A word on embryonic stem cell research

President Bush was vilified for not allowing federal funding for stem cell research. These stem cells originated from "thrown away" embryos in fertility labs, and since they were "garbage", they could be used for experimental research that has the potential to cure diabetes, Alzheimer's, etc. The thought that fully realised embryos, which, if they were merely implanted into a womb would grow into a child, was not something President Bush could support with federal funds. It amounts to aborting an embryo before it's even been in a womb. There was a common misconception that he made it "illegal". He did not. He just didn't want American tax dollars supporting it. Just like regular abortion.

Then our saviour, Barak H. Obama came into office and reversed that decision immediately. But it's too late. American scientists have figured out how to create stem cells without a fertilized embryo ( http://www.dbtechno.com/health/2009/04/25/scientists-make-history-find-new-way-to-create-stem-cells/ ). But it's probably no matter. Experimenting on potential children is the "change" we voted for.

Why I'm pretty sure I think I'm pro-Life. Maybe. I'm getting there.

When I was in high school, I was a Leftist. So far Left, it makes me sick thinking about it now. I would attend protests calling for the destruction of the Jewish state, and for former President Bush to be tried and hanged for war crimes. I went to a high school that didn't exactly discourage this sort of thing. I think of it as Indoctrination High (David Horowitz's new book, Indoctrination U: http://www.amazon.com/Indoctrination-U-Against-Academic-Freedom/dp/1594032378/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1240232313&sr=8-1 ).

I was a Leftist before I started there, however my level of political interest was limited until my senior year of high school. The only thing my mother voted on was the issue of abortion, even on the state and local level. If you didn't support a woman's right to choose, she didn't support you. Slowly, starting in college, uncharacteristically, I moved to the right. It started with two books: A History of Israel by Howard Sachar, a dry historical accounting of Israeli history from WWI to the present. I saw the Middle East, for the first time, in an un-biased light, and it made me wonder why the Left was hellbent on defending a people that tried to commit genocide against another ("throw the Jews into the sea!" was exclaimed during the War of Independence in 1947). The Jews were always eager to give land and peace whenever possible, but were often thwarted by the Arabs who were insistent on the destruction of the Jewish State, and nothing less. A second book, Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand showed me the future of a socialist state, and made me totally reevaluate my economic leanings. Something that I've held onto, however, was my social Leftism. Until now.

Like many other bits of my Leftism, I never quite understood how people believed in G-d and religion. I thought it was a crock. There's a famous quote by the wrestler-turned-Governor Jesse Ventura, "Religion is a crutch for the weak-minded." That was my truth. I always self-identified as Jewish, and culturally and historically sided with the Jewish people. The G-d part of it, however, I didn't quite buy. It wasn't until a biology class my first year of college that something clicked. The perfect way that everything worked, how every cell and every system of the body perfectly complimented another, the thought struck me. "This is no accident." Thus started my venture into the world of religion, only this time I wasn't an outsider looking in.

So what does this have to do with abortion? During this same class, I started to see how much we are impacted by our DNA. How little nurture has so little to do with who we are, and how much it as to do with nature. Why did some siblings in the Holocaust survive when others did not? Why, in the face of adversity do some flourish and some fail? Partially it is to do with how we are raised, but mostly, it's how the genome falls. There is much less personal choice than most people feel comfortable with admitting. To me the argument that "it's just a bunch of cells" fell short of the reality. That bunch of cells was a potential person, with complexities and potential, just like a full-term fetus. It is no less a person at day 9 than it is at month 9. It astounds me to look at my baby cousin, to see how quickly her personality formed, long before she was aware of her own hands. Why are some babies "happy babies" and some miniature Scrooges? It's in our DNA, it's inherent.

In the summer of 2007, I spent three months in Cambodia. While I was there, teaching at an English school for adults, one of our students offered to let the female teachers come to her clinic, where she was performing abortions, to watch one. I was the only one to decline. The others I think saw it as a woman's right to choose in action. Each came back pale, and couldn't really speak about what they saw. It was, I think, much more violent and graphic than they expected. By the time the fetus was big enough to be vacuumed out, it already looked like a baby. Probably because it was.

After that point, I decided, personally, I would never do that to myself or my body, and more importantly, to my child. I decided, however, it was a personal choice that every woman had the right to make over her own body. Who are we to regulate that? But the thought occurred to me, once that embryo is formed, is that really her body anymore, or is it that it becomes outside of her control? Should it be one person's choice to end another's life? I don't think so anymore.

And what of the argument: they're going to do it anyway, let's give women a safe alternative? Do we give guns to convicted murderers, because, hey, they're going to do it anyway? No, we do not facilitate crimes just because of their likelihood of occurring. You can do it, in end we can't stop you but we shouldn't be offering a helping hand. Nor should we be providing tax-dollars to do it, Mr. Obama (read: Mexico City Policy).

We, as women, do have a choice. The choice is to not become pregnant in the first place. With the ready availability of birth control pills, condoms, IUDs, no woman in the United States of America has any business getting pregnant when we don't want to. (And yes, I know that I am ignoring the issue of rape and incest, however that is quite honestly an entirely new ball of wax, and the amount of abortions those cases actually account for is really quite small.) The issue becomes what happens when we do get pregnant accidentally.

My biggest issue with the Left is a complete lack of accountability, a complete lack of personal responsibility. We expect other people (read: the government) to provide our health care, to help us on defaulted mortgages on homes we could never afford in the first place, to pay for the retirements we never prepared for. However, taking ownership of these mistakes is the first step in making them right. We should not run from them, or pretend as though others should solve them. This should not doom children to death before life, nor to homes that never wished for them in the first place (pull a Juno, open the PennySaver, there are plenty of couples that would do anything for a child to love).

So, to echo the title of this entry. I'm pretty sure I'm pro-Life. I'm getting there. It's raining outside today, and I just hope that my mother doesn't pull a Zeus and strike me with lightening. That's probably the only thing stopping me from saying, yes, I am pro-Life. My first memory with my mother is driving down the highway on Long Island and giving protesters at an abortion clinic the finger. It's a happy memory. I'm almost able to settle myself with who I am now, to what I was then.

To all the Leftists reading this (I doubt any have made it this far), watch this:
http://www.catholicvote.com/

Chatting with Chavez today, bowling with Ahmadinejad tomorrow

Earlier today I loaded CNN.com as I usually do when I'm in the mood for a quick fix on the news. Given their unbelievably biased coverage of the tea parties earlier in the week (you can tell I Twitter too much when I made that one word instead of two), I've been doing that less frequently. What I saw almost made me fall off my couch. Our President sharing a coy smile and a handshake with none other than Hugo Chavez.

Even in my worst of Leftist days, I despised Mr. Chavez. I had a friend when I was living in Belgium (in 2002-2003) that was Venezuelan, and he would tell me stories of his family's apartment in Caracas getting fire bombed, and they always suspected Chavez's chronies. His parents would be harassed and assaulted at protests against the government. Even though I, at the time, was an avowed Socialist, I disapproved of his violent methods of keeping and saying in power.

There are many things that frighten me about Mr. Chavez. His being in bed with our greatest enemies, namely Arab extremists and Mr. Ahmadinejad, top fairly high on my list. In a visit to the UN in 2006 Mr. Chavez stood in front of the world and called a sitting U.S. President "the Devil" and declared that the US was "on its way down". Previously he had stated that Bush committed genocide and said the U.S. President should be imprisoned by an international criminal court. Granted, Obama has been on an anti-Bush bend for a while now (compare this to Bush's refusal to comment on Obama on his latest trip to Canada). Meeting, shaking hands with, and smiling for the cameras with Hugo Chavez is just another of President Obama's slaps in the face for a man who served this country for eight years. This meeting with Chavez, however, signals not just disrespect for former President Bush, but also a shocking Left turn in American foreign policy.

Mr. Obama seems to believe that opening tourism to Cuba will bring it closer to democracy, and farther from the Communist totalitarianism they've been living under for the past fifty years. Allowing more Americans onto the shores of this Communist isle will do nothing more than line the pockets of party leaders, further entrenching them in power. Family members who have vocally oppposed the regime would be foolish to visit, given the liklihood of an "accident" (read: firing squad) which would prevent their safe return to US soil. Being nice, Mr. Obama thinks, is enough to drive the country off the Communist dictatorship path it's been on for the past ten US Presidents.

Mr. Obama believes that he can charm the world the same way that he charmed the US public with empty rhetoric about "hope" and "change". Leaders like Kim Jong Il and Hugo Chavez, however, do not respond to smiles, handshakes, and empty threats of UN sanctions. Now, more than ever, we need a leader who the the rest of the world respects, and more importantly, fears. Niccolo Machiavelli famously stated, "It is better to be feared than loved. You cannot be both." Well delivered speeches, shirtless trots on the beach with your family in Hawaii, and catchy campaign slogans may win elections, Mr. Obama, but they do not, and will not, keep this country safe.