Posted on 12/08/2006 8:31:16 PM PST by rakovskii
Mary Cheneys pregnancy poses problems not just for her child, but also for all Americans. Her action repudiates traditional values and sets an appalling example for young people at a time when father absence is the most pressing social problem facing the nation. With 37 percent of American children born to fatherless families, Mary Cheney is contributing to a trend that is detrimental to all Americans who will live with the ramifications of millions of children whose anger and frustration at not knowing their father will be felt in the public schools and communities of our nation.
Mary Cheney is among that burgeoning group of adult women over age 20 that are driving the trend of women who dont want a man in the picture, but want to have a baby. These older women are pushing out-of-wedlock birth statistics higher and higher. At a time when teen births and teen abortions are declining dramatically, older women are having more un-wed births and more abortions, including repeat abortions (indicating that they are using abortion as birth control).
Well-educated, professional Mary Cheney is flying in the face of the accumulated wisdom of the top experts who agree that the very best family structure for a childs well-being is a married mom and dad family. Her child will have all the material advantages it will need, but it will still encounter the emotional devastation common to children without fathers.
One Georgia high school principal reported, We have too many young men and women from single-mother families that dont have the role models at home to teach them how to deal with adversity and handle responsibility. Theyve seen their mom work 60 hours a week just to put food on the table; they end up fending for themselves.
When fatherless children get to be teens, the girls tend to start looking for love in all the wrong places and the boys tend to find as their role model the bad-boy celebrities of MTV, NFL and NBA.
As they grow older, fatherless children tend to have trouble dealing with male authority figures. Too often children in single-mother households end up angry at their absent fathers and resentful of the mother who has had to be a father figure, too. Typically, the boys who have a love-hate relationship with their mother end up hating all women. Numerous of them look for vulnerable women where they can act out their anger and be in control.
Mary Cheneys action sets an example that is detrimental for mothers with less financial resources who will start down an irrevocable path into poverty that tends to be generational children in households without a father tend to themselves have unwed births later in life. Experts from both the left and the right cite a disastrous litany of negative outcomes that are predictable when a child grows up in a fatherless family. Such children tend to get involved in drugs, alcohol abuse, and delinquency; they tend to drop out of school and have teen pregnancies. An assistant principal in a Junior High School said that many of the behavioral problems that teachers face in the classroom stem from households without a fathers influence.
Marys pregnancy is an in-your-face action countering the Bush Administrations pro-family, pro-marriage and pro-life policies. She continues to repudiate the work to which her father has devoted his life. Mary has repeatedly said that studies show that children only need a loving home. Her statement is incomplete because the experts agree that for the well-being of children, they desperately need a married father and a mother.
All those people who talk about doing what is best for our children need to get back to the basics: children need a married mom and dad. Children can do without a lot of the trimmings of childhood, but nothing can replace a home where the mother and dad love each other enough to commit for a lifetime and are absolutely crazy about their kids enough to be willing to sacrifice their own needs to see that their children get the very best.
Janice Shaw Crouse, Ph.D., Senior Fellow at the Beverly LaHaye Institute, a culturally conservative think tank for Concerned Women for America, is a recognized authority on domestic issues, the United Nations, cultural and womens concerns.
Actually Rush had nothing harsh to say about Mary Cheney's pregnancy. I take his stance to be that it's none of our business.
I do believe the stupidity of 'conservatives' is increasing exponentially. The Bill of Rights is a further list of limitations on the federal government in relation to the citizens of the respective states. What the federal government can do and not do to the citizens. Nothing more. It is not a list of rights that the citizens of the respective states have nor is it a list of limitations on the citizens. As a matter of fact the introduction to the Amendments reads
The Conventions of a number of the States having, at the time of adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added, and as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government will best insure the beneficent ends of its institution;The first attempted legislation that became an Amendment was the 18th (the 13th cannot be considered purely moral as it dealt with individual rights of others). Which was overturned less than 20 years later. I restate. You cannot, nor will not, be able to provide statements from the majority of the Framers (I doubt even one or two) that will advocate legislation of morality (including amending the Constitution) as it pertains to the citizens of the respective states at the federal level. This was intended to be an issue, as are all other issues 'true conservatives' are concerned with, for the separate and sovereign states
Fatherless, Motherless, Godless...the abyss.
"The Word, not the sword, is the tool the evangelist or witness must use. If I am not mistaken, historic Catholic teaching has condemned sex outside of matrimony. If you claim the name of Catholic, how can you then reject the authoritative teaching of your church, supported by Scripture and the writings of the church fathers and doctors? If you can find where the Magisterium of Catholicism has commended lesbianism and immoral relationships, please inform the Catholic ping list on FR."
Done hold your breath on that ping.
Right and you are a prime example of that stupidity.
Inclusion of the Bill of Rights was based on the moral concern of the founders that citizens God given rights could be abused by government. In fact the totality of the Constitution, the BOR's, the DOI and every law passed by every legislature since the founding are and were based on "moral concerns". If that causes you angst, that's a good thing but this really isn't a hard concept to grasp.
Why did everybody ignore Cheney's pro gay history when Bush picked him in 2000?
My bad, I thought Steve wrote it, I was confusing it with "You never even call me by my name", which David Allen Coe made big.
I agree, Goodman was a talent we lost too soon...
Self-righteous freaks like Haggard and Foley have done more to hurt conservatism than the biggest transvestite in San Francisco. If you are gay, stop pretending you aren't. And I suggest the constituents of Republican closet queens like Foley do their homework a little better come election day.
It's a basic question of morality, one that is being intentionally ignored because of Cheney's father. Imagine if this were Chelsey Clinton in a lesbian relationship having a child, and the howls of derision that would follow.
What does it take to become an expert these days? This woman is divorced, a gay activist and a family counselor? You'd be better off consulting a magic 8 ball for advice.
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I think a lot of the problem was having Mom in the local newspaper a lot. But despite the liberal activism to normalize gay families, little kids still think a family should be Mom and Dad, I think, and no matter how great the gay parents are, it can never be exactly the same.
Having said that, it's also true enough that plenty of heterosexual moms and dads are terrible, horrible parents (who is better, Britany Spears and K-Fed, better known as Fed-Ex, or Rosie O and her girlfriend? Yuck, some choice...). The argument is always made that two loving gay parents are better than two screaming/fighting hetero parents. But gays have exactly the same problems as everyone else when it comes to relationships, and I'd venture to say, more.
Since Mary Cheney has made her decision and it's underway, I wish them the best, and hope they have a healthy child and provide it as normal a life as possible.
"Children of the upper classes used to be farmed out to others, of the same station, to be raised to be knights, in the Middle Ages, with the poor and lower class' children being shipped off to work in higher class homes as servants. Farm children worked on farms, devoid, more or less of childhoods and once the Industrial Revolution hit, they went off to work in mills and mines and sweatshops; as well as being servants and prostitutes and thieves."
And I believe it's God's will for us to evolve past these archaic tradtions of medieval and industrial societies. Capitalism and the Judeo-Christian ethic have helped foster a world in which we can now hope to have functional parents more often than not. I don't see how gay parenting can be justified by the fact that parenting was dysfunctional over the greater course of history. Good points though.
"Gramsci insisted that alliances with non-Communist leftist groups would be essential to Communist victory. In our time, these would include radical feminist groups, extremist environmental organizations, so-called civil rights movements, anti-police associations, internationalist-minded groups, liberal church denominations, and others. Working together, these groups could create a united front working for the destructive transformation of the old Judeo-Christian culture of the West."
Excellent post
Correct definition of the Constitution and the limitations upon the federal government is defined as stupidity. Gotcha. Again, if you will, at no point will you be able to find arguments from the Framers for 'moral concerns' to be defined by law at the federal level. It just was not a consideration as they recognized it to be a right of the states. I realize this may destroy your world view and that of many other 'true conservatives' but it was just not intended.
Inclusion of the Bill of Rights was based on the moral concern of the founders that citizens God given rights could be abused by government
No, it is rather explicit. It was to define the role of the national government.
number of the States having, at the time of adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added
But in no way were they 'moral concerns'. Moral concerns would involve church attendance, marriage, theft, rape, etc. None of which was defined by the federal government (please note theft, rape, murder could plausibly be legislated by the federal government but it would only be in very specific instances under original intent)
every law passed by every legislature since the founding are and were based on "moral concerns". If that causes you angst, that's a good thing but this really isn't a hard concept to grasp.
It causes me no angst at all, although I do appreciate your wish for ill will upon me. What does cause me 'angst' are those that 'feel' morality should be defined at the federal level. Again, listen closely. I have no issue with the separate and sovereign states defining morality within their borders. This is right and correct concerning the Framers. What I have issue with is defining the same morality at the federal level, where it was never intended to be determined
"I believe that the divorce rate among heterosexuals is close to 50%. That is a real problem for those who believe that children *need* a mother and father."
The social acceptibility of divorce is part and parcel of the same breakdown in morality that advocates gay parenting and gay marriage. If people took the marraige vow seiously, we would be in much better shape. Both problems stem from the lack of absolutes and the abnegation of any personal responsibility to God for one's actions, regardless of one's particular religion.
(On a side note I also believe that anyone who says there is a perfect way to parent is not only delusional, but dangerous. As one very smart poster says: I am WAY too old to know everything. The parents I come in contact withand there are a lotwho believe themselves to be particularly good at parenting have VERY screwed up kids.)
"I do not approve of the militant gay agenda (of which Cheney is not a part, btw) because it is seeking to corrupt the ideal. However, I fundamentally support the liberty of others to make choices with which I do not agree in their private lives and without the need for approval from the majority of the population."
This is really the heart of the argument: Moral clarity vs. liberty. A free society must adapt some level of moral responsibility in order to preserve that freedom - otherwise it moves toward anarchy and social relativism. The founding fathers were not even totally in agreement over the degree to which religion should infuse a society. Maybe the gay parents i've known were bad examples, or maybe I'm a religious whacko, but the whole gay parenting thing is just not sitting right in my heart.
Yours is one of the most thoughtful posts on this thread. Thank you.
Especially when someone starts a thread like this.
It is gratifying, however, to see that there are actually several reasonable folks here to point out that it's nobody's business, and ridiculous to make some of the accusations that are being made here.
So whose business is it to make sure people are loving and caring parents?
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