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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: cosmicforce who wrote (112216)	5/29/2009 5:02:00 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541906

Equal protection for people has to exist in a context. All people are free to swim so therefore blocking your access to your house by a channel is fine because you can swim to it. Blocking access (or just ground access) to my house but not other people's wouldn't seem to be equal treatment. Blocking such access to everyone's house would be unjust, and ridiculous, and maybe impossible, all of which in many ways might be more important points that equal treatment, but it would be equal. The Final Solutions are fine if one doesn't care about the human cost. I wasn't saying that the human cost doesn't matter or should not be considered, only that it wasn't the issue under debate. Its entirely reasonable to decide that a policy is equal, but creates or allows for an unconscionable human cost, so the policy shouldn't and won't be followed. I'm not downplaying or ignoring human costs. In many cases they may be the most important concern, and I wouldn't argue otherwise. When you making the big final decision on the actual policy issues, considering human costs is fine, and usually expected. If the issue is "Should desperately poor people be allowed to beg" (or "should they receive public benefits?" or whatever), then you need to consider human costs. But if the issue is whether its a violation of equal treatment under the law, then those human costs are mostly irrelevant. Irrelevant does not mean unimportant. A point that has no relevance to a specific technical question may be much more important than the question. My point isn't that its less important, or even that it isn't more important, or much more important. My only point is that it doesn't settle the specific question. If its much more important, then a reasonable response might be "how cares about that question, this other issue is far more important, why don't you pay attention to it?". But "This other irrelevant issue is much more important, therefore your wrong about the issue in question", isn't a reasonable response.

To: cosmicforce who wrote (112216)	5/29/2009 7:04:28 PM
From: Rambi	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541906

Rambi didn't say it wasn't ok to nominate her, merely that it was not a strong argument for appointment, or the right one to make, and it was that word that the RW picked up on and distorted. Empathy is meaningless without the tools to evaluate and analyze the entirety of a case. And as several have now pointed out, empathy is fairly common, and experience doens't necessarily guarantee good judgment, can in fact, restrict a view. That said, empathy is fine, although common sense could also preclude silly judgments based on pure unthinking interpretation of law, without the complication of bias from empathy. Maybe> Am winging it here.