I had previously written an article about the many fallacies of abortion at http://webpages.charter.net/jeffstueber/abortwr.htm. After I had done that,  I ran across a very good book written by Joseph Sobran which contains articles that were originally published in the Human Life Review between 1975 to 1982. Much of what he says has been echoed several times, and in that respect he’s not saying anything new. What makes his book rather enjoyable and separates his book from other conservative material is the sarcastic seriousness that penetrates his material.

The book begins with a topic you would expect most conservative publications about human life to address: abortion. Sobran is blunt when saying "Abortion violates every decent human instinct - so much so that its indecency must be clothed in euphemism."  I have found this to be true in my readings on the subject. Abortion is not called "murder" but instead "terminating a pregnancy." Sobran even saw a book on a newsstand called Caring for Your Unborn Baby when it should, he says, have said Caring for Your Fetal Matter. (That’s his sarcastic seriousness acting up.) The reason, I believe, for such verbal manipulation is that liberals who argue this way know what they are advocating, but wish they didn't know it. So they cloak what they are behind in language that obscures it.

Another way for liberals to avoid the issue is to claim that we can't know when life begins. The conclusion, therefore, is that abortion cannot be immoral if we don't know if we are killing human life. Sobran takes this up when quoting Yale President A. Bartlett Giamatti as criticizing the Moral Majority for knowing when life begins, something Giamatti thinks only God knows. Sobran, quick to the punch, asks how Giamatti knows what things God alone knows. Does this mean the Bible has nothing to say about it? Sobran suggests people may have interpreted his words to mean he will soon run for the Senate - a whimsical way of suggesting politicians forsake a pro-life position for a pro-abortion position for political expediency.

Sobran also uses his wit to puncture liberals. This particular brand of intellectual believes the well off have an obligation to care for those who are not as well off, but the less fortunate can never have obligations imposed on them. Sobran, quoting James Burnham, says  the liberal is someone who feels himself disarmed by anyone he regards less well off than himself. Why should anyone pay for the results of their actions when nobody should be stuck with the bill. Here is where the pro-abortion plank comes in. People shouldn’t have to say “no” to sex and, if they do, they shouldn’t have to cope with the consequences. Liberals won’t say they are for abortion. They just favor the choice even if they won’t call it killing. If you happen to think otherwise and have a business called Hobby Lobby, too bad for you.

What’s next on my blog? More from Sobran on public decency.

Have you ever been to Hobby Lobby? I haven't, but they have made news in the two years with their staunch refusal to provide health insurance to their employees that provided coverage for birth control while citing their freedom of religious conscience. I did a brief Google search for articles about this debate and came across this gem from what Rush Limbaugh calls the “Huffing and Puffington Post.” (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/28/hobby-lobby-birth-control-lawsuit_n_4680163.html). Nineteen Democratic Senators (no surprise they are Democrats), including Patty Murray (D-Washington) filed an amicus brief in support of the contraception mandate under the Affordable Care Act. Hobby Lobby argues that forcing them to provide contraception coverage violates their religious freedom to oppose such things. While reading this article, one blurb immediately caught my eye.

“Allowing a woman’s boss to call the shots about her access to birth control should be inconceivable to all Americans in this day and age, and takes us back to a place in history when women had no voice or choice,” according to the prepared remarks provided to Yahoo that Murray has planned.

If you follow this logic, then if I decided to have sex, I must insist that my employer provide paid access to condoms. However, I have always felt that engaging in intercourse is a choice, and one must therefore bear the cost of such a choice. This paragraph stunningly uses the slippery slope fallacy to suggest denial of contraception will lead down the path to women’s servitude. Yet, one does not lead logically to the other. Am I to believe a woman’s freedom hinges so tightly on this alone that the whole thing can come crashing down so easily?

Where one fallacy exists, another is bound to surface, or at least hide nearby to muddy the waters of intellectual discussion. Actually this blurb reminds me of typical liberal intellectual falsity that presumes the existence of some “right” to something without arguing such a right exists.  This was highlighted in Thomas Sowell's book The Vision of the Anointed.   Sowell says “One of the most remarkable – and popular – ways of seeming to argue without actually producing any arguments is to say that some individual or group has a ‘right’ to something that you want them to have.” Doing this merely focuses on the beneficiary and ignores those whose time and resources have been preempted, he says. We can see that in the above blurb. Some women want their contraception paid for, have decided it is a right, and then preempted the choices that others wish to make with their own freedom and money. The same can be said to a “right” to health care, affordable housing, or any other things declared to be rights today. If these people are not given what they want, they presume, falsely, that all of their freedom will be taken away.

Yet, there can be no constitutional argument for such a right and neither can there be a moral or religious one. On what does such a proclamation rest then? Like many liberal arguments, it rests on nothing. Hobby Lobby may have to acquiesce in the end because of the force of Obamacare’s mandates, but in the end the force of the law is the only thing that can compel such a mandate. Logic certainly can’t.

Greetings. Welcome to my blog. Actually I had a blog already and didn’t like it’s name (“Logic in Exile”) and have subsequently not done much with it. So after trolling the woods looking for a better alternative, while making a meal today – March 16,2014 – I have settled on this one that seems to adequately summarize my intellectual pursuits. It’s a blog I’ll be glad to add to.

I’ve been studying religion and politics for over 20 years now after getting a degree in Accounting and studying computer programming as a hobby. After having my faith questioned, I began researching it and found a great deal of problems with atheist, secular, humanist, and evolutionist arguments. What I found are things I never knew from attending Christian parochial school or church for that matter. I found these while digging – hard – not in dirt or soil but in the written word. While some believers may be content with praise and prayer, I’m into the more serious aspect of my faith.

In 1996, after having a lot of thoughts in my head about these topics, I began writing a book on the New Age movement and how some of its ideas are present in our everyday lives. But I had the material poorly organized and after a short time it died. I also began a book on evolution, but some material did not play well with other material, and that project died of a natural death as well. However, I have subsequently cobbled material together in a book soon to be published by Tate Publishing called “The Vast Wastelands of Unbelief.” I will let viewers know when that book is published.

In the meantime, much of my writing has been published through the Lutheran Science Institute  http://www.lutheranscience.org/ where I am a member of the board of directors. If you go to their web site, you can search for my writings. I have also created a web page years ago where I publish major essays of mine. The best site to access is http://webpages.charter.net/jeffstueber/jsessays.htm, but I do need to do serious work with this site to improve the files I want there. Since so much of my work is published through the LSI now, I have not improved my personal web page like I should.

I have discovered I have strong analytical skills and have put them to work critiquing “the other side.” As a result, I’ve become a much stronger and wiser Christian. Look forward to posts on here from me. I will cross post some of mine from my other blog as well.