When does adulthood begin?
In Connecticut, there is a 17 year old girl who doesn't want to undergo chemotherapy. Known only as "Cassandra C" in legal filings, the State went to court to force her to be treated via chemotherapy. Doctors testified that without it, she will die from high-risk Hodgkin's Disease. With the treatment they estimate her chance of survival at between 80% and 85%. Her mother doesn't want her to have this treatment, as she believes it will do more harm than good.
The law in this, and most states, says a person is a minor and not an adult until they reach the age of 18. You can't vote until you are 18. You can serve in the military at 17, with the approval of your parent(s). You can be tried for crimes as an adult long before becoming one in the eyes of the law in every other respect. In 2011, Jordan Brown was charged as an adult in a murder case in Pennsylvania. While the judge's decision to allow him to be tried that way was reversed, there are other cases where minors stood trial as adults.
So why is it that a child can avoid almost any responsibility (except criminal) and not be allowed to make decisions for themselves, but the list of exceptions seems endless. Some states allow any pregnant girl to obtain an abortion without any parental involvement. In Delaware, only those girls younger than 16 must get parental approval for an abortion. Why is it that 16 and 17 year old girls get to make an adult decision (I fully support this and other laws giving women the right to choose, I'm merely using this as an example to point out the contradictions regarding when one becomes an adult)?
Minors who enter into contracts before the reach the age of 18 can almost always void the contract, whenever they want to. That doesn't mean minors can enter into contracts and receive services/products and then refuse to pay for them. It is yet another example of inconsistency in this area.
If a minor can be held to answer for their actions in criminal court as an adult, then perhaps some teens should be able to make the decision whether or not to receive medical treatment. I'm not 100% sure about this, but it is worth thought and discussion..
* * *
Lots of people are saying "je suis Charlie" in trying to show their support for the victims of the mass shooting at the Paris headquarters of Charlie Hebdo. Are you? If you are, I have a question for you.
Are you saying it because you're supporting freedom of expression rights, or because you agree with the sentiment of their cartoons? Are you okay with a cartoon that shows the Prophet Mohammed as someone who beheads someone drawing a picture of him? Of him having a child bride who he plans to make love to when she is only 9 years old? I sure don't.
Let me be clear. I am a staunch supporter of freedom of expression. I don't agree with what the membership of the KKK has to say about people of color, but I will defend, to the death, their right to say it. There is a big difference here.
I don't agree with the anti-Semitic and anti-Islamic cartoons published by Charlie Hebdo. I am NOT Charlie. But I grieve for those innocents who were murdered under a false flag of religion, and I support the right of everyone to freely express themselves.
On a related note, hate speech regarding any minority is labeled as abhorrent by so-called "progressives." So why don't they have a problem with hate speech directed at the Christian Right? Just curious.
* * *
Random Ponderings
Did you watch the Golden Globe Awards show? Tina Fey and Amy Poehler were funny as usual. George Clooney was gracious in accepting yet another award for awesomeness. It was entertaining. What I can't wrap my head around is why these awards generate so much interest? Did you know that the voting membership of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association is right around 90? The judgment and opinions of less than 100 people generate world-wide interest in these awards and I just don't get why. Great PR I guess.
The only part of George Clooney's acceptance speech at the Golden Globes that I didn't like was when he mentioned his age and I realized I'm older than he is.
Spending insufficient time in the sunlight may lead to a vitamin D deficiency but at least you don't have to deal with having a farmer's tan.
Just had a visual image of Taylor Negron in Heaven, delivering pizza to Ray Walston.
I don't need to read about the latest arrest of George Zimmerman to know he's a jerk and an ass.
Every time I see the video of "End of the Line" by the Traveling Wilburys, seeing Roy Orbison's guitar being rocked by a rocking chair as his voice is singing, makes me sad.
Interesting that two of the men who were members of the Tuskegee Airmen both died on January 5th. Nothing sinister, but one of those coincidences. RIP gentlemen, we honor your service.
I can understand the frustration Jennifer Aniston felt after the Golden Globes, waiting in the interminable line for the valet parkers to return her vehicle. But dropping the F-bomb?? Watch at your own risk:
The ad that McDonald's aired showing the marquees outside their locations, with messages of support in bad times, was a mistake.
The man who people thought tried to buy a child in a supermarket for $100 was actually telling the mother to use the money to buy something for her son. He'd just found out it had been a good year for his business and he was trying to pay it forward. Glad they cleared that up.
Did I really just listen to Bill Mahre say that "...hundreds of millions of Muslims support the attack on Charlie Hebdo in Paris? That's ridiculous.
* * *
January 13th in History:
532 – Nika riots in Constantinople.
888 – Odo, Count of Paris becomes King of the Franks.
1435 – Sicut Dudum, forbidding the enslavement of the Guanche natives in Canary Islands by the Spanish, is promulgated by Pope Eugene IV.
1547 – Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey is sentenced to death.
1607 – The Bank of Genoa fails after announcement of national bankruptcy in Spain.
1666 – French traveller Jean-Baptiste Tavernier arrived in Dhaka and met Shaista Khan.
1793 – Nicolas Jean Hugon de Bassville, representative of Revolutionary France, lynched by a mob in Rome
1797 – French Revolutionary Wars: A naval battle between a French ship of the line and two British frigates off the coast of Brittany ends with the French vessel running aground, resulting in over 900 deaths.
1815 – War of 1812: British troops capture Fort Peter in St. Marys, Georgia, the only battle of the war to take place in the state.
1822 – The design of the Greek flag is adopted by the First National Assembly at Epidaurus.
1830 – The Great fire of New Orleans, Louisiana begins.
1833 – President Andrew Jackson writes to Vice President Martin Van Buren expressing his opposition to South Carolina's defiance of federal authority in the Nullification Crisis.
1840 – The steamship Lexington burns and sinks four miles off the coast of Long Island with the loss of 139 lives.
1842 – Dr. William Brydon, an assistant surgeon in the British East India Company Army during the First Anglo-Afghan War, becomes famous for being the sole survivor of an army of 4,500 men and 12,000 camp followers when he reaches the safety of a garrison in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.
1847 – The Treaty of Cahuenga ends the Mexican–American War in California.
1869 – National convention of black leaders meets in Washington, D.C.
1893 – The Independent Labour Party of the United Kingdom holds its first meeting.
1893 – U.S. Marines land in Honolulu, Hawaii from the USS Boston to prevent the queen from abrogating the Bayonet Constitution.
1895 – First Italo-Ethiopian War: the war's opening battle, the Battle of Coatit, occurs; it is an Italian victory.
1898 – Émile Zola's J'accuse exposes the Dreyfus affair.
1908 – The Rhoads Opera House Fire in Boyertown, Pennsylvania kills 171 people.
1910 – The first public radio broadcast takes place; a live performance of the opera Cavalleria rusticana is sent out over the airwaves from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York, New York.
1913 – Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Incorporated was founded on the campus of Howard University.
1915 – An earthquake in Avezzano, Italy kills 29,800.
1934 – The Candidate of Sciences degree is established in the Soviet Union.
1935 – A plebiscite in Saarland shows that 90.3% of those voting wish to join Nazi Germany.
1939 – The Black Friday bush fires burn 20,000 square kilometers of land in Australia, claiming the lives of 71 people.
1942 – Henry Ford patents a plastic automobile, which is 30% lighter than a regular car.
1942 – World War II: First use of an aircraft ejection seat by a German test pilot in a Heinkel He 280 jet fighter.
1951 – First Indochina War: The Battle of Vĩnh Yên begins, which will end in a major victory for France.
1953 – An article appears in Pravda accusing some of the most prestigious and prominent doctors, mostly Jews, in the Soviet Union of taking part in a vast plot to poison members of the top Soviet political and military leadership.
1958 – The Moroccan Army of Liberation ambushes a Spanish patrol in the Battle of Edchera.
1960 – The Gulag system of forced labor camps in the Soviet Union is officially abolished.
1963 – Coup d'etat in Togo results in assassination of president Sylvanus Olympio
1964 – Anti-Muslim riots break out in Calcutta, resulting in 100 deaths.
1964 – Karol Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul II, is appointed archbishop of Kraków, Poland.
1966 – Robert C. Weaver becomes the first African American Cabinet member when he is appointed United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.
1968 – Johnny Cash performs live at Folsom State Prison
1972 – Prime Minister Kofi Abrefa Busia and President Edward Akufo-Addo of Ghana are ousted in a bloodless military coup by Colonel Ignatius Kutu Acheampong.
1974 – Seraphim is elected Archbishop of Athens and All Greece.
1978 – United States Food and Drug Administration requires all blood donations to be labeled "paid" or "volunteer" donors.
1982 – Shortly after takeoff, Air Florida Flight 90, a Boeing 737 jet crashes into Washington, D.C.'s 14th Street Bridge and falls into the Potomac River, killing 78 including four motorists.
1985 – A passenger train plunges into a ravine in Ethiopia, killing 428 in the worst railroad disaster in Africa.
1986 – A month-long violent struggle begins in Aden, South Yemen between supporters of Ali Nasir Muhammad and Abdul Fattah Ismail, resulting in thousands of casualties.
1988 – Lee Teng-hui becomes the first native Taiwanese President of the Republic of China.
1990 – Douglas Wilder becomes the first elected African American governor as he takes office in Richmond, Virginia.
1991 – Soviet Union troops attack Lithuanian independence supporters in Vilnius, killing 14 people and wounding 1000.
1993 – Space Shuttle program: Endeavour heads for space for the third time as STS-54 launches from the Kennedy Space Center.
2001 – An earthquake hits El Salvador, killing more than 800.
2012 – The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia sinks off the coast of Italy. There are 32 confirmed deaths amongst the 4232 passengers and crew.
Famous Folk Born on January 13th:
Jan van Goyen
Archduchess Maria Anna of Austria (doesn't the title Archduchess sound sinister?)
Salmon P. Chase
Horatio Alger, Jr.
Sophie Tucker
Alfred Fuller
Gwen Verdon
Frances Sternhagen
Charles Nelson Reilly
Rip Taylor
Cabu
Richard Moll
Bruce Hart
Janet Hubert
Mark O'Meara
Little Oral Annie
Kelly Hrudey
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Suggs
Trace Adkins
Penelope Ann Miller
Patrick Dempsey
Traci Bingham
Shonda Rhimes
Nicole Eggert
Michael Pena
Orlando Bloom
Liam Hemsworth
The law in this, and most states, says a person is a minor and not an adult until they reach the age of 18. You can't vote until you are 18. You can serve in the military at 17, with the approval of your parent(s). You can be tried for crimes as an adult long before becoming one in the eyes of the law in every other respect. In 2011, Jordan Brown was charged as an adult in a murder case in Pennsylvania. While the judge's decision to allow him to be tried that way was reversed, there are other cases where minors stood trial as adults.
So why is it that a child can avoid almost any responsibility (except criminal) and not be allowed to make decisions for themselves, but the list of exceptions seems endless. Some states allow any pregnant girl to obtain an abortion without any parental involvement. In Delaware, only those girls younger than 16 must get parental approval for an abortion. Why is it that 16 and 17 year old girls get to make an adult decision (I fully support this and other laws giving women the right to choose, I'm merely using this as an example to point out the contradictions regarding when one becomes an adult)?
Minors who enter into contracts before the reach the age of 18 can almost always void the contract, whenever they want to. That doesn't mean minors can enter into contracts and receive services/products and then refuse to pay for them. It is yet another example of inconsistency in this area.
If a minor can be held to answer for their actions in criminal court as an adult, then perhaps some teens should be able to make the decision whether or not to receive medical treatment. I'm not 100% sure about this, but it is worth thought and discussion..
* * *
Lots of people are saying "je suis Charlie" in trying to show their support for the victims of the mass shooting at the Paris headquarters of Charlie Hebdo. Are you? If you are, I have a question for you.
Are you saying it because you're supporting freedom of expression rights, or because you agree with the sentiment of their cartoons? Are you okay with a cartoon that shows the Prophet Mohammed as someone who beheads someone drawing a picture of him? Of him having a child bride who he plans to make love to when she is only 9 years old? I sure don't.
Let me be clear. I am a staunch supporter of freedom of expression. I don't agree with what the membership of the KKK has to say about people of color, but I will defend, to the death, their right to say it. There is a big difference here.
I don't agree with the anti-Semitic and anti-Islamic cartoons published by Charlie Hebdo. I am NOT Charlie. But I grieve for those innocents who were murdered under a false flag of religion, and I support the right of everyone to freely express themselves.
On a related note, hate speech regarding any minority is labeled as abhorrent by so-called "progressives." So why don't they have a problem with hate speech directed at the Christian Right? Just curious.
* * *
Random Ponderings
Did you watch the Golden Globe Awards show? Tina Fey and Amy Poehler were funny as usual. George Clooney was gracious in accepting yet another award for awesomeness. It was entertaining. What I can't wrap my head around is why these awards generate so much interest? Did you know that the voting membership of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association is right around 90? The judgment and opinions of less than 100 people generate world-wide interest in these awards and I just don't get why. Great PR I guess.
The only part of George Clooney's acceptance speech at the Golden Globes that I didn't like was when he mentioned his age and I realized I'm older than he is.
Spending insufficient time in the sunlight may lead to a vitamin D deficiency but at least you don't have to deal with having a farmer's tan.
Just had a visual image of Taylor Negron in Heaven, delivering pizza to Ray Walston.
I don't need to read about the latest arrest of George Zimmerman to know he's a jerk and an ass.
Every time I see the video of "End of the Line" by the Traveling Wilburys, seeing Roy Orbison's guitar being rocked by a rocking chair as his voice is singing, makes me sad.
Interesting that two of the men who were members of the Tuskegee Airmen both died on January 5th. Nothing sinister, but one of those coincidences. RIP gentlemen, we honor your service.
I can understand the frustration Jennifer Aniston felt after the Golden Globes, waiting in the interminable line for the valet parkers to return her vehicle. But dropping the F-bomb?? Watch at your own risk:
The ad that McDonald's aired showing the marquees outside their locations, with messages of support in bad times, was a mistake.
The man who people thought tried to buy a child in a supermarket for $100 was actually telling the mother to use the money to buy something for her son. He'd just found out it had been a good year for his business and he was trying to pay it forward. Glad they cleared that up.
Did I really just listen to Bill Mahre say that "...hundreds of millions of Muslims support the attack on Charlie Hebdo in Paris? That's ridiculous.
* * *
January 13th in History:
532 – Nika riots in Constantinople.
888 – Odo, Count of Paris becomes King of the Franks.
1435 – Sicut Dudum, forbidding the enslavement of the Guanche natives in Canary Islands by the Spanish, is promulgated by Pope Eugene IV.
1547 – Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey is sentenced to death.
1607 – The Bank of Genoa fails after announcement of national bankruptcy in Spain.
1666 – French traveller Jean-Baptiste Tavernier arrived in Dhaka and met Shaista Khan.
1793 – Nicolas Jean Hugon de Bassville, representative of Revolutionary France, lynched by a mob in Rome
1797 – French Revolutionary Wars: A naval battle between a French ship of the line and two British frigates off the coast of Brittany ends with the French vessel running aground, resulting in over 900 deaths.
1815 – War of 1812: British troops capture Fort Peter in St. Marys, Georgia, the only battle of the war to take place in the state.
1822 – The design of the Greek flag is adopted by the First National Assembly at Epidaurus.
1830 – The Great fire of New Orleans, Louisiana begins.
1833 – President Andrew Jackson writes to Vice President Martin Van Buren expressing his opposition to South Carolina's defiance of federal authority in the Nullification Crisis.
1840 – The steamship Lexington burns and sinks four miles off the coast of Long Island with the loss of 139 lives.
1842 – Dr. William Brydon, an assistant surgeon in the British East India Company Army during the First Anglo-Afghan War, becomes famous for being the sole survivor of an army of 4,500 men and 12,000 camp followers when he reaches the safety of a garrison in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.
1847 – The Treaty of Cahuenga ends the Mexican–American War in California.
1869 – National convention of black leaders meets in Washington, D.C.
1893 – The Independent Labour Party of the United Kingdom holds its first meeting.
1893 – U.S. Marines land in Honolulu, Hawaii from the USS Boston to prevent the queen from abrogating the Bayonet Constitution.
1895 – First Italo-Ethiopian War: the war's opening battle, the Battle of Coatit, occurs; it is an Italian victory.
1898 – Émile Zola's J'accuse exposes the Dreyfus affair.
1908 – The Rhoads Opera House Fire in Boyertown, Pennsylvania kills 171 people.
1910 – The first public radio broadcast takes place; a live performance of the opera Cavalleria rusticana is sent out over the airwaves from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York, New York.
1913 – Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Incorporated was founded on the campus of Howard University.
1915 – An earthquake in Avezzano, Italy kills 29,800.
1934 – The Candidate of Sciences degree is established in the Soviet Union.
1935 – A plebiscite in Saarland shows that 90.3% of those voting wish to join Nazi Germany.
1939 – The Black Friday bush fires burn 20,000 square kilometers of land in Australia, claiming the lives of 71 people.
1942 – Henry Ford patents a plastic automobile, which is 30% lighter than a regular car.
1942 – World War II: First use of an aircraft ejection seat by a German test pilot in a Heinkel He 280 jet fighter.
1951 – First Indochina War: The Battle of Vĩnh Yên begins, which will end in a major victory for France.
1953 – An article appears in Pravda accusing some of the most prestigious and prominent doctors, mostly Jews, in the Soviet Union of taking part in a vast plot to poison members of the top Soviet political and military leadership.
1958 – The Moroccan Army of Liberation ambushes a Spanish patrol in the Battle of Edchera.
1960 – The Gulag system of forced labor camps in the Soviet Union is officially abolished.
1963 – Coup d'etat in Togo results in assassination of president Sylvanus Olympio
1964 – Anti-Muslim riots break out in Calcutta, resulting in 100 deaths.
1964 – Karol Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul II, is appointed archbishop of Kraków, Poland.
1966 – Robert C. Weaver becomes the first African American Cabinet member when he is appointed United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.
1968 – Johnny Cash performs live at Folsom State Prison
1972 – Prime Minister Kofi Abrefa Busia and President Edward Akufo-Addo of Ghana are ousted in a bloodless military coup by Colonel Ignatius Kutu Acheampong.
1974 – Seraphim is elected Archbishop of Athens and All Greece.
1978 – United States Food and Drug Administration requires all blood donations to be labeled "paid" or "volunteer" donors.
1982 – Shortly after takeoff, Air Florida Flight 90, a Boeing 737 jet crashes into Washington, D.C.'s 14th Street Bridge and falls into the Potomac River, killing 78 including four motorists.
1985 – A passenger train plunges into a ravine in Ethiopia, killing 428 in the worst railroad disaster in Africa.
1986 – A month-long violent struggle begins in Aden, South Yemen between supporters of Ali Nasir Muhammad and Abdul Fattah Ismail, resulting in thousands of casualties.
1988 – Lee Teng-hui becomes the first native Taiwanese President of the Republic of China.
1990 – Douglas Wilder becomes the first elected African American governor as he takes office in Richmond, Virginia.
1991 – Soviet Union troops attack Lithuanian independence supporters in Vilnius, killing 14 people and wounding 1000.
1993 – Space Shuttle program: Endeavour heads for space for the third time as STS-54 launches from the Kennedy Space Center.
2001 – An earthquake hits El Salvador, killing more than 800.
2012 – The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia sinks off the coast of Italy. There are 32 confirmed deaths amongst the 4232 passengers and crew.
Famous Folk Born on January 13th:
Jan van Goyen
Archduchess Maria Anna of Austria (doesn't the title Archduchess sound sinister?)
Salmon P. Chase
Horatio Alger, Jr.
Sophie Tucker
Alfred Fuller
Gwen Verdon
Frances Sternhagen
Charles Nelson Reilly
Rip Taylor
Cabu
Richard Moll
Bruce Hart
Janet Hubert
Mark O'Meara
Little Oral Annie
Kelly Hrudey
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Suggs
Trace Adkins
Penelope Ann Miller
Patrick Dempsey
Traci Bingham
Shonda Rhimes
Nicole Eggert
Michael Pena
Orlando Bloom
Liam Hemsworth
posted by me at 3:50 PM
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