How Can It Be Wrongful Death if Nobody Was Killed?

As tragic is it sounds, police officers in Kansas City arrested a woman for outstanding warrants and traffic violations, allegedly causing her to have a miscarriage.

The 32 year old woman was three months pregnant when she was arrested last year. Video tapes show the woman was complaining that she was three months pregnant and bleeding at the time of the arrest, one female officer is quoted as saying, "how is that my problem?"

Now, that is a horrible situation, which has been rightfully followed up by a wrongful death lawsuit by the woman who was thrown in jail.

The bigger issue, however, is how a wrongful death suit can be brought by a mother who miscarried, when nobody technically died?

If nobody technically dies during the course of an abortion, as recognized by the federal courts, how is this any different?

Is it merely because the mother says so? What about the father? Should then, the father be awarded an opportunity to stop a pregnant woman from having an abortion?

I believe that anyone that maliciously causes the miscarriage of a baby should be held civilly and criminally responsible. I also believe that the lack of consistency in the law is an abomination.

The law pretty much assumes that the mother is granted sole right of the baby while she is pregnant, thus allowing her by herself to make the determination as to whether or not she will obtain an abortion when pregnant.

Sooner or later, the law is going to have to make very clear that unborn children have rights granted under the United States Constitution.

At the very least, considering this is a civil suit, I should hope that perhaps this will lead to suits by would-be fathers to stop would-be mothers from having abortions.

After all -- shouldn't we be consistent in the law and the courts?

Don't Tell Al Gore – It Just Snowed In Phoenix

Another fine posting from the Center For Individual Freedom (www.cfif.org):

Don't tell Al Gore, but it snowed in Phoenix, Arizona this past week. In fact, this month has been the coldest January in Phoenix since 1979.

Global warming, we hardly knew ye.

Considering the "urban heat island" effect that has resulted from Phoenix's explosive population growth during that twenty-eight-year period, National Weather Service meteorologist Paul Iniguez concedes, "you can only hypothesize how cold it could have gotten."

The timing of this desert cold spell couldn't be more ironic. After all, back in the 1970s, climate change alarmists were trumpeting "global cooling" as the impending crisis.

For example, the always-reliable New York Times lamented plummeting temperatures in its December 29, 1974 edition, warning that "the facts of the present climate change are such that the most optimistic experts would assign near certainty to major crop failure in a decade."

Newsweek Magazine echoed this erroneous consensus in 1975, stating that "there are ominous signs that the Earth's weather patterns have begun to change dramatically, and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production – with serious political implications for just about every nation on Earth."

Thirty years later, chronic obesity, rather than mass starvation, is the new boogeyman of every nanny-state politician and "health advocate" throughout the country. Even in China, whose proverbial starving children once provided American parents with a basis to order their children to clear their plates, faces increasing obesity.

This 1970s fad, however, didn't pass as abruptly as such other embarrassing '70s fads as disco, El Caminos and Jimmy Carter.

As recently as 1992, in fact, Newsweek reported that increasing snowfall amounts could reflect sunlight back into space, triggering revived glacier growth in North America.

This tail-chasing confusion amongst climate change alarmists obviously provides amusement for more sober observers. The alarmists' spectacular failure and remarkable pivot should prompt anyone bombarded with predictions of global warming doom to immediately respond, "Remember Global Cooling!"

Unfortunately, the real-world consequences of this environmentalist back-and-forth are anything but amusing.

This fall, Senators Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME) commanded Exxon-Mobil to stop donating to private groups who, according to them, "contributed to the small but unfortunately effective climate change denial myth." The Senators' effort to silence free speech ironically came the very same week in which the United Nations admitted that the Kyoto Protocol is failing.

Similarly, Weather Channel climatologist Dr. Heidi Cullen, host of "The Climate Code," calls for the American Meteorological Society ("AMS") to refuse to approve any television weather reporter who voices skepticism toward global warming alarmism.

For his part, Al Gore has labeled climate change realists "global warming deniers," drawing a sinister parallel to Holocaust deniers.

The simple truth is that the only constant in the world's climate history is change. Periodic ice ages are common throughout the earth's history, regardless of human activity.

Further, critics of environmentalist initiatives such as the Kyoto Protocol have been proven correct, as nations that have passed the Kyoto accord have failed to meet its standards while suffering economic consequences. These realists, however, are increasingly isolated, denounced and even silenced.

The underlying reality is that climate change is not environmentalists' real concern. After all, does anyone really believe that environmentalists fear urban damage due to rising coastlines, when they detest urban society and human development anyway?

Rather, environmentalists' underlying goal is to impose greater power over American lives and achieve greater self-importance. Global warming is merely a trendy vehicle for that agenda. Shrewdly, these environmentalists have latched onto a hypothesis that cannot be proven or disproven for at least several decades (or until their study grants run out), allowing them to impose their agenda through public hysteria in the meantime.

As the global warming echo chamber becomes progressively louder, it is more critical than ever that scientists and citizens engage in free, open, unmolested, honest debate concerning climate change and public policy.

Instead, climate McCarthyism gains increasing momentum. In the battle between free speech and environmental orthodoxy, climate alarmists are on the march... Snow in Phoenix be damned.

Republicans Nominate West Point Army Brass For County Council, Dems Get Desperate

The Republican Central Committee recently met for the purpose of nominating a replacement for Doug Funderburk on the County Council. Funderburk, as you probably know, vacated his seat after being elected state representative for his district.

Although former state Represenatative Cindy Ostmann was the early favorite going into the meeting, political newcomer Paul Wynn grabbed the nomination in a unanimous vote.

What does it take to snatch an almost obvious nomination from a seasoned political veteran? How about this:

-West Point graduate (as is his brother)
-Number two all-time punt returner for Army
-Major, United States Army Reserve
-Two tours of duty in Iraq, recently returning from second tour
-Minister
-Married, father of five

The democrats, on the other hand, had to make a few phone calls in order to nominate their candidate. Over the phone, they managed to muster the votes to nominate Terry Briggs, an IBEW member at Boeing. Briggs is reported by the St. Louis Post Dispatch as saying he is, "very much a pro-labor individual." (This from an IBEW member? What a shock! *insert eye roll here*) He wants to bring more balance to the council, which has a 4-2 Republican majority.

It makes me wonder what direction Mr. Briggs feels the county is going that needs changing ... but I digress.

The fact that they had to have a last minute phone call to make their nomination speaks volumes about the quality of the candidate they have chosen to field.

Wynn ought to be a slam dunk. Let's hope he gets out and learns the game early and runs a successful campaign. I like the looks of this candidate, he may go far!

Hanoi Jane is At It Again!

Count Sean Penn and Michael J. Fox in as two more self-described experts in foreign policy, as Hollywood met Washington this weekend.

Now, everybody knows that Penn is nothing more than a liberal thug anyway, but any credibility that Fox managed to garner from his pro-stem cell ads across the country is out the window, now. From this point forward, he will forever be teamed with Hanoi Jane and Sean the hothead liberal.

Jane Fonda ... well, what can one say about her? She betrayed her countrymen in Vietnam almost 40 years ago, and now she's being taken seriously again? Perhaps she'd like to visit a camp of Muslim fundamentalists in Iraq, and see how they react to her liberal agenda?

For those who aren't aware, there are well documented stories of this treasonous bitch here, here and here.

As I sat the other day with a soldier recently back from Iraq, he stated to me his displeasure at what these people, specifically the new Congressional majority, were doing to the morale of the troops overseas.

Here's my thought: Get the damn media out of Iraq, get the politics out of the military and LET THEM DO THEIR DAMN JOB!

This war would have been over long ago if this had happened from the start!

These Congressmen and women and Senators that choose to belittle our presence in Iraq during this time of war should be impeached. While the war may not be popular, it is far less popular for elected leaders to lack leadership and courage, allowing the winds of political polls to determine public policy.

Sometimes, doing what is popular is not always doing what is right.