Well, it appears that however reluctantly Herman Cain is pro-choice. He may change that position once he realizes what it means for his chances of winning the Republican nomination, but he’s on the record. Speaking with Piers Morgan on CNN he said the following, in the context of discussing someone who has been impregnated by their rapist:
“No, it comes down to is, it’s not the government’s role — or anybody else’s role — to make that decision. Secondly, if you look at the statistical incidents, you’re not talking about that big a number. So what I’m saying is, it ultimately gets down to a choice that that family or that mother has to make. Not me as president. Not some politician. Not a bureaucrat. It gets down to that family. And whatever they decide, they decide. I shouldn’t try to tell them what decision to make for such a sensitive decision.”
It will be interesting to see what happens to his poll numbers and where his supporters migrate.
It’s apparently an ongoing saga.
it’s not like he’s going to get the nomination, anyway.
The GOP will “use” Cain for cover; on tax policy, or border security.
“Sanity is a relative thing, Bonaparte”
The GOP will “use” Cain for cover; on tax policy, or border security.
And let’s not forget the ultimate cover: “We’ve got black friends!”
Perhaps he misunderstood the question. Once again.
Not only has Cain not read up on Foreign Policy he also has never checked the GOP’s platform, hence the negotiating with terrorists gaff and the waffle pro life debate. He seems to just keep talking until the interviewer gives up…like David Gregory. Course if you’re a designated driver for the winger bus, stop signs have always been pretty irrelevant.
Cain is not running for president. This is all marketing for his motivational speaking gig and book tour.
Agreed. Cain is not doing some of the necessary things that a serious candidate does (like, organize in Iowa). As Ed Kilgore notes today over at The Democractic Strategist, http://www.thedemocraticstrategist.org/ , Iowa is still up for grabs.
My own guess is that if Perry wins Iowa, it’s a two man race. If Bachmann, Cain, Gingrich, Paul, Santorum or any other non-Romney candidate wins Iowa, then Romney is the overwhelming favorite to secure the nomination.
Yep, he has no political infrastructure, anywhere. He is using campaign donations to buy his book, which he gives out in exchange for more political donations.
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/10/herman-cain-spends-100k-in-campaign-cash-on-herman-cain-in
c-1.php
Grifter got to grift.
This makes his weird waffling on abortion all the more odd though.
If he’s on a self-promotional tour (which I think he is) why stick his neck out? Why not just pound out an “abortion is wrong” message and move on? Maybe he just stuck his foot in his mouth, but it seems like this kind of thing hurts him with his target demographic more than it helps.
From the Herman Cain website.
“I’m 100% pro-life. End of story. “
http://www.hermancain.com/h
Nothing to see here folks, move along.
I get the sense Cain is making this all up as he goes along. He came out in favor of allowing communities banning mosques, then changed his mind when he realized that didn’t sound right. Just because you’re running for President doesn’t mean you have to work out all your positions and philosophy in advance, at least not on issues you don’t care that much about. Afghanistan? I’ll figure that out when I’m President. I’ll be sure to talk to the generals, keep an open mind, and do what’s best. Why should anyone need to know anything more?
he’ll be back up in my womb by lunchtime.
Why?
Romney’s a loser against Obama. maybe not in the current polls but Obama will eat him up in a real election. Plus the Mormon thing? Fuggedaboudit!!!
They’ve tried Perry. No go. Too crude, too slow.
They’ve tried Bachmann.
Too flakey.
They’ve tried Christie. He said “No. I wanna be Vice Preznit first,” and then immediately endorsed the Empty Suit.
Gingrich? It’s being discussed. Seriously. (!!!)
Lemme see…who’s left?
Huntsman? Too weak.
Santorum? Dumber than Palin, and that is saying something!
Hmmm…I guess that’s it, eh?
Oh.
Wait a minute!!!
What’s that I hear?
Geez!!!
They’re just like Booman Tribune!!!
S.S.S.
Some Sad Shit.
On both sides.
Bet on it.
Wake the fuck up.
AG
Amusingly, Cain’s position on abortion is significantly more freedom-loving than Ron Paul’s. For some reason I find that hilarious.
Hilarious, eh?
Ever seen an abortion performed?
Ron Paul has. He’s an obstetrician who has delivered upwards of 4000 children.
Here’s what he has to say about it:
Pretty funny, right?
You ever seen that?
Betcha not.
Herman Cain? Not likely.
Nor anyone else on either side of the so-called “abortion” issue except medical personnel.
The fathers don’t see it, and neither do the mothers who are anesthetized at the time.
Ron Paul has seen it, and it branded him for life. Can you blame him for his lifelong aversion to the idea? I suppose that you can, on the evidence of your callous and superficial post. I don’t blame him one bit, myself.
So…”Amusingly,” you see Cain’s position on abortion as “significantly more freedom-loving than Ron Paul’s.”
Guess it depends on your definition of freedom, doesn’t it?
And hilarious amusement as well.
Here’s the whole page from Paul’s website.
Read on if you have the stomach for it.
Laugh your ass off, bubba or bubbette. Ain’t no “funny” about it. Abortion is tragic, not funny, and so is the need for it in a culture that not only regards the lives of million of non-Americans as disposable but feels the same way about the lives of its children. Betcha you’re against capital punishment as well aren’t you, leftiness person. How do you square those two positions up against one another? It’s OK to kill the innocent but not the guilty? Wake the fuck up. “Nonynony” indeed. Nonsense syllables as used by a child who doen’t want to listen to something. Weak like a motherfucker!!!
Another leftiness shmoo.
Damn I grow tired of this shit!!!
AG
Have you ever known a woman who died in labor?
I have asshole.
Take your self-righteousness elsewhere you pig.
Have I ever known a woman who died in labor?
No, I haven’t.
But the woman who I love most in the world was adopted in pre-legal abortion times. If her mother…who we later found out had some really serious emotional, mental and personal problems…had been able to easily and legally have an abortion, this love of my life would not have graced the world with her presence.
Guaranteed.
Does that count in your world?
Nonynony?
Does it?
Millions of times over?
I wonder.
How many abortions in the United States are performed due to fear for the mother’s life, nonynony? What is the percentage? I am sure that:
1-It is a very low percentage. Some say as low as 10%. A 10% that should…and I do not doubt would…remain legal and available. The rest? “Elective.” Translation? Mostly a matter of convenience and/or the result of carelessness. Rape victims? A fine line there, I will admit. Proven rapists? Immediate and final castration if not execution.
and
2-As a doctor, Ron Paul would not object in the least to medically necessary abortions.
But that’s not where the problem lies. It lies, as he so clearly states, in the fact that “casual elimination of the unborn leads to a careless attitude towards all life.”
He also asks
This country’s whole moral code has gone askew. On every level. It’s time to rectify that problem.
You don’t agree?
I’m not surprised.
You got nasty quite quickly.
So it goes.
AG
Your writing indicates that you care more about proving how much smarter you are than everyone else than in making a moral case against abortion.
I’m someone who thinks abortion should be rare but you are not a very good advocate.
No sir.
I “care” about the survival of this country.
I am sorry that you do not like my so-called advocacy. To tell you the truth, I do not think very much one way or another about abortion as a general rule. I do think a great deal about the steady moral, cultural, societal and economic decay of the United States because it negatively affects my own life, the livee of my loved ones and the future of this country.
Someone else brought up the abortion thing, not me. To me it’s just another brick in the massive wall of negativity that is being built here.
I care more about “…proving how much smarter [I am] than everyone else?”
I am who I am. I have nothing much more left to prove, to tell you the truth.
I am who I am.
Deal with it or not, as you must.
AG
Sad to see how much of a misogynist you are. No wonder you’re such a Ron Paul fanboi.
I’m not a misogynist, seabe. Why would you say that? You don’t know anything about me except what you have read here. And what have you read? That I support Ron Paul? That I am not a fan of the whole culture as it stands today, and that I believe that the epidemic of “elective” abortions that we currently see in the so-called developed world is a symptom of the decay of that culture? (Read “convenience” for that “elective” word by the way, because that’s what these elective abortions are, really. A convenient way to be able to have sex without responsibility. Not even the responsibility of contraception. Male and female responsibility.)
Call me a misanthrope if you want, but not misogynist.” Use the “elective” word while you are at it. I am an elective misanthrope. I “elect” to thoroughly despise most of the people who unquestioningly ascribe to the viciousness of this society, from permanent war right on through unthinking, unfeeling abortion.
Yes, I do.
Sue me.
AG
I’m not a misogynist, seabe. Why would you say that? You don’t know anything about me except what you have read here. And what have you read?…Read “convenience” for that “elective” word by the way, because that’s what these elective abortions are, really. A convenient way to be able to have sex without responsibility.
The prosecution rests.
How is that “misogynistic, ” Joe? I’m an equal opportunity blame-placer, and it takes two to tango. The male half of an abortion team should have to go through a similarly serious surgical procedure at the same time.
Yup.
I can see it now…
Betcha that would cut the abortion rate down to size in a damned quick hurry.
Betcha.
The prosecution rests regardng my supposed misogyny?
The prosecution is full of shit, actually.
This whole abortion thing has to do with a precipitous downfall in moral values here. Not “Protestant” or “Catholic” or “Jewish” or “white” or “black,” not “male” or “female” or whatever moral values…just the stand-up kind of ethical practicesd that have been firmly in place in every successful, long-term surviving societal group in the world for thousands of years. Work ethics, marriage ethics and child-rearing ethics, no matter which of the almost infinite forms they have taken in human cultures.
Casual sex plus the equally casual killing of the results of that sex?
Sorry, Charlie…it doesn’t work. And the men are as guilty as are the women in this.
If not more guilty.
Over and over here I have been speaking of this.
So…where is the “misogyny,” brother?
Misanthropy?
Maybe.
But I still have faith that this course of events can be changed, so I suppose I’m not a misanthrope either.
Just another pissed-off American, I guess.
Another pissed-off American, looking for ways to save this country before goes down the tubes along with its other victims, aborted children included.
But “misogynist?”
Not on your life, Joe.
Not on your life.
AG
Further…why brand my supposed misogyny as a reason why I would support Ron Paul. Is he a misogynist? Show me some proof.
Nice.
Ron Paul has been married to the same woman since 1957 and they have five children. Unless he got away with torturing or otherwise mistreating her in some way for 55 years, his “misogyny” is certainly in doubt, to say the least.
Saying that someone who opposes runaway abortion is a misogynist is exactly parallel to accusing someone of antisemitism because he doesn’t think that Israel’s Palestinian policies have been correct. Which is of course another little leftiness trick, although not very common on this site.
Nice, seabe.
Very nice.
AG
God I can’t believe I’m breaking my rule about engaging with misogynistic libertarian douchebags on the Internet but here I go.
First of all short version – go fuck yourself Gilroy.
More in depth version – every fucking time a woman goes into labor there is a chance she will DIE. Every. Fucking. Time. It doesn’t matter how healthy she is. Every woman who gives birth puts her life on the line. Even with modern medicine the way it is today in the US. Every time.
The women who decide to go through with it are far, far braver than any libertarian douchebag like yourself could ever hope to be. The women who don’t want to put themselves on that line should have their decisions respected. No moralizing asshole – not you, not your little racist misogynistic bastared of a god Ron Paul, No. Fucking. One. stands there and tells a woman that she needs to put her life on the line just because you fucking need to feel morally superior to her.
Tell you what douchebag – how about we set up a little experiment. We take a gun and hook the trigger up to a computer program calibrated to the percentage chance of a middle-aged woman who lives below the poverty level dying in labor and we’ll put the gun to your head. Want to pull the trigger on that dickhead? Do you? Well that’s what you do Every. Fucking. Time. you force a woman to go through labor because of your little moralistic crusade.
God – I am shaking I’m so pissed off right now. You don’t fucking KNOW what it’s like to lose someone because she fucking died in labor asshole – and she got a choice. You are a fucking monster.
Back to shorter – go fuck yourself Gilroy. I hope you NEVER have to fucking live through what you would, with your moralizing, woman-hating ways, would consign others to go through. Maybe someday you’ll grow some empathy and learn to be a human being.
Ok. You’re right.
Women shouldn’t get pregnant. It’s too dangerous. And those that do decide to do so are doing it sheerly out of bravery.
Not out of love, not out of regard for continuing the human race or reverence for the efforts of their thousands and thousands of ancestors’ efforts to serve in the evolution of life…they’re smply being brave. Female warriors, they are. And the men who stand with them? The ones who make their own compromises in order to stay put and raise famiiles to the best of their abilities…as I did, as my fathers and grandfathers did, as Ron Paul and literally billions of other men do every year all over the world, as I sincerely hope that my own son will eventually do…what, are they coddled cowards of some sort? Or is it that they work themselves so hard that their lives end on an average of 5 to 7 years earlier than do the lives of women?
Get real. Yes, women die in pregnancy and childbirth. Men and women die other ways, too. At work, at war, on the street…we all die. So what!!!??? Does this come as some sort of surprise to you? Should we all stop stepping out of the door in fear of being hit by a bus, lightning or a passing meteor shower?
Get real.
I am sorry that you have apparently experienced the death of a loved one due to childbearing issues. That is a tragic thing. But fear of that is not a valid excuse for murder. Not in my book it isn’t.
You say “The women who don’t want to put themselves on that line should have their decisions respected.” Women who get pregnant when they do not want to do so? I feel sorry for them. But…with the exception of rape victims…they should have been much, much more careful. However, to commit murder..? Murder of a loved one, of one’s own flesh and blood, even though he or she is inconvenient in some way or the possibility of injury or death during the pregnancy and/or delivery exists? What an awful choice!
Let me draw a small parallel.
Say I am father or mother to several children. I am having trouble making ends meet. I made some mistakes in business and/or life and misjudged my abilities in some way. If I killed a kid or two it would be much easier for myself and for the remaining family. Should I do so?
Of course not.
Where is the difference between this and “elective” abortion? Where is the difference other than the fact that you never see and thus never bond with the child. Show me.
Do you not feel repulsion at the millions of murders of female babies in India? (India Has Killed 10 Million Girls in 20 Years -ABC News) Left to die in the woods somewhere or thrown out in the trash because they are female and thus somehow “inconvenient?” Please show me the difference. I do not see it.
Or…just call me nasty names if it makes you feel better. That’s just like saying “Nonynonynonynonynonynonynonynony” really loud if you don’t want to hear me. When a child does something like that…I understand. They can’t handle the information that is being directed at them so they close off their ears and minds. OK by me. Some of them actually grow through that stage.
And some do not.
We all face the danger of death every day, nonynony. I almost bought it just yesterday on the West Side Drive when some fool pulled into my lane at 70+MPH while my car’s front end was about parallel with his rear wheels. Only luck, good reflexes and a car that handles and brakes well saved me and my (very much loved) female passenger.
Should I stop driving?
Kill my car?
Kill the other driver?
Retreat to a cabin in the North Woods?
What?
Or just keep on keepin’ on, as did every one of our ancestors who lived long enough to bring up a child who in turn brought up another child, etc. until the process reached you, me and the other 7 billion people now on earth, no matter what the terrors.
Millions of “elective” abortions, drones that kill with no contact, the vicarious thrills of violent movies, TV shows and video games, passive acceptance of the ongoing intrusion into our lives of the surveillance state…all symptoms of the same illness.
All the same.
Bet on it.
AG
The surveillance state?
The surveillance state.
Here you are discussing a moral question somehow removed from the question of enforcement.
Yes, we can all craft a hypothetical situation, no matter how rare or common, where it seems that the decision to have an abortion is callous, selfish, or a result of lack of personal responsibility.
Those situations exist, but they are also irrelevant to the debate about whether or not the state should have the power and the ability to serve as judge over the decision to carry a pregnancy to term.
Why?
Because you can’t devise a system that would equitably and fairly make that decision on behalf of women and their families.
According to science, and certainly in my experience, most conceptions end in miscarriage. Shall we empower the state to investigate the circumstances of miscarriages?
This is debate about the law. The morality is a separate issue. A libertarian who opposes choice is a joke.
Let’s quote Barry Goldwater:
Do the first and last quotes have some conflict? Yes. Yes, they do.
It’s how we codify that conflict that matters.
This is a series of comments that center on Ron Paul’s candidacy and my support of it, Booman. Here’s how the line works, whether it be abortion, murder, theft, passive acceptance of the surveillance state or whether one should take drugs, be they heroin, Prozac, aspirin or coffee.
First the individual must decide. First.
Then the situations in which he or she lives…in ascending order of family, neighborhood and local social contacts, town, county, state and country (w/the religion or other belief system wild card thrown in)…have a say. Ron Paul personally finds elective abortion abhorrent. So do I. Therefore we do not take part in it and we form our relationships with that decision in mind. But Ron Pau .is also very concerned about the burgeoning power of the federal system in the United States and its rapidly growing interference in the affairs of the smaller groupings that I mention above. Me too, these days. As an ideologue he wants the federal government to keep its hands off of decisions of that sort and refer them to the smaller venues of states, counties, towns, families, social systems and…most importantly…individuals.
I support this set of ideas and thus I hear nasty names like “misogynist” and “racist” being thrown about.
I am neither and I do not believe that they fit Ron Paul. I am writing about this on your so-called progressive website because I think that the majority of progressives mean well but have bought into the “bigger is better” idea that has been promulgated in the mass media for at least 20 years.
But it ain’t better, Booman. It’s worse. It’s simply not working, and only Ron Paul of all the major politicians in this country is standing up and saying this. Loud and clear. All “progress” does not necessarily tend towards the large.
In fact, in my opinion on paul is not going far enough.Hhave you seen this set of news items? Revealed – the capitalist network that runs the world
Sounds like your run of the mill batshit rightwing rant, right?
But it isn’t.
It’s an article from the NewScientist website regarding a study done by a group of European
statistics wonksstatistical scientists regarding the real, massively interconnected web of investments that has produced a global set of powers that has more clout than does any government.Check it out.
The network of global corporate control
How does this relate to the subject(s) at hand?
The larger the system the less it relates to individual human rights and needs. If corporations are considered to be be individual entities with rights of their own…as is the established case in corporate law throughout the world…and those entities are more economically powerful than even individual states, then the disdain with which larger states treat the lives of human beings is just the middle of that “individual…family, neighborhood and local social contacts, town, county, state and country” decision curve that I sketched out above. Corporations do not even much consider the fate of sovereign countries except in a profit/loss sense, Booman, let alone the rights of individual human beings.
If abortions, wars and economic breakdowns are simply convenient profit-making and crowd/population-control tactics…why sure, let’s promote them through our corporate-owned and controlled hypnomedia.
And the sleeple just clomp clomp clomp on along.
Murder the results?
And the beat goes on.
“It’s how we codify that conflict that matters,” Booman? (You wrote it…)
Yes it is.
Yes it is, indeed.
I’m speaking in a different code, that’s all.
Bet on it.
So’s Ron Paul.
Bet on that as well.
Maybe you should check on which code talker you’re using.
Just sayin’…
Yup.
Just sayin’.
Later…
AG
Speaking as someone who’d like to see Obama get reelected:
1 – I think he faces an uphill battle given this economy;
2 – I think he stands a better chance of defeating Cain, Gingrich, Paul, Santorum or any of the other “insurgent” candidates than he would against Perry or Romney.
John McCain: Tan, rested, and ready!
Marco Rubio’s been all over news auditioning for VP with his BS “the French deserve ALL credit Libya, Obama admin didn’t do much” (no mention of our soldiers btw) so now he’s got out there and the other VP hopefuls and their surrogates are out to let him know not so fast…
“Rubio’s Parents”
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1011/Rubios_parents.html?showall“ rel=”nofollow”