Bones of Contention

Just a service for the powers that be, in case I am to be considered for Sandra Day O'Connor's seat on The Supreme Court. My politics, in no particular order:

• Marijuana should be legal
• Any consenting adult should be able to marry any other consenting adult outside his immediate family
• Abortion should be legal, and minors should not be required to notify or seek the consent of their parents; notification laws are innefective and potentially dangerous
• The day-after pill should be available over-the-counter; the pill's effective cancelation of a pregnancy after unprotected sex is no more an abortion than the natural ejection of any other (perhaps) fertilized egg that doesn't attach to the uterus and grow to term; According to the FDA, it is safe and would prevent countless actual abortions
• If life begins at conception, it is hardly worth fretting over; Stem cell research can save adult lives; it should be legal and supported by the government with at least as much enthusiasm as farm subsidies and energy policies favoring oil companies
• Government should not coerce citizens into following any particular religion, and government should not provide any money for religious institutions or displays; Society should not shrink from displaying the religious preference of the marjority, so long as minorities aren't coerced into practicing another religion; For example, if I live in a predominantly Christian country, Christmas can be a national holiday just as schools are closed for Jewish holidays in New York; Also, I am free to ignore Nativity scenes and tell people to go fuck themselves when they approach me on the street with a "Jews for Jesus" pamphlet
• Intelligent Design isn't science; it doesn't belong in schools; science demands evidence through experimentation to support all hypotheses; something isn't true just because you might want it to be
• Prostitution should be legal; "Why should it be illegal to sell something that's perfectly legal to give away?"--George Carlin
• Downloading music is theft, but fans sharing music for no profit can never be stopped, and it ultimately helps the artist gain exposure; unless you're already so big you don't need it, in which case you should go back to your solid gold jacuzzi and diddle yourself
• Burning a flag is stupid, but far less harmful than outlawing a constitutionally protected act; love the principle, not the artifact
• Physician-assisted suicide is between the dying patient and the physician; Why can we put dogs out of their misery but not end our own suffering?
• Like doctors and lawyers, journalists should be shielded from being forced by the government to reveal confidential sources unless a life is at stake
• Capital punishment is not a deterrent and is racist in practice. Therefore, no state should execute a citizen simply to satiate society's or a victim's family's thirst for revenge; While more than half of the countries in the world have abolished the death penalty in law or practice, Amnesty International has compiled statistics revealing that out of the 1,813 known people executed in 1999, 85% could be accounted for by China, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United States; Is this the type of company we want to keep?