Trying to convince us that $250,000/yr is a "middle class income"?

Horse shit. And not the good, fertilizing kind.

McCain LOST the election tonight when he put "women's health" in airquotes.

What an "asshole".

For a small business with an employee or two $250,000 is very much middle class.

It's interesting, fjblau, that you can skip right over those children who were born in Illinois, and then were placed aside to die. How about we think what is best for their health as well? How about fighting for life? Can you imagine: fighting for the life of the woman and the baby?
I've never met or heard of a woman who regretted not killing her unborn baby. I know many many many woman who regret every beat of their dead child's heart that they snuffed out.
Legal or not, it is wrong, just like killing the Jews was wrong even though Hitler said it was "legal."

By the way, fjblau, just as Paul was transformed on the road to Damascus by Jesus himself, I am praying for that same transformation in you.

My little photography business brings in around $300,000 a year.(Thanks in large part to Gary's techniques) I have one full time employee and a handfull of part-timers. Work out of my home. Still growing the business AND working on being more efficient - shrinking the operation. The truth is I am a photographer AND an IRS collections agent. The tax burden for small businesses (and it gets no smaller than me) is burdonesome. I am EXTREMELY middle class. It's funny how people perceive people like myself as having so much free time and extra money. Not true. I am not complaining (although it may sound like it) - I chose this and wouldn't trade for anything.
But the concept of redistributing wealth to "help" those who are behind is silly and NOT what the framers of this form of govornment intended. This is not the govornments purpose!
These socialisistic ideas of taxing the snot out of one "class" will just suck the life out of those who are the very backbone and driving force behind economic growth. And that additional overhead will just be passed on to the customers OR cause business failings and an unemployment rise.

@thejohns - well said. We want the govornment to tell us what we should eat, not to smoke, hand out birth control to CHILDREN in middle school - but stay the HECK out of the way when we want to kill unborn children because we don't have time for them.

I agree with Gary - that this might be the end of America as we know it - just for some different reasons. Mainly the absolute moral tanking of a society who is so completely self absorbed that anything goes. Ask your grandmothers what they think of today's youth and society.

Ok -Frank and Jacksonwhole - take a deep breath....

... and Fire away!

-Chris

@fjblau - 

Really I have NERVER heard of a woman in this modern age dying in childbirth, come on maybe in the 20's-30's but not 2008.
and how come it's ok for you to use bad words but not for someone who is a christian, are you being judgmental?
I bet your mommy would be unhappy to see you writing such BAD words.
John McCain WON the debate by far look at the polls today.
I really wonder about you dude.
Do you work?

@isawthelight2 - 

Um, I wonder which polls you are looking at to make that statement?

Who fared better in Wednesday's presidential debate?
Sen. John McCain 22% 90748
Sen. Barack Obama 72% 297582
No clear winner 6% 23643
(CNN)

14.3%
John McCain
34,766 votes
82.2%
Barack Obama
200,233 votes
1.8%
Tie
4,282 votes
1.8%
Not sure
4,338 votes

(MSNBC)

(CBS) Uncommitted voters named Barack Obama as the winner of the third and final presidential debate by a large margin, according to a CBS News/Knowledge Networks poll.

So um, yeah. Maybe Fox news? Tell you what... lets wait a few days for the national tracking polls to pick up the post-debate standing... then we'll come back to this, ok?

And as for praying for me... by all means... my mom does too. It's cute. Pointless, but cute. But her words about Republicans are even worse than mine. :)

And yes, I work. Full time. Good salary. :)

"Really I have NERVER heard of a woman in this modern age dying in childbirth,"

You really need to get out more.

I've noticed that many pro-lifers miss the point.

Pro-choice should not be confused with being anti-life. It is a philosophy of placing the burden of the decision on the person most affected; the mother, rather than leaving it in the hands of the government. Pro-choice is about having the ability to making a personal choice and sacrifice. Not every pro-choice mother chooses abortion. The burden of ultimate judgement will be between the woman and her creator (if you believe in the concept of one). Let her own up to that responsibility.

Personally I am pro-choice AND pro-life and I don't want the government to take either one of those away from me.

I find it ironic that pro-lifers such as Bush and McCain have no qualms about sending our nation's young men to war where death is an expected outcome. Such hipocrisy.

@fjblau - 

Really send me the names and I will look them up.
I really doubt you will come up with any.
and Yes I only listen to FOX news and it's a little too liberal for me.
why would I waste my time listening to the liberal news media just spout their lies?
Just as your polls are nothing but lies.
And as for the guy below you there you CAN'T be pro-life AND pro- death. duh
If you have sex and get blessed with a little baby made of your own flesh and blood do the responsible thing and raise it or give it to a family who wants a little bundle of joy to raise and love and watch grow and start a family of their own and bring along their own kids its a cycle God in heaven created, I only feel sorry for a mother who has to live with the knowledge that she killed her own baby and she will remember that till the day she dies.
Just do the right thing.

WE BRING THE FIGHT TO YOU!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22425001#27215561

some really good friends of mine just had their daughter die during childbirth this last summer. She was an otherwise healthy 24 year old. Baby survived. It does happen, even if it doesn't happen to you.

"and Yes I only listen to FOX news and it's a little too liberal for me."

There is an old expression in Alcoholics Anonymous (25 years, thanks) that says "if one person tells you that you have a tail you can assume they are insane, but if 2 or 3 people tell you that you have a tail, the least you can do is turn around and check"...

But I can certainly understand now how you think John McCain won last night if your ONLY source in the world is Fox News.

And um, I've raised two bundles of joy already... now they are teenagers. Healthy, happy, smart, beautiful teenagers.

So, I've already done the right thing, thanks.

Ps: They are also intellectually curious, spiritually interested, politically involved and musically inclined. OK, one is a vegan, which I just don't get, but kids have to rebel somehow!

"Just as your polls are nothing but lies."

Well then, we'll just wait for the election... unless of course, democracy itself is a lie.

Peace,

Frank

@NUYOKA_AND_CO - 

Thanks I loved it.
I'm going to post it myself, I bet I know who he is voting for.

And otto 802 what happened didn't they tell her in time so she could have killed her baby instead.

I'm glad your off the alcohol.
But the tail thing?

@qnetx - 

so do you vote pro-LIFE or pro-death (after all that is what it really is)

@qnetx - 

If I saw my little girl going out into the road and a car was coming do you think I would go get her, or not go so that I could live. after all it would be my choice, but I'm afraid I couldn't live with that choice.

@fjblau - 

ok I get it, when you tell me you have listened to Jack Van Impe I will listen to CBS

"ok I get it, when you tell me you have listened to Jack Van Impe I will listen to CBS"

I could care less if you listen to CBS. Really. Your ignorance is your loss, not mine. But I did check out Jack Van Impe. My vote says "fundamentalist nutcase". Thanks for the education on yet another one.

And I had a sister-in-law die during childbirth too. A tragic loss to our family. So you can kindly STFU about something you know nothing about.

If the only abortions happened in the case of dying mothers then this wouldn't even be a discussion point because that is very rare.

It's equally ironoc that many anti-war people (legit reasons for being anti-war by the way) are so because there is never a reason for war and death - are pro abortion - the right to kill an unborn baby because they want to. There is conflict on both sides. Hypocrasy knows no political party!

MSNBC? Really. You can lump them in with Fox if you want - but their ratings and biased are laughable. Maddow and Olberman are the biggest sniveling winers who have ever been on TV! Unwatchable. CNN the same. Fox certainly biased to the right - mass media today is simply another form of pop culture.

"mass media today is simply another form of pop culture."

No worries, we'll just wait for all those people in those polls to actually vote on November 4th... unless of course, democracy is ALSO just another form of pop culture... :)

Here's a link to the RISING number of maternal deaths during childbirth in the US:

Rising Childbirth Deaths

So, um, isawthelight2, you might want to stop bearing false witness. I've heard your theology frowns on that.

@theojohns - 

I consider that birth control, including abortion, should be assessed on a case by case basis. I am not a woman, I never lived through the dilemma of choosing, nor lived the consequences of keeping a child in a social situation that may make that child wanting for two loving, caring, and providing parents for its emotional and mental stability. If we look at criminal and social statistics, problem children come from families who could not care for them properly, including foster homes: that includes delinquency, drugs, major crimes. Not all children become delinquent, but it's heavily represented in those areas.

This DOES NOT MEAN, for one second that abortion should be based on this. Abortion should be assessed on a case by case basis with professionals, not born-again Christians, unless they are health-care professionals and psychologists who can actually put their personal beliefs aside to act without bias.

If "killing" unborn babies is such an issue with you, you should be demonstrating in the streets calling back soldiers from Irak and Afghanistan who killed and continue killing either directly or by they're being there, dozens of innocent men, women, and children, including, probably, pregnant women who DO WANT their children to be born, and live happy lives. The fact that armed intervention does not work in invaded countries should be a clue that intervening in other people's lives to impose your lifestyle does not work, either. Remember, WWII, the US and Canada did not go to war to impose their lifestyle on the countries they liberated, but to liberate countries from German invasion. Not the same thing as what is happening in Irak and Afghanistan, in case you want to make a comparison. And, it was not a question of oil, either.

YOU WRITE: "Fighting for the life of the woman and the baby": How about minding your own business, instead of imposing your narrow views and values on other people you simply don't know? You don't seem to care about the conditions in which the child may be born as well as the psychological and financial stability of the mother. How can you generalize life based on your own narrow, close-minded point of view?

You write: "You've never met or heard a woman who regretted..." And you probably never will, because you will filter out anyone who could go against your beliefs and values. You will remain blind to them. As far as the women who regret every beat of their dead child's heart..." It sounds so poetic... How "many, many" do you really know? 3, 5, 10, 25? Out of how many thousands of women who get abortions, for their own reasons?

You compare abortion to the killing of the Jews? Are you serious or are you just acting like an imbecile? Note, I did not say you're an imbecile, but just acting like one. Definite lack of sensitivity, though. You should apologize to jewish readers.

These parrot-like empty phrases that you keep repeating to yourself to convince yourself, are the very stuff that hypnotize you into blind faith. Wake up, look around, the world is more complex than your aseptic judgmental, narrow born-again Christian dogma would like you to believe.

You SEEM to be living in fear. Fear of not going to Heaven, fear of not being raptured, probably. God-fearing, I suppose, not being able to be counted as one of the "just". Fear created God and all the myths surrounding that. Jesus, if he really existed as one single person, never wrote a single word. He was interpreted by men much less perfect than he was who had political and personal agendas. Read conflicting passages. Read the Scriptures that were not included by MEN in the current Bible, because it did not fit the message that they chose to distribute.

Once you liberate yourself from thinking that there is something beyond your living life, you will start living your life as it is right now, be compassionate and understanding to people who have real life problems, and not live life through mind-made egocentric fables. Do I have all the answers? No, I don't. At least, I do not have only one answer as you SEEM to have. I'm open-minded to many answers. Human life is work in progress. It's obvious that we're drifting away from Nature to bury ourselves in ego-centric illusions, of which religion is one of the biggest.

If there is indeed a God, then let Him rule the world as He seems fit. I doubt, if He needs YOUR meddling. Who are you to play God? Who gave you the right?