision as an appropriate prevention tool against HIV infection. From the Fact Sheet, consider these statements:

Depending on culture, circumcision is usually performed soon after birth or during adolescence as a coming-of-age rite.

It is estimated that globally, about 20% of men, and some 35% of men in developing countries, are circumcised for religious, cultural, medical or other reasons.

And:

Female genital mutilation/cutting (sometimes incorrectly referred to as female circumcision) comprises all surgical procedures involving partial or total removal of the external genitalia or other injuries to the female genital organs for cultural or other nontherapeutic reasons.

There is no condemnation of injuries to male genital organs for cultural or other nontherapeutic reasons, even though such reasons are explicitly included to explain why parents cut their male children. If the UN (and anyone else who denies the obvious similarities) browsed through justifications for female circumcision in countries that permit it, they would recognize arguments bearing a striking resemblance to the reasons given for male circumcision in developed nations. Hygiene, aesthetics, partner approval, they’re all there. So what’s different? Do we permit assault because it’s not as bad as murder?

The post where I praise the Bush Administration

This is wonderful news:

The Bush administration has decided to end its funding of a groundbreaking program that has sought to curb the spread of HIV by offering subsidized circumcisions to men in Swaziland.

A statement issued Thursday night by the U.S. Agency for International Development said that it had only recently learned of the program and that it violated government policy supporting study of circumcision but not services offering the procedure.

In its statement, USAID said the funding “should not have occurred, and there will be no further circumcisions performed with U.S. Government funds until the PEPFAR Scientific Steering Committee reviews data from ongoing clinical trials and considers any recommendations on male circumcision from the normative international Agencies.” PEPFAR is the Bush anti-AIDS program.

According to the article taxpayer money only paid for adult circumcisions. That makes me happier less angry, but barely. I’m not sure where funding AIDS prevention in Africa falls within the Constitutional responsibilities granted to the United States government, but that’s not my issue. I’m not going to approach the scientific implications, either. I’m still not denying them; I just don’t believe they’re enough for the reasons I’ve explained in the past.

I applaud this primarily because I don’t believe circumcision is the most effective HIV prevention for the Third World. Economic development would have a far greater impact. Clean water would have a far greater impact. If we’re going to be involved, we need to set the foundation for allowing these men (and women) to help themselves. They need some hope that engaging in safer sex will result in a better life, a life with opportunity.

This means no longer propping up corrupt dictators who squander our foreign aid. That’s easily said, and I accept that. The details, which I haven’t provided beyond the most basic form, are important. But it seems obvious that we need to remove diseased regimes. Removing healthy foreskins only hides the symptoms.

This fails my ethics test

Related to Saturday’s post on the use of discarded foreskins, consider:

… Dr Indira Hinduja once again became the first Indian scientist to use human feeder layer as medium to develop three human embryonic stem cell lines.

“We conduct our research strictly adhering to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) Guidelines and the embryos are taken for research with the full consent of both the husband and wife and are documented legally,” she said.

“We also take the necessary consent of the parents as well as the surgeons concerned for the human feeder as they are taken from foreskin when the circumcision is done in children between new born and up to five years”, Hinduja said.

I can think of considerations that would make this less troublesome, but they’re unlikely, so I will ignore them here. Guidelines are good, though, and acknowledging the use of the discarded foreskin through a consent form is commendable. However, whose consent is missing from this equation?

Consumers make different, rational choices

Thanks for studying the obvious:

One of the lures of the outer suburbs is more house — maybe even one with a big yard — for less money. But a new study shows that the savings are illusory: The costs of longer commutes are so high that they can outweigh the cheaper mortgage payments.

When Danielle and I bought our house last summer, we specifically considered the impact of living in an outer suburb because we’re intelligent. First, the difference in price was significantly more than the $40,000 to $50,000 listed in the article. Second, the economic impact does not have to include getting in my automobile. Public transportation is still an option for me, and I considered in our decision. Of course, I could also change jobs to live closer to home if they commute becomes burdensome. That’s three factors. How many more could I name if I tried?

The Washington Post story includes this:

Moving closer to their jobs is out, Hannah said, because “there is no way we could move into an equivalent three-bedroom house for the same amount,” she said. “We don’t want to downsize and give up a yard, for instance.”

That suggests a willingness to pay the associated cost of having a large house and yard on a specific budget, namely, higher commuting costs (economic and lifestyle). Bottom line: Buyers aren’t stupid. Don’t bombard us with studies implying that we might be.

The initial assumption was reasonable. The explanation was not.

Note: This is the entry I originally wrote about yesterday’s plane crash in New York. The quotes are no longer in the linked article, but I’ve excerpted them as they appeared yesterday afternoon.

———-

It makes sense to consider all possibilities when an aircraft strikes a building, but it can also reveal the absurdity of our thought process and reactions to terrorism.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff spoke with Gov. George Pataki (R-N.Y.) to assure him there is “no credible” threat “to the homeland,” a statement from the department said.

Has any statement in recent memory better attached the dangerous implication of the term homeland to the word? Referring to America as America is reasonable and accurate. Homeland remains absurd and dangerously militaristic.

Also in the story:

“We’ve been in contact with all of our intelligence partners, coalition partners around the world . . . and there are no — repeat, no — indications that there is anything underfoot beyond this one” aircraft, [NORAD commander, Adm. Timothy J.] Keating said. He added: “We reserve the right to exercise our capabilities, which is what we have done here.

Why state this? Who believes that we don’t have the right to respond if terrorism strikes? Saying as much makes you us look pompous and insecure. Stop it.

This should be an episode of House, M.D.

I went vegetarian in early ’94 (vegan in ’02) for its potential health benefits. The animal rights/ethics implication mattered little, as I was mostly unaware. Health reasons still dominate, but the disturbing callousness with which we disregard animals as sentient beings is enough to keep me vegan on the unlikely chance I falter in my dedication. Consider Exhibit A, the E-Z Catch Chicken Harvester:

I don’t expect any mass abandonment of meat as a food item in my lifetime, but who can watch that and consider it the mark of a civilized society?

Following that line of thought, how does this story read in the animal rights context?:

[Dr. Jennifer] Eddy is one of many doctors to recently rediscover honey as medicine. Abandoned with the advent of antibiotics in the 1940s and subsequently disregarded as folk quackery, a growing set of clinical literature and dozens of glowing anecdotes now recommend it.

Most tantalizingly, honey seems capable of combating the growing scourge of drug-resistant wound infections, especially methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, the infamous flesh-eating strain. These have become alarmingly more common in recent years, with MRSA alone responsible for half of all skin infections treated in U.S. emergency rooms. So-called superbugs cause thousands of deaths and disfigurements every year, and public health officials are alarmed.

Though the practice is uncommon in the United States, honey is successfully used elsewhere on wounds and burns that are unresponsive to other treatments. Some of the most promising results come from Germany’s Bonn University Children’s Hospital, where doctors have used honey to treat wounds in 50 children whose normal healing processes were weakened by chemotherapy.

I’m sure there are vegans who could argue against such a use as animal exploitation; I am not one of them. I don’t think I’m prone to relying on any sort of relativism to justify some things while denouncing others (example), but this is fine with me, if it works. Although there is a price, preventing disability and death is a clear benefit.

For more on honey from a vegan perspective, read this, including its fuzzy (and stringent) indications of how honey might be ethically harvested. For more on MRSA, read this again.

Video link found at Boing Boing