Free Republic

1. The foetus cannot be taken seriously as a person An unborn baby in its 7th week after conception Before I knew much about the abortion debate, I was entirely uninterested in the unborn baby. When it was mentioned, I accepted uncritically that the "foetus" was just some sort of overdeveloped sperm of no value or worth. Pro-abortion rhetoric convinced me that the baby in the womb was somehow an entirely different class of human from you or me, as though the mere act of leaving the womb and inhaling oxygen conferred humanity on someone. I'm not sure I considered...

SOMEONE CALLED GEORGE Monbiot was peculiarly allowed to write a column for the Guardian today. The result was some of the most idiotic ranting even they have dared print: "[America's] preparedness to go to war with Iraq without a mandate from the UN security council is a defiance of international law far graver than Saddam Hussein's non-compliance with UN weapons inspectors.... [I]f the US were not preparing to attack Iraq, it would be preparing to attack another nation. The US will go to war with that country because it needs a country with which to go to war.... [Tony Blair's]...

“But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded, and the glory of Europe is extinguished forever.”Edmund Burke, 1793 On British television recently, there was an advertisement for a beer. Set in the eighteenth century, it began by showing a pretty young woman sat in a carriage, looking on as the two men who seek her heart meet up in a field and bow before one another. Then, turning on their heels, they both walk towards their duelling positions. Except the duel doesn’t happen. After a few seconds, one of the duellers turns and...

Thought for the day If you believe in a truly libertarian society, your only way to success is in working to build a society based upon traditional morality, shame and chastity. Contradictory? Actually, no. Given a little examination, it turns out to be rather obvious; almost self-evidently true. If you want to live in a country where every man supports himself rather than looking to the taxpayer, where crime is rare and so massive police powers, ID cards and DNA databases are superfluous, you will not do so on the back of the destructive policies of social liberalism. Libertarians traditionally...