Thursday, January 25, 2007

On Autonomy

Lawyers, Guns and Money flags this quote from Paul at Powerline:

My Hill experience gave me a startling insight: Liberals and conservatives seemed to have mirror-image approaches to paternalism. Liberals made intrusive laws for the competent while conservatives preferred to rely on individuals to make their own decisions. Conversely, conservatives preferred intrusive laws for the incompetnet [sic] to whom liberals applied a hands-off policy. Liberals were comfortable with public health paternalism: intrusive nonsmoking laws, taxes on unhealthy products, strict risk-averse EPA and FDA regulations. . . . Yet, when a person was incoherent, defecating in the streets, or freezing a limb off in the part [sic], than [sic] -- and only then -- did the principles of autonomy apply.

If Paul is right, what explains the need by conservatives to regulate teh gay and abortion?

Are teh gay and women incoherent or incompetent?

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