After-Birth Abortion?

. . . aka infanticide. Just in time for Easter, we find moral justification for killing new born babies, extending the logic of abortion beyond the womb. The poverty of thinking of so called ethicists on the left leaves me stunned. Alberto Guibilini and Francesca Minerva argue that since new born babies brains are still developing and they lack their own personalities, they have no inherent right to life. From BioEdge, your newsletter for bio-ethics from around the world.

They [Guibilini and Minerva] argue that both the fetus and the new-born infant are only potential persons without any interests. Therefore the interests of the persons involved with them are paramount until some indefinite time after birth. To emphasise the continuity between the two acts, they term it “after-birth abortion” rather than infanticide.
. . .
“We claim that killing a newborn could be ethically permissible in all the circumstances where abortion would be. Such circumstances include cases where the newborn has the potential to have an (at least) acceptable life, but the well-being of the family is at risk.”

And I thought that it was just the radical right who said that late-term abortion would lead to arguments for infanticide. William Saletan at Slate.com asks this question after a more lengthy discussion of the issue:

The challenge posed to Furedi [chief executive of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service] and other pro-choice absolutists by “after-birth abortion” is this: How do they answer the argument, advanced by Giubilini and Minerva, that any maternal interest, such as the burden of raising a gravely defective newborn, trumps the value of that freshly delivered nonperson? What value does the newborn have? At what point did it acquire that value? And why should the law step in to protect that value against the judgment of a woman and her doctor?

Where indeed does human life acquire value? Ultimately, these so called bio-ethicists are going to end up arguing for killing anyone whose existent isn't convenient to society. I believe its all wrong; abortion, euthanasia and capital punishment. The state should never sponsor nor condone killing of humans; that's an ethic I can live with.

H/T to SarahB of Lipstick Underground (though not published on her blog).

The Most Important Story You Won't See on TV

Yesterday, Judge Jed Rakoff, pictured, rejected the proposed settlement of $33 million by the Bank of America with the SEC over allegations that Bank of America had lied to shareholders regarding bonuses for Merrill Lynch managers. BofA acquired Merrill Lynch last January, just after over $3 billion in bonuses were paid to Merrill management. The SEC alleges that BofA's proxy letter to shareholders was materially misleading.

Judge Rakoff states:

"Oscar Wilde once famously said that a cynicis someone 'who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.' The proposed Consent Judgment in this case suggests a rather cynical relationship between the parties... And all this is done at the expense, not only of the shareholders, but also of the truth."

The reason this is so important is that it affirms the rule of law and accountability in our financial markets. I don't know if the BofA executives committed a crime or not; but look at the perverse incentives in the system. For a mere $33 million, not even your own dough, but that of your shareholders, you, the CEO of BofA get to waive prosecution, WITHOUT ADMITTING PERSONAL GUILT. Considering that your own future bonus might be at stake, better to get this thing over, if you're the CEO. On the SEC side, you've got plenty of egg on your face already, from Bernie Madoff, to a number of bonus related issues. The fine allows the SEC to maintain that they are on the job.

But it is all crap. The SEC says that the execs relied on the lawyers for advice, so we didn't prosecute. OK, so why not prosecute the lawyers? WHO IS ACCOUNTABLE? There is also a back story that no one wants exposed here. The chairman of the Fed, Ben Bernanke, has claimed that neither he nor then Treasury Secretary Paulson pressured Bank of America to buy Merrill Lynch. I think he's lying. I want to see a trial. I want to see the truth come out.

Transparency and the rule of law are necessary for capitalism to work. Much of last year's melt down can be traced to a lack of both. I find myself applauding Judge Rakoff, along with Dennis Kucinich of all people. However, I suspect Kucinich is just upset over the bonuses, my interest is in the rule of law. We'll see if the SEC has the guts to prosecute. There case might be weak. If it is, that will tell us something too.

Why is this the most important story not on TV? It's neither glamorous nor gruesome, but goes to the heart of what makes capitalism work. Our future economic growth depends as much on ethical behavior as it does on defeating big government spending.

The Pope Analyzes the Market Crash

And he has a point. I have not often agreed with previous Popes' concerns with the lack of morality of free markets, but Pope Benedict, in a 1985 presentation titled "Money, Markets and Ethics" authored when he was Cardinal Ratzinger had the following to say:

But the damage caused by the lack of morality of market players could end up being fatal for the system itself. "The decline of such discipline" – the moral discipline which is the product of "strong religious convictions" – "can actually cause the laws of the market to collapse."

How prescient. All market economies are built on trust. We trust that competition causes prices for similar goods to be similar when we shop. Investors trust that published financial information of companies is more or less accurate. Lenders trust that borrowers accurately describe their ability to repay loans. Sometimes trust is aided by regulation. More often it is the product of the free market, where untrustworthy actors suffer through loss of reputation and therefor loss of business.

However, the market discipline tends to break down when transactions are one-off, i.e. not likely to be repeated. This is why garage sales have to deeply discount used goods compared to Ebay. You are probably never returning to that garage sale, but the Ebay seller has a reputation to maintain. Standard game theory tells us that there is far less incentive to be honest in transactions where there is no likelihood of repeat business. This is where a culture of honesty allows commerce to proceed with low transaction costs, because it is likely that both sides are getting fair value. Ethics and honesty have a positive network effect on the economy.

We can look at how failing ethics works in the housing market, filled with many one-off transactions. Many borrowers succumbed to greed and failed to disclose risks in their ability to repay, betting that a rising market would bail them out. Mortgage dealers set up loans without due diligence, knowing they could sell the loans to banks. Banks gave up on due diligence, knowing they could pass the loans to Fannie Mae. Fannie Mae's executives were earning fat bonuses cooking the books, and hiding loan risk while selling securitized loans to Wall Street. Wall Street was just looking at all the fat profits being made with an ever rising housing market. Greed and dishonesty work their way through this entire chain of transactions. Not by everyone, but by enough that eventually the system collapses, just as the Pope predicts.

Morality has consequences for society and nations. Many on the left decry moral judgement as judgemental, but clearly it is necessary for the good outcome of sustainable economic growth. Most Americans don't have to be told and wouldn't even be persuaded that honesty is the best policy just because of a little economics lesson. But the left seems to need object lessons like this, because they instinctively reject tradition. There is a reason for traditional morality, whether you believe it is due to God's will or natural selection, it works for both individuals and society.