After Jonah Goldberg teed the story up, Michael Gerson nails it in the Washington Post today (What in hell am I doing in bed with these guys? I don't know, I just like it, they're not scrawny like my usual bedfellows, but a little doughy, well-fed):
It is more likely that Ginsburg is describing the attitude of some of
her own social class — that abortion is economically important to a
"woman of means" and useful in reducing the number of social
undesirables. Neither judge nor journalist apparently found this
attitude exceptional; there was no follow-up question.
I agree. This is all about elitism. And for me this is a Jewish struggle. Exceptionalism, the creed of my family growing up, of Ruth Bader Ginsburg and I venture journalist Emily Bazelon as well, must be interrogated. Notice I don't say, Thrown out. Interrogated.
Yes I noticed you didn't say "thrown out". And with "interrogated" you will find a more comfortable, a more palatable way to continue. You might quote Nietzsche,"revaluation of values" and consider this as it applies to your Jewishness: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_JrrnJ2pjA&fe... Richard W. is in the Camel stage, you are just entering in the lion stage, IMHO. You can reevaluate, but can you create? …Not and hold on to your Jewishness.
You mean we have class issues in America? Reagan told us not to talk about those.
RE: "a little doughy" MY COMMENT: A LOT doughy in Jonah Goldberg's "doughy pantload" case. SADLY NO – http://www.sadlyno.com/archives/22788.html
RE: "Michael Gerson nails it in the Washington Post today" FROM DAILY KOS : Michael Gerson goes after Ruth Bader Ginsburg for an answer she gave on abortion during a recent interview, and Gerson says a "statement like this should not be taken out of context." Too bad he omitted two sentences from the statement. SOURCE – http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/7/17/75442...
We already practice eugenics through genetic counseling, prenatal testing, and the abortion of fetuses with serious genetic defects. If, say, a single mother living in poverty with a chaotic social life aborts a fetus, there is a good chance that it will avoid tens of thousands of dollars (at least) in public costs from social services and the criminal justice system. If the unfortunate kid never manages to get his life together, you are looking at Harvard-tuition level expenses. A state with a strong social safety net winds up paying for babies that are brought into the world by those who can't or won't care for them properly. It's entirely reasonable that the state would wish to promote abortion of fetuses statistically destined to become a public burden. (This is why libertarians are so hostile to social welfare programs.) Unless you 1.) are rich enough to avoid living in areas of social chaos, 2.) want to be wiped out by taxes (or imagine that the money will come from "someone else"), you should be able to see the logical point in Ginsburg's statement.
The basic issue here is who Ginsburg meant by "we" when she spoke of populations "we don't want too many of." Literally one would expect that "we" includes herself, but expecting people to always speak literally is naive and suggests an inability to understand nuanced speech. I still think she was speaking ironically (Jews are known to do this on occasion, you know) and in reference to the historical supporters of birth control who explicitly argued that contraception, abortion, and voluntary sterilization would reduce "undesirable elements" of the population. Yes, it is odd that you now find yourself "in bed" (as you put it) with people like Jonah Goldberg and Michael Gerson. This isn't, by itself, proof that you're off the mark on this issue (even someone like Goldberg may be right once in a blue moon), but it is something that ought to cause you to think carefully about the situation. When you find yourself in bed with pigs, the likelihood is that you're lying in mud.
What is the price society pays for people like Ivan Boesky, or Michael Milken or Sandy Weil, or Bernie Madoff, or Robert Rubin or Marc Rich…
"Literally one would expect that "we" includes herself, but expecting people to always speak literally is naive and suggests an inability to understand nuanced speech" – Ginsburg was giving an interview, she was not ruminating at a cocktail party. If she hasn't the good sense to speak in such a manner to make herself clearly understood in an interview, then she hasn't the good sense to be a judge. But then again her receiving her position was *Killing two birds with one stone* (is that nuanced enough for you?).
One could turn this around and say that she was giving an interview, not writing a legal opinion. I don't expect people to speak in interviews as if they were writing mathematical proofs, and in any case Supreme Court justices are in a very different position from elected officials. Do you really think interview subjects never make use of irony or sarcasm?
Only reason this is posted is because Ginsburg is a Jew. "Bad Jew" theory of relevant news. Anything to make Jews sound worse and thus help ethnic cleansing of Jews from Israel.
Especially because she is a SUPREME COURT JUSTICE she should make herself clear. Speaking so that you are understood is not equivalent to writing a (complicated) mathematical proof, at least not for most people. I do hold a higher standard of communication for a SCJ than I do for dog catcher, but perhaps you don't.
Ginsburg said what she thought. I believe it is clear. You don't believe it is because of what that says about her and because you think tribally, what that says about you.
Well, I understood her just fine, as apparently did the interviewer. If you didn't, that probably says more about you than about her. Intelligent, educated people don't always speak literally, nor are they obliged, even in interviews, to communicate in baby-talk or take into account that a fair portion of the people reading the interview are likely to be cultural illiterates.
Yes I think you did understand her just fine and that is why you are trying so hard to spin what she actually said. Like when she said *we* she really meant *them* because being Jewish she couldn't possibly mean poor people should have abortions so that there would be fewer of them. "It was just *Nuance*"… right. That line must have worked on you once, probably more than once.
American left-liberals desperately DON'T want to beleive that Ginsberg was speaking literally, because they understand that lefty Jews like her and their thinking are the basis of their entire God-foresaken ideology. They've got their own icons and myths to maintain, although anybody who's studied left-wing movements know how inherently misanthropic they are. I guess they're upset that Ginsberg briefly let down the pretense of idealism.
(What in hell am I doing in bed with these guys? I don't know, I just like it, they're not scrawny like my usual bedfellows, but a little doughy, well-fed) FYI [Although meant as a joke it sounds like a liberal elitist Phil]
My wife Karin addressed the connection between birth control and eugenics in a recent op-ed that she published in the Khaleej Times: White, European and Endangered: Is the Caucasian Race Dying?