Life termination is called death, or killing if it is induced (murder if intentional and unjustified).

Abortion is pregnancy termination. In political terms, induced pregnancy termination – miscarriages are not the issue here.

I know of no one who has attempted to define killing people after they are born as an abortion, except jokingly.

What or who is a “person” or “person born” is a complex question; partly scientific and partly political”. “Human life” and “legal person” are not identical.

The LP platform plank does not attempt to answer those questions.

What if someone thinks that a human infant outside the womb is not a “person” until myelinization of the brain is complete?

What if a cow jumps over the moon? The issue here is that there is plain language in the current platform.

That position may or may not be correct, and it may or may not remain the party’s position in the future.

If someone wants to make the case for legal infanticide, they can do so, but it isn’t abortion, isn’t the topic of the LP plank, and doesn’t mean there is any doubt about what the term abortion means as used in that plank.

There are many things “stated” in the Constitution that are and have been complexly argued before the Supreme Court and decided on a 5-4 vote. Hardly a consensus.

My real point is that the LP should not have a detailed platform. The LP members are not competent to define how everything should be in arrogant detail. The LP should stick to a simple, clear, unambiguous mission statement. Let the individual candidates state what they intend to accomplish if nominated and elected.

You falsely portray the complexities inherent within the definition of “human” as being a dichotomy: “partly scientific and partly political”; yet throw a pitch with a ball doctored with philosophy/religion.

You threw another false dichotomy with: “‘pregnancy termination’ and ‘life termination’”.

There is no complexity to “person born”. This is the standard stated in the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. If you disagree, then you are free to attempt to institute a Constitutional Amendment redefining “lawful person”. Any legislation short of a Constitutional Amendment is itself an unconstitutional tyranny.

It does not define “abortion”. I know everybody thinks they know what the word means, but it is not self-explanatory. There is a difference between “pregnancy termination” and “life termination”. What or who is a “person” or “person born” is a complex question; partly scientific and partly political”. “Human life” and “legal person” are not identical. What if someone thinks that a human infant outside the womb is not a “person” until myelinization of the brain is complete?

“A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed. ”

As saying that only those people in a well-regulated militia should have the right to keep and bear arms, and that this regulation refers to government regulation as we now understand it – and that the National Guard is that militia.

Of course, this is absurd – why would the government need a constitutional provision that the government has the right to keep and bear arms?

Likewise, if anyone wants to suggest that the “matter” on which each individual should have their own conscience is whether they support government prohibiting abortions for other people who wish to have them – this is absurd, since it would be far simpler to simply not have a plank on this issue at all if that was the case.

It appears that Geoffrey, and perhaps Donny, is reading this:

Recognizing that abortion is a sensitive issue and that people can hold good-faith views on all sides, we believe that government should be kept out of the matter, leaving the question to each person for their conscientious consideration.

as:

Recognizing that abortion is a sensitive issue and that people can hold good-faith views on all sides, we believe that our party should be kept out of the matter, leaving the question to the government for their conscientious consideration.

Notwithstanding that this is clearly not what it says, why would such a statement even need to be made in the political platform of any party – wouldn’t it be more verbally economic not to have a plank, since the party would then not be taking any position at all?

http://libertarianmajority.net/power-platform#toc9

8. Reproductive Rights and Population

The Issue: The tragedies caused by unplanned, unwanted pregnancies are aggravated and sometimes created by government policies of censorship, restriction, regulation and prohibition. Recognizing that abortion is a sensitive issue and that people can hold good-faith views on both sides, we believe that government should be kept out of the matter, leaving the question to individuals for their conscientious consideration.

The Principle: The American people are not a collective national resource. Individual rights should not be denied nor abridged on the basis of gender, age, dependency, or location. Taxpayers should not be forced to pay for other people’s abortions, nor should any government or individual force a woman to have an abortion. It is the right and obligation of the pregnant woman, not the state, to decide the desirability or appropriateness of prenatal testing, Caesarean births, fetal surgery, voluntary surrogacy arrangements and/or home births.

Solutions: We oppose government actions that either compel or prohibit abortion, sterilization or any other form of birth control. Specifically we condemn the practice of forced sterilization of welfare recipients, or of individuals with diminished mental or physical capacity. We support the voluntary exchange of goods, services or information regarding human sexuality, reproduction, birth control or related medical or biological technologies. We oppose government laws and policies that restrict the opportunity to choose alternatives to abortion. We oppose all coercive measures for population control.

Transitional Action: We support an end to all subsidies for childbearing built into our present laws, including welfare plans and the provision of tax-supported services for children. We would eliminate special tax burdens on single people and couples with few or no children.

The 2008 platform was sold to the delegates as a simplification of the verbiage on this issue, not a change in overall policy – which has long been, and continues to be, no government prohibition of abortion, despite all the caveats listed.

Those of you who have gone to “The Libertarian Party” facebook group will indeed find a list of “Officers”. If you know something about Facebook — perhaps his grand-daughter can explain it to him — you will realize that the list of “Officers” found on every facebook group is a list of people with particular powers in that group. Of course, you can be made an officer without your permission, so perhaps some of those people are taken by surprise. However, the reason I refer to Barr as an officer of the group is that the word at the top of the list of names is “Officer”.

The names by the way are
“Bob Barr (Atlanta, GA)
2008 Presidential Nominee
Donny Ferguson (Washington, DC)
Director of Communications
Austin Petersen
Volunteer Coordinator
Michael Jingozian
Vice-Chair
Aaron Starr (Ventura County, CA)
Treasurer
Patrick Dixon
At-Large Representative
R. Lee Wrights
At-Large Representative
R Anthony Ryan (Sioux Falls, SD)
Region 1 Representative
Scott Lieberman
Region 2 Alternate
Stewart Flood (Charleston, SC)
Region 4 Representative
James Lark (UVA)
Region 5S Representative
Hardy Macia (Manchester, NH)
Region 5N Alternate
Jake Porter (Des Moines, IA)
Region 6 Alternate
Rachel Hawkridge (Seattle, WA)
Region 7 Representative
Stephen Gordon (Huntsville / Decatur, AL)
Chairman, LSLA”
Perhaps they are unaware of how their name is being used.

In American English, as Paulie has explained, our platform is entirely explicit.

By God, though, Geoffrey is right on something! Apparently serving on the platform committee had no effect on Donny’s cognizance of the actual party platform.

Finally, I would suggest that “Geoffrey” tries working on his English comprehension, which as we see here from the above is sadly deficient. As an approach, try reading out loud to your grand-daughter, Geoffrey, and have her help you with the hard words. Our former President used to read out loud a challenging book. You should try it. I do not know if “My Pet Goat” is available in the United Kingdom.

“1.4 Abortion
Recognizing that abortion is a sensitive issue and that people can hold good-faith views on all sides, we believe that government should be kept out of the matter, leaving the question to each person for their conscientious consideration.”

This is indeed a pro-choice position that the platform takes on abortion. If government passes laws against abortion, it’s certainly not being kept out of the matter.

How is this not plain English? It states, very explicitly, that abortion should be up to the conscientious consideration of each person, with government holding no role in the matter – but that we recognize that some people can disagree with our pro-choice position (which the party has had for decades, and which has never been revoked) in good faith.

I found the good professors comment #3 above to be rather intriguing, so I enlisted my grandchild to have a quick look around the web and answer some questions for me pertaining to your USLP stand on abortion.

First thing she did was laugh when she read the good professors verbiage concerning the word “explicit.”

Grandfather, she said to me, the definition (according to our dictionary perched up here beside me on the bookshelf) of “explicit” is “precisely and clearly expressed or readily observable; leaving nothing to implication” – then she goes on to say “their platform is anything but explicit!”

I said, good work! Then a little bit more digging on this Donny Ferguson character showed that he was actually on your platform committee, twice, that wrote this! A little further digging shows that your members wanted ‘explicitly” not to state if abortion should be legal or illegal.

Mr. Professor, clearly English is not your subject. Go back to school.

Geoffrey

PS – Regarding your last comment sir, Cong. Barr is clearly labeled “2008 LP Presidential Candidate” – I believe that clarifies that he is not an officer, as does the label for your Mr. Gordon whom is also listed.

Donny Ferguson pitches the pure Republican line when asserting the Solis was “lobbying for an anti-employer organization attempting to change federal law to allow union organizers to more easily coerce workers into joining unions”.

Why not just call it what it is; Solis supports card checks. Why is union organising considered to be anti-libertarian? Do not workers have a right to belong to any group they damn well please?

Card checks are no more coercive than an employer who threatens to shut down shop if the workers vote to form a union. Workers have a right to organise, and seek a collective bargaining agreement. The employer should not be forced by the government to agree, but damn well should face the consequences from bad public relations for not agreeing.

Th LP has become Republican Light.

Ron Paul is the closest thing we have to an exception on that, and even Ron Paul is just one vote of 435 in the House and he gets a few national cable news interviews.

In a real police state, no one is safe.

In a real police state, is is often difficult to tell the good from the bad.

In a real police state, no one is safe, not even those in power.