corbenrice's blog
Posted at 10:04pm on Jun. 24, 2008 A Shameless Plug
By corbenrice
Cross posted at http://www.illinipundit.com/
I realize that this is perhaps more local then people here will be interested in but I thought I would post this here since redstate has been a hang out for me in the past:)
For those who don’t know me, I am Corben Rice and I live in Champaign, IL with my lovely wife and 5 young children. I work as a chemist at Isotech Laboratories. I am running for County Board in Champaign Illinois District 5.
Posted in State Politics — Comments (2) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 5:49pm on May 23, 2008 True Heroes
By corbenrice
I don’t have much to say. I just want to share this with you.
I am grateful for a country that honors true heroes.
May God Bless him and his Family.
Posted in Military Roundtable — Comments (3) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 4:14pm on Feb. 11, 2008 Gop.com Valentines
By corbenrice
Ok these were too funny. I had to share them.
These come from gop.com
They have others then these but I thought these were the funniest.
Send one to a loved one today. :)
Posted in Archived — Comments (0) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 2:33pm on Jan. 15, 2008 Do as I say not as I Do
By corbenrice
As a parent of four (soon to be 5), I try to make it a personal policy to have my children do as I do. However John McCain apparently ascribes to the, “Do as I say not as I Do” policy.
He recently sent out a mailer that “compares” Romney’s record to him. This of course is sweet irony coming from the guy who cried that he didn’t have the money that Romney does, and that his “attacks” were unfair.
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Posted at 11:23pm on May 17, 2007 The Democrats Know What Needs to be Done
By corbenrice
This is why I could even bring myself to vote for Ron Paul. At least I know with him that if I'm successful I won't be enslaved to Hilary the confiscator of all profits.
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Posted at 12:24pm on May 9, 2007 Feeding the Piranhas
By corbenrice
From my wife’s Blog:
So, yesterday, I went to the public school board meeting in my town. Now, I am a homeschool mom, but we pay our taxes. I am concerned about the education, not only of my own children, but of all children, especially in my community.
All I can say is that I was appalled.
A few years ago, the school district was sued for discrimination and the judge has decreed that the school district must keep the statistics racially balanced across the board, from gifted programs to disciplinary actions. Sounds like a good thing.
Posted in Culture — Comments (23) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 9:14am on May 9, 2007 To Test or not?
By corbenrice
Crabcakes just recently posted a diary about this. Out of respect for management I have chosen not to comment on his post so I will propose my own thesis.
I am a father of four. Each time we have had a child we were asked if we would like to screen for these and other “deformities”. Each time we refused the test because it has a slight chance of harming the child and my wife and I are committed to our children no matter their challenges.
Posted in Life Issues — Comments (22) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 11:37am on Apr. 26, 2007 A Little Tidbit
By corbenrice
I thought this was funny/informative. I suggest an immediate moratorium of all doctors.
Facts to ponder:
(A) The number of physicians in the U.S. is 700,000.(B) Accidental deaths caused by physicians per year are 120,000.
(C) Accidental deaths per physician is 0.171.
Statistics courtesy of U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services.
Posted in Law — Comments (5) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 9:36pm on Apr. 15, 2007 Mitt Romney’s YouTube Faux Pau?
By corbenrice
Mitt Romney took a bold step recently and became the first candidate to address the YouTube population directly. In his address to the YouTube society he asked the question, “What do you believe is America's single greatest challenge?”
This seems like a great idea on the surface. Free publicity, people become vested in your campaign and you show that you listen to the “people”. Win, Win, and Win right?
Posted in 2008 — Comments (5) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 6:59am on Feb. 20, 2007 Hello World
By corbenrice
Have a good day :)
A really nice day.
Do wah diddy do diddy doo
There she was just a walking down the street singing
Doo Wah diddy diddy dum diddy doo
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Posted at 7:00am on Sep. 4, 2006 Honor Guard
By corbenrice
For the last week I was down in Texas to attend the funeral of my Grandfather and visit family. It felt good to get back to my roots where I grew up and I was struck by the significant cultural differences between my now home of Illinois and Texas, but that is a subject for another time.
My Grandfather was a kind man who loved his family. I remember one Christmas where he made hand made stick horses for me and my brothers.
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Posted at 8:51am on Aug. 3, 2006 Corben & Abortion
By corbenrice
This post is inspired by SlimJim's diaries where he took various Presidential hopefuls for 2008 and looked critically at their stances on abortion. One in particular caught my eye.
In his diary SlimJim says the following:
He favors abortions, in very limited circumstances (something about brainwaves?) but just about anytime he is presented with a vote he comes down on the pro-life side.
I found this statement interesting, because I have heard few people who come down on the pro-life side of the argument site anytime (if they bother) other than conception as the significant factor in when life should be protected. My views on the subject have evolved and are more complicated then one simple statement can make clear.
This diary is not intended to defend Allan or endorse him, but is intended to explain a viewpoint about abortion that is alternative to the all or nothing conception ideology.
For a long time, I ascribed to the ideology that life begins at conception and in reality I still do but my opinion on this issue has changed quite a bit. Leon has a great post that explains in part this ideology
I first started arguing for life in highschool classes I took, such as Government and Sociology. I always felt that it was wrong to destroy human life, so my position was a natural one to take. While I researched the topic I only found one argument that was internally consistent and made a great deal of sense to me. That of course was that life begins at conception and destroying said life is unethical and should be illegal.
My favorite argument was a scientific one that I created (I may not have been the first to use this argument) because I was scientifically inclined and the left worships science. It went something like this:
Definition of life according to science is that life displays the following characteristics:Organization, Metabolism, Growth, Adaptation, Response to stimuli, Reproduction.
A fertilized egg has all these characteristics and therefore is life. If it is life, what type of life? It has to be human life as it carries no other species' DNA. Since laws exist to protect human life, abortion should be banned.
I held to this argument along time. My sociology teacher even asked me what I would do if my sister was raped. I responded that I would suggest to her that she have the child and give it up for adoption. This answer bothered me a little bit but I saw no way around it. My stand must be internally consistent, or else what did I have to stand on?
Later, discussing the issue with my brother (fiscally conservative, socially liberal), he asked me to defend my position in light of birth control that prevents implantation. He also asked me if it was an equal tragedy with abortion that many fertilized eggs never become implanted and leave the body naturally. Again I did not concede his points but I felt as if my overriding ideology was lacking answers. What was my position on birth control then? Should we be doing something to rescue these fertilized eggs that naturally are expelled? What about my sister? If she was raped and went out the next day and took an extra high dose of birth control would she be killing a child (implantation can take 48 hours)?
These thoughts rattled around in my brain (feel free to make fun of the state of my brain ;) ). It was a long time before I came to an understanding that answered these questions in a consistent manner that I felt was ethical. These decisions had to be made in light of my scientific understanding of the subject and my personal beliefs.
The question became for me, what is murder? I had to answer the forcible separation of the individual's spirit from their body. Now this argument can be secularized by saying individual will or conscience but for me I'll explain it in my terms.
So then the natural next question is, when does the human spirit (conscience) enter the human body? Leon has said location matters little and I agree with him.
I have heard the following times argued by various individuals of when a person is a "person".
- Sperm and Egg are potential for life so condoms and other barriers should not be used.
- A fertilized egg (child) is a person and therefore should be protected.
- An implanted egg (child) is a person and therefore should be protected.
- When the child has divided its cells X amount of times, it's a person.
- When there is a heartbeat, it is a person.
- When there is brain wave activity, it is a person.
- When the child begins to move it is a person.
? At some arbitrary time it becomes a person.
? At some point when the soul enters the body, it is a person. (me)
- When the child leaves the womb, it's a person.
- Some point after birth when the child is named, it is finally a person.
Number 8 I discounted right away since we know that John the Baptist reacted in the womb to the presence of Mary.
I had trouble envisioning a spirit from God (human will for secularists) residing in a fertilized egg that for 2 more weeks can still divide into twins. So when does this spirit reside in flesh in the womb? I think the only measurable way to tell if a spirit (mental individual) is present is by action. Does the child show movement, and are there brain waves? (Now you can see why SlimJim's diary caught my attention). These things demonstrate individual mental activity and must be accompanied by a human spirit.
So looking at this policy-wise, what does it mean? To me, it argues that anytime there is a soul present in the womb, that life must be protected no matter what the reason except perhaps when another life would be lost.
Does this mean that anytime before the spirit enters there should be free reign on the destruction of human life? I still argue, no! I still stand on the fact that a fertilized egg is human life with the potential to be a person. Do we devalue human life and potential personhood? Leon said it eloquently when he said,
To use a crude analogy - a tapeworm residing inside a human is completely contained within the human, but is unquestionably not the human it resides within. So it is with the fetus. However, unlike the tapeworm, the fetus is not the final form a human will take. Eventually, in the normal course of events, it will become an infant, toddler, child, adolescent, adult. It is, however, unquestionably a separate biological organism, which is almost human.
What about rape, incest and birth control then? I think rape and incest are then left up to the individual until they have a "person" residing in them. At that point they must honor the individual that they host. Birth control of the type that will prevent implantation I am still slightly conflicted on but I see it much more desirable then the use of abortion to prevent birth.(And since the left has lower birthrates than the right who am I to say that people shouldn't use birth control ;) There is also a large difference between making a uterus unfriendly to implantation through the use of chemicals and going in and destroying implanted life well on its way to personhood.
So am I pro-life? I claim to be and the policy I advocate is the same as the conception ideology excepting rape, incest and birth control (for some people). So why did I write this long diary then? I wanted to write out my ideas for myself to formalize my thoughts and to put out there another possible approach to the pro-life argument.
Posted in User Blogs — Comments (18) / Email this page » / Read More »
Posted at 7:21pm on Jul. 25, 2006 Negotiate with Terrorists?
By corbenrice
I promised a post on Romney for my first post but I saw this and I just had to talk about it.
The article is nothing really spectacular. It discusses the war and Rice's visit to the middle east. What struck me in the article though was it answered a few questions I had.
I often wondered. What did Hezbollah expect when they killed Isearili soliders and captured 2 of them? Did they think they were the Lost Boys from Peter Pan. "When we win we let them go. And when they win they let us go." This whining about proportional response was confusing me. Where did they come up with the idea that any response should be proportional. Don't they know what an act of war is and how wars are fought?
Then I read this article and they explain their thinking.
""The truth is -- let me say this clearly -- we didn't even expect (this) response.... that (Israel) would exploit this operation for this big war against us," said Komati. He said Hezbollah had expected "the usual, limited response" from Israel.
In the past, he said, Israeli reponses to Hezbollah actions included sending in commandos into Lebanon and kidnapping Hezbollah officials or briefly targeting specific Hezbollah strongholds in southern Lebanon.
He said his group had anticipated there would be negotiations on the exchange of the soldiers with three Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails, with Germany acting as a mediator as it did before."
Wow! After reading that I was intensely greatful that I live in the U.S. where our policy has always been not to negotiate with terriorsts. Now I think this is probably Hezbollah is partially trying to placate the populis in this statement but is also probably partially true.
Why did they think they could get away with it?
Because they had in the past!
I hope the U.S. remembers this next time terriorists try to negotiate with us. You do it once and you are in danger for along time afterward.
I also hope that the international community also learns a lesson. If you force someone to negotiate with terrorists you might as well be shooting them yourself.
could someone please tell me how to do the cool boxy quote thing in auto format? (maybe editors can put my quote in a box for me?
Posted in User Blogs — Comments (3) / Email this page » / Read More »
