Justices Gone Wild

Recently the US Supreme Court has made some decisions that I have found to be so disturbing that I have come to believe that the mental affliction that President George Bush has, is in fact highly contagious. The first decision was the one in which the Justices, none of whom are medical doctors or experts in the field decided that so called "partial birth abortions" are illegal. Well no, actually that a state ban on such actions are constitutional. Now this should bother everyone and in my opinion should not be framed as an abortion issue. Prior to this event, we have the Terri Shiavo case in which members of the US congress sought to pass a law based on their opinion that Terri Shiavo should not be taken off of life support. Much of this clear meddling in the personal medical life of both Terri and her rightful guardian, was based on the religious moral values of the members of congress that came out. If nothing else serves as a shining example of the reason for a separation of religion and the state, the Terri Shiavo case was it.

It was unfortunate that the Iraq war became the center of focus for much of the election news during the last election. Even though the Iraq war is a very important issue, I thought that this feeling that congressmen and women thought they could invade the private life of a citizen in order to determine what medical procedure should or should not be performed was a gross violation of the constitutional rights of US Citizens by one of the very bodies responsible for upholding said constitution.

So it came as little surprise to me that the Supreme Court would get in on the action. Reports said that the courts majority decision was that the Congress has the right to pass laws that they saw fit and to ban procedures they find reprehensible. There are a lot of things people don't agree with. For example I have no wish to be a vegetable. I have no wish to be live paralyzed from the neck down. I would like for my loved ones to be able to end life support under those circumstances. There are people who do not agree with that. I say that is perfectly fine for them. THEY shouldn't make such decisions but they do not have the right to dictate to me what manner of life I should live or what medical conditions I should be forced to "live through". In the case of the partial abortion ban, the justices put their personal, religious, etc. opinions over that of the medical establishment (with it's own faults) and experts in the field. While partial birth abortions may be rare, the fact of the matter is that some situation may arise where it may need to be done as the best procedure to protect the life of the mother. By using the language the court is reported to have used, it is only a matter of time before other abortive acts become "reprehensible" and therefore subject to congressional banning. Eventually we will see a situation where doctors would be unable to induce an abortion to save a mother until some other medical threat appears (often worse than the initial reason the woman showed up in the hospital). The NY Times had an article on that very situation in a South American country last year.

The next dumb decision made by the court was in regard to police chases. When they reported on it, ABC News noted that 30% of the victims of vehicle chases are innocent civilians. The issue at hand was the danger that such cases pose to the general public.. That 30% number clearly showed that police chases are a danger to the public. What I haven't seen is a report that shows how often criminals that escape car chases are caught later. Nor have I seen the percentages of captures when there is no chase involved. In other words what is the clearance rate for crimes that involved vehicles but not police pursuits. Is it possible to catch the criminal without the initial pursuit? If so shouldn't, for the safety of the public, there be restrictions on the conditions under which a pursuit will be undertaken? After all, given that most criminals in vehicles do not want to bring attention to themselves and want to survive to enjoy the spoils of their crime; wouldn't they be more likely to not speed, crash, dodge and weave and do those things that can get civilians killed? And if the ultimate purpose of policing is to keep the public safe, then why is a 30% civilian casualty rate acceptable but not a rarely performed abortion procedure?

Shiavo posts:
http://garveys-ghost.blogspot.com/2005/03/terri-kicking-horse-some-more-i-was.html
http://garveys-ghost.blogspot.com/2005/03/insanity-of-it-all-today-i-read-op-ed.html
http://garveys-ghost.blogspot.com/2005/03/teri-shiavo-and-you-even-though-most.html

Technorati Tags: critique, privacy, Supreme Court, US Constitution