Dalton Conley, in an editorial for the NY Times, asks an interesting question: does the the father of a fetus have a right to choose whether or not that fetus is aborted? On many aspects I can agree with what he says. Yes, the nine months a woman carries the child are not exactly a party, but if the father is willing to spend his lifetime taking care of the child what’s nine months of discomfort? Of course, this would lead to a legal nightmare of men fighting their lovers and girlfriends to keep unwanted children. In the end it would create more problems.
One thing I very much agree with is married women notifying husbands of their decision to have an abortion. This is a completely different kind of relationship. In a sense, a married couple is a unit working together, should the father of the child not also have the right to choose whether or not a piece of him is aborted? I think he does. Unfortuanely, this could also lead to men wanting to decide to have an abortion when the wife does not. A scenario that could easily happen. Of course, any law such as this must make allowances for the life of the mother.
Appointing a Democrat to be his chief of staff seems like a desperate move on the part of Schwarzenegger that won’t endear him to state Republicans and will likely cost him re-election. I’m not sure what he hopes this woman can do for him. It’s his policies that have alienated Democrats in the state, not the people he has around him.
I have to say, I like Wikipedia. There are time when I’ve found it to be a handy tool for information you can’t find elsewhere. I also like the idea of a free information resource created by the Internet community; however, I take everything I read there with a grain of salt. These entries are, after all, the personal opinions of the people who wrote them, and there are times when the information presented in blatantly wrong and/or biased. I would never, never, use it as a source for a scholarly paper. I mean, come on, who in their right mind would!
Well, John Seigenthaler — the elder, not the NBC journalist — found out just how bad Wikipedia can be. In looking up his own biography he found what can only be termed a hatchet job designed to impugn his character. Whoever wrote the article had the temerity to accuse Seigenthaler of having a role in both of the Kennedy assassinations! Seigenthaler has a right to be pissed and I think he could sue the writer of the article; that is, if he could ever find out who wrote it.
The one important thing Wikipedia could do is stop accepting anonymously written articles. If you’re going to put something out there as fact at least have the balls to put your name to it; or, if you’re going to run an operation like Wikipedia then require people to attach their name to an article, require a credit card to verify information. This is not that difficult.
Of course, you might ask yourself why I, as an anonymous blogger, have the right to lecture someone on anonymity. Well, there’s a subtle difference here. I am not representing myself as an expert, nor am I writing "scholarly" articles. I’m just some Joe Bloe Schmo expressing his opinion on the writings of people much smarter than I. If I were to actually start creating original material, then you can bet I would attach my name. In fact, I have quite a long list reviews on Amazon.com and my name is all over those reviews. Besides, two years ago I had a blog that didn’t hide my identity and it was the worst experience I’ve ever had. I will not repeat that.
Sometimes I forget the youth of the men and women serving in our military. Take Cpl. Jeffrey B. Starr for example. He was only 22-years-old when he died and he had already served three tours in Iraq. I’m not a military person so I don’t know if a tour is year, but either way that would be this young man joined right of high school and was dead by the age when most young people are starting to graduate from college. I know Cpl. Starr volunteered, that he supported the war (whatever that means), but that doesn’t make it any less sad. Especially when you consider the lies and back-door shenanigans used to take us to war.