Hot Button Week

It's been a tough week. Hot buttons being pressed everywhere; from the abortion debate in South Dakota to the question of using material when the owner of the copyright can't be found. Both are contentious issues and the weblog rounds are full of argument.

Neither of these arguments can be understated, nor can they be dismissed lightly. Both seek to challenge the rights of the individual - one to control over a woman's body, the other to earn a living, fundamental human rights in my view.

But it's not just about the here and now. It's about the insidious undermining of individual rights. For the abortion amendments, it's an attack on Roe v Wade, one amendment at a time until R v W becomes obselete. Take note, for instance, of a recently defeated bill in Illinois that required a doctor to report to authorities any woman who suffered from a miscarriage. As an invasion of privacy, it's reprehensible; that Senators can come up with such proposals and have support indicates a growing radical religious right wing willing and able to usurp an individual's rights just because they don't believe it is the 'christian' way.

For the copyright issue, it's stripping an artist of the right to make a living from their hard work.

The issue of Fan Fiction is already out there causing problems and this is one more step towards legalised plagiarism - theft, in fact. When was that legalised?

The good news is, this is happening in the U.S.; the bad news is that America influences the world.

I'd like to say it is moral decline, but it's much worse than that. These two issues are yet another example of a government willing to listen to the self-servicing whores who sit on Capitol Hill pursuing personal agendas rather than the issues of the people who voted them in.

What lies in the future? Why does America have a president who is unwilling to support women in need of an abortion - for whatever reason - and is yet ferociously killing off young men and women in a war? What price that hypocrasy?