On KLZ’s Grassroots Radio Colorado yesterday, co-host Ken Clark told a story about how he was waiting in line for car wash and got rear-ended.

He jumps out to confront the asshole who hit him. He’s  swearing and cursing and cussing and…. He can’t see who hit him because of tinted windows.

He assumes the fight stance. He’s going to kick some ass. Door opens.

It’s a 17-year old young woman…. Crying and freaked out.

Ken talked to the girl’s dad on the phone and it all worked out – even though Ken never met the guy, and even though he was so pissed off he was willing to initiate a violent altercation.

Everything worked out FINE!

Ken’s moral of the story:  Government is bad.  Obamacare would have told Ken where he HAD to take his car for repair… and the work would have sucked.  Ken would have been forced into a bureaucracy, and would not have been able to settle this issue on his own.

Nice huh? Only on Grassroots Radio Colorado!

Denver Attorney Randy Corporon is one of those Tea Party activists who thinks Republicans are losing elections because, as he said on the radio recently, they’ve “gotten away from the conservative values that make Republicans win.”

If that’s true, then why not talk about “conservative values” until you turn red, and Colorado reddens up right along with you?

Maybe it’s because Republicans are listening to consultants who tell them to shut up about what they really believe.

When he arrived at the Legislature, freshman State Rep. Justin Everett was told not “to go to meetings, and not fill out surveys, and not really take strong stances on anything,” Everett told Corporon last month on KLZ radio’s Grassroots Radio Colorado.

“Obviously, I didn’t do that,” Everett said on the radio in January, saying essentially that he won’t be silenced and pointing to issues he discussed right there on Grassroots Radio Colorado as proof that he will continue to speak out. (Apparently, other GOP lawmakers whose legislation was featured in a Denver Post article over the weekend, won’t back down either.)

You’d think the good folks on Grassroots Radio Colorado would want to know who told Everett to tone it down at the Legislature, because it sounds like the Grassroots Radio Colorado hosts are the ones whom Republicans are trying to keep guys like Everett from chatting with. But the question wasn’t raised, so I asked Everett who told him to avoid meetings, not take strong positions, etc.

“I think it was some of the consultants that were hired,” he wrote, adding that he filled out every survey he had time for, and attended every meeting he could possibly make.

“I’m not going to turn my back on Tea Party people,” he said in one interview during the campaign, during which he certainly came out with some strong positions against, for example, providing grade-grade school education to undocumented children.

Everett said on the radio Jan. 11: “We’re going to go through this battle every two years, about, ‘Yeah, we need to move to the Left, further left, further left.’ And then of course, there will be those of us who will push back. ‘Actually, we need to move further right,’ because it seems that we’re always compromising with the Democrats, much to their side, and that’s how we end up with $17 trillion deficits, and you know, our Constitution basically being used as toilet paper.”

The Constitution as toilet paper? Ouch.

“And all those [state legislative] races that were supposedly competitive races ended up not being competitive races because our candidates just weren’t taking strong stances, on anything,” Everett told Corporon, who was a guest host on Grassroots Radio Colorado.

Everett’s comment about being advised not to fill out surveys might explain why so few Republicans bothered to fill out The Denver Post’s 2012 candidate survey, which had basic questions about candidates’ stances on key issues, during the last election. Do GOP candidates plan on ignoring The Post’s basic voter guide again? (Hint: If I’m The Denver Post, I might want to check on this.)

Everett, by the way, filled out The Post’s survey, and my guess is he’ll do it again. Listen for him on Grassroots Radio Colorado.

The good folks on Grassroots Radio Colorado have a strong opinion on gun safety issues. They like to bounce it off guests like Sen. Vicki Marble, who bounces it right back at them.

From there, it goes out over the radio, where it ricochets off canyon walls or wherever it’s heard. And then it returns into the studio from the mouths of callers, who utter similar if not identical sounds to hosts Jason Worley and Ken Clark.

The obvious way to add excitement and air to this closed loop would be to bring in fresh ideas that don’t match the sounds bouncig around the KLZ offices.

To do this, bring in someone to counter folks like Marble, who appeared on the show Tuesday.

Here’s what Marble had to say about gun safety:

Marble: Pretty soon, we’re going to be left with a pea shooter if we don’t take a stand…

I can honestly say, the bottom line on gun control, it’s advocating for criminals! That’s basically what gun control is. It’s criminal advocacy. Because it’s taking away the gun rights from law-abiding citizens and leaving us defenseless. And the criminals! It’s going to be open season for them…

And the bottom line. You know, all the gun laws they make are not going to stop crime. All the guns that they have made so far have not stopped crime and drugs. Basically, our jails are full, and crime is doing a pretty good business.

In reality, none of the gun safety proposals in the State Legislature would reduce the talk-show crowd to arming themselves with pea shooters and microphones, if they’re law-abiding citizens. Nothing would stop citizens in good standing from buying a gun or owning one. Defenseless? What?

For the sake of safety and decency, why have a one-sided conversation about guns, even on conservative talk radio?

By Michael Lund

When it comes to Ryan Call, Ken Clark and Jason Worley are not impressed.

In the past week on Grassroots Radio Colorado (airing weekdays from 5 to 7 p.m. on KLZ 560 AM), show hosts Worley and Clark have been heard to call for current GOP State Party Chairperson Call to own up to his responsibility for the devastating November election losses “like a man”, and step down from his leadership position.

Last Friday on Grassroots, Arapahoe County Tea Party Chair Randy Corporon was filling in as guest host, as he often does.  Worley and Clark were on a “top secret” special assignment.  The guests that day, freshman State Representative Justin Everett (HD-22) and John Ransom from Townhall.com/Finance pleaded with Corporon to throw his hat into the race for the GOP Chairmanship.  Their enthusiastic request was modestly evaded.

And then yesterday, Mark Baisley, Douglas County GOP Chair, appeared on Grassroots to announce his candidacy for the position.

Ryan Call probably isn’t too worried.

He has endorsements from approximately half of the current County GOP Committees that will eventually vote to decide who leads the state party, as well as support from GOP notables such as AG John Suthers, and Rep. Cory Gardner.

Call’s ascendency two years ago came in a firestorm of name calling and finger pointing around previous Chairman Dick Wadhams, who withdrew his candidacy for reelection after the debacle that was The McInnis-Maes-Tancredo Show and Ken Buck’s losing challenge to Democrat Michael Bennet’s senate seat.

Stating his frustration with trying to herd the un-herdable cats of Colorado’s GOP, Wadhams said in a recent Lynn Bartels blog post for the Denver newspaper’s political blog, The Spot (January 13, 2013)

“[…]  he was “tired of the nuts who have no grasp of what the state party’s role is.”

In the same column, Bartels quoted Wadhams pointing to fundraising as another piece of the fallout from his decision to withdraw:

 “When I went back to major donors they said, ‘Since you’re not running we’re going to hold off. We’re not going to give to a state party run by an idiot.’ Ryan is who they wanted to have win and so after he won fundraising picked back up,” Wadhams said.

The “idiot” refered to in Wadham’s quote is most likely Senator Ted Harvey, who was challenging Call at the time with support from liberty and grassroots groups in the GOP.  Could the same divisive scenario be setting up for this spring’s GOP Chair election?  Well, Baisley is no Ted Harvey, although they appear pretty similar on paper.

Worley and Clark were happy to give Baisley a soapbox to announce his candidacy, as they have with other successful GOP candidates.  But they didn’t hold back with their criticism of Call, who they said runs a party that’s not all too inviting to liberty groups’ participation.  Worley points out that he and Call went to high school together, but they still butt heads.

Callers to Grassroots Radio last Friday echoed some of Wadhams’ concerns from 2011, namely the danger of splitting a minority Party whose wounds continue to weep along ideological fractures, and the proven abilities of a candidate to deliver in the Chairmanship’s two biggest responsibilities:  winning elections and fundraising.

Baisley addressed both concerns.

He asserted his longstanding friendship with Ryan Call and said they have always worked well together.  He’s offering to unite the all who believe in limited government with his “model of respect,”  where everyone is invited to share their talents in defeating the Dems – apparently to include  “nuts” and “idiots.”

As proof of his capabilities, Baisley cited his success in organizing over 3,000 Douglas County volunteers, activitating a localized ground game for getting out the vote, and the notable coup of electing seven conservatives to the Douglas County School Board which eventually tossed the American Federation of Teachers union from the district.

As far as fundraising, Baisley reduced its importance as secondary to the ground game, but noted his successes, just the same.  On the finance committee during Bruce Benson’s tenure ten years ago as leader of the Colorado GOP, he helped raise more than $10 million for the Party.  In Douglas County this election cycle, enough funds were generated to cover all GOTV costs, max out a contribution to Mike Coffman’s congressional campaign, while filling in gaps in other legislative races, he said.

Addressing Ryan Call’s claim of early support from the counties, Worley and Clark enthusiastically point out that new leadership in the counties committees could undermine some of those initial endorsements.

Then  Baisley said he had heard from some county leaders, who said if they’d known Baisley was running for the Chair, they would never have endorsed Call.   They promised Baisley they wouldn’t be seen campaigning actively for Call.

It all sounds very encouraging for Baisley, if you can believe Grassroots Radio.

But can he herd cats?

On KLZ’s Grassroots Radio Colorado Jan. 9, State Senator Ted Harvey said he likes to refer to “same-day voter registration” as “same-day voter fraud,” and, he added, “it’s a disaster for the Republican Party.”

Hosts Ken Clark and Jason Worley, didn’t ask Harvey for his evidence that that same-day voter registration results in increased fraud. Maybe because they know there isn’t any, and they didn’t want to embarrass themselves and Harvey.

Also, contrary to Harvey’s assertion, same-day voter registration, allowed in eight states last year, does not favor Democrats over Republicans.

SENATOR TED HARVEY: Election reform. They will do same sex – [correcting himself]—same day voter registration. I call it ‘same day voter fraud’ because you’re going to have people registering to vote all over the state multiple times, and voting multiple times. It’s a disaster for the Republican Party. You’re going to see same – you’re going to see all–mail ballots, in all elections. So that even in partisan elections, you’re going to get all-mail ballots. I have a problem with all-mail ballots for primaries because of the potential for fraud. I really have a problem with all-mail ballots in general elections because people can—a lot of people are worried about the fraud that we saw in the last election when we had ballot booth voting. You’re going to see a lot more of it if you have all-mail ballots, I think.

Talk-radio hosts, even the good folks a Grassroots Radio Colorado, shouldn’t throw out accusations of election fraud without evidence to back them up.

And if they have an elected official on the show, they should raise the bar for rational discourse above the low level where it normally rests in the studio.

Don’t we all want elections that are as fair and inclusive as possible? Allowing Harvey to promote hyperbolic and unsubstantiated accusations of potential election fraud won’t help get us there.

Listen to Sen Harvey on KLZ Radio Jan 9 2013

If you listened Tuesday to KLZ’s Grassroots Radio Colorado (560 AM), you got to hear Republican State Sen. Scott Renfroe say that all potential gun-control legislation is so “crazy” and “un-American” that he won’t compromise on it at all, even though he later said Republicans always want to reach across the aisle.

Un-American? You’d think Renfroe was talking about an effort to wipe out the constitutional right to bear arms.

But no. He was referring to bills affecting “high capacity magazines, a “waiting period of up to 30 days to buy a gun,” “private sales,” and an unspecified “list of things we’ve heard as potential bills.”

Renfroe said he’d kill all gun-control legislation, if he had his way.

Renfroe: You know, the NRA has been at the table making compromises. So, unfortunately, we don’t put the best people forward from the Republican Party to stand for liberty, either. And we need to do a better job at that. And this issue is going to be at the forefront, and I’d rather try to kill everything we have and move forward, as opposed to rely on the next generation of elected officials to fix something that we do now.

Renfroe won’t compromise on gun legislation at all, but that didn’t stop him from saying later on the same radio show that Republicans are always ready to compromise.

Bemoaning potential Democratic opposition to his bill regarding photo radar and photo enforcement, Renfroe said Republicans are the ones who “always try and reach across the aisle.”

You’d think the good folks at Grassroots Radio Colorado, even if they don’t always do their homework before their show, would call out a guest when he completely contradicts himself during the course of one short interview.

Read a transcript of the segment and hear audio here.

In a post Thursday, I discussed a conversation between two local talk-radio hosts and Colorado Springs Gazette Editorial Page Editor, Wayne Laugesen.

Unfortunately, the good folks at KLZ’s Grassroots Radio Colorado thought I unfairly presented their show as attacking every garden-variety environmentalist under the sun, not just the radical fringe.

So I’ve posted more of the exchange between Laugesen and the KLZ hosts below, including more insight into Laugesen’s thinking on whom he’s referring to when he talks about “radical” environmentalists. Warning: he’s pretty vague, as some suspected on ColoradoPols and elsewhere.

I’d love to meet the soccer-mom environmentalist from Jefferson County who feels good about the Republican Party after hearing this conversation on conservative talk radio.

If the KLZ radio hosts, and Laugesen for that matter, really cared about the toxic effect of talk radio on the Republican Party, here’s a suggestion on how they could begin to do something about it.

Have an actual debate! Bring a mainstream environmentalist on the show, for example, when you talk about radical environmentalists or environmentalism as religion. Refuse to be a guest unless more than shades of conservative gray are present. I’m not saying this never happens, but do it more often, please.

Chances are, when the echo chamber starts echoing on talk radio, it’s turning off most of the electorate. That’s when you need to bring in an opposing view.

In any event, here’s more of the discussion from last week:

Co-host Ken Clark: [chuckling after hearing audio of ] Wayne, what did you think about those whack jobs?

Laugesen: Oh, you know, it was just kind of funny…I couldn’t hear it through the phone, but–

Clark: Well, that was the one who said that I don’t want to be able to light my water faucet on fire.

Laugesen: Right. Yeah, lots of people can light their water on fire. It’s methane gas that you know, that often comes through a faucet. You know, it’s become a big symbol of fracking. You know, lots of people, where there’s no fracking anywhere near the water supply, can light their water. These are the same—. Honestly, I’ve been to a lot of protests in Colorado Springs. Believe it or not, there is a lot of left wing activism in this town. We are a majority Republican, conservative town. But that doesn’t mean that, you know, forty, forty-five percent of the town isn’t on the other side. And it’s a big town. I mean, there’s 600-plus thousand people in the metropolitan Colorado Springs area. So, several hundred thousand of those people are left of center. And of those several hundred thousand who are left of center, you know, a significant number are radical left-wing activists. So, you’ll find that in any large city. These are the same activists you see who will protest any form of human progress you can think of. They will – you know, if somebody finds a way to feed famished children in Africa through a new agricultural practice, they’re going to be there with – you know, they’re going to be on the streets with signs telling us how this is a bad thing….

[See excerpt from previous post.]

Worley: And my question is, “Where did we get this abundance of ignorance?”

Laugesen: You mentioned religion a minute ago. I don’t think — I’m not saying for a minute that we got if from religion. I’m saying that the same – you know, the people who lack religion, who have no religious belief, they need something. They need a cause. They need something outside of themselves that seems like a good thing, to worship, to work toward. And I think that’s what you – you know, we joke, some of us on our side of the equation, jokingly use the term “tree huggers” “Tree worshipers”. But I think there’s a lot to that. I really – I think that—I think these — that activists who – their activism is directed against progress, that it is serving the same – it is doing for them what religion has done for thousands of years for most people.

Clark: Well Wayne , it is also the ultimate feel-good philosophy because think about it, it is the biggest sales job that has ever been perpetuated on the world-wide public as a whole, and I’m talking about climate change, global warming, anti-fracking, anti-coal – the whole nine yards. Because think about it. You create this made-up travesty that is going to kill the planet – global warming. And then you’ve got all these people, “Oh, my God! Look what I can do! I can go out there and save the world!” And these people buy into it. They give them false propaganda, false junk science, on and on and on. And they read this stuff. They think they’re educated. But they’re reading the Sierra Club propaganda. They’re reading this Agenda 21 propaganda. And it is the ultimate in feel-good, left-wing, propaganda. And there – people succumb to it, and man, they think they are really doing something. And in fact –

Laugesen: They feel great! – about a cause like that–

Clark: Oh, yeah! Oh, that’s –

Laugesen: –and the protests themselves are kind of fun. Now, I was counter-protesting yesterday, but it was fun! I really enjoyed it. And I know the people who were there making a lot of noise and holding up signs—they were having fun. It was something to do….

The Editorial Page Editor of the Colorado Springs Gazette, Wayne Laugesen, caught my attention last month when he pointed out that talk radio is “viewed, right or wrong, as part of the GOP, a big part of the GOP.”

This, he said, has hurt Republicans among Hispanics.

I asked Laugesen whether the damage caused by talk radio goes beyond Hispanics, to women or environmentalists, for example.

“I think a lot of good comes out of conservative talk radio,” he told me “But it can be a double-edged sword. That which gets ratings is not always in the best interest of those trying to win elections. Trying to find a niche on the radio is different from trying to put together a coalition of voters to win an election.”

I called Laugesen after listening to him on a talk radio show yesterday, where he had this exchange with radio host Jason Worley on KLZ’s Grassroots Radio Colorado yesterday:

Jason Worley: Environmentalism is a religion today. If you compare it to Judaism, Catholicism, Christianity, Hinduism, it has the same tenents, the same ideas. The problem is, the people who follow it, don’t have to actually ever suffer the effects of it. Go drop them off in Borneo in the middle of the rainforest with no mosquito protection repellent, no sunscreen…see how long they could last. They wouldn’t.

Laugesen: Right. If they ever got their way. If they were ever successful at stopping all this progress they intend to stop, they’d be miserable.

Worley: Wayne, you and I share a lot of beliefs. We’re right there on libertarian-leaning conservative beliefs.

Laugesen: Sure. I love progress. Almost 100% of the time, with some exceptions, when someone creates profit, which is really just the cost of capital, that person has improved the human condition. Because what are we willing to pay for? What makes us part with precious capital? An improvement to our lives. That’s the only thing that makes us part with capital. Human beings are not intuitively into destroying their lives, or the environment that supports their lives.

Lots of people, like swing-voting soccer moms, consider themselves environmentalists.

Could this conversation possibly make them feel good about the GOP?

To be fair, there was a lot more to the KLZ radio segment, including Laugesen’s audio of a group of anti-fracking protesters saying some silly stuff, but still, if you’re the kind of person who feels warmly toward environmentalism, and you listened to this show, you could easily have felt personally attacked.

But that wasn’t Laugesen’s intention.

I interpreted Laugesen’s 100% comment to mean he’s against most all regulations that might hinder profit. But he straightened me out, saying he believes that rules and regulations are necessary.

He also said he thinks “organized religion is far more legitimate than extreme environmental activism.”

In fact, throughout his radio appearance, Laugesen directed his critique at “radical” environmentalists, not all of them.

But, amid the extreme comments by a guy like Worley, do everyday environmentalists hear the distinction. Or do they just feel attacked, like Hispanics?

Laugesen and I agreed that amplification can overpower details on talk radio.

“Dwelling on the nuances does not win the favor of dittoheads,” he said.

On KLZ’s Grassroots Radio Colorado Wednesday, a caller put the following question to Joe Coors, who’s running against Rep. Ed Perlmutter for a congressional seat.

Caller Elkie: Hi Joe. I just want to call in because I [inaudible] you. And I’m a supporter. But I have a friend who said he was not going to vote for you because you’re anti-Semitic. I hadn’t heard anything about that, so I thought I’d ask you.

Strange question, to be sure. Here’s Coors’ answer:

Coors: Elkie. Thank you for the question. I can’t imagine where that comes from. I’m a big supporter of Israel. I have a lot of Jewish friends. And I can’t imagine that kind of–well, that’s a typical misconception that’s coming out of the Perlmutter camp. And it’s unfortunate. But I can honestly tell you that–and I’ve visited Israel. What a great place. And I just don’t understand.

Listen to the audio here: On KLZ Oct 31, Coors discusses “typical” misconception spread by “Perlmutter camp”

My first thought was, had host Jason Worley read Lynn Bartels great article about the personal connections between the Coors and Perlmutter families? Perlmutter hired Coors’ daughter. Coors and Perlmutter’s dad were friends and next-door neighbors for 16 years. Coors’ brother is the godfather of one of Perlmutter’s kids.

And now Coors’ is accusing the “Perlmutter camp,” which would presumably include Perlmutter himself, of spreading the rumor that Coors hates Jews? I would have thought Clark would have at least asked, “Joe, why do you think Ed would spread a rumor like that? And where’s your evidence?”

But later in the show, Worley and co-host Randy Corporon, who was subbing for regular host Ken Clark, raised questions about the caller, Elkie, saying she had misrepresented her question prior to coming on air.

Corporon: “We were talking off-air with our call screener about Elka who called in and sprung this phony-bologna allegation on Joe Coors. And we did call it, because Elka absolutely lied to our call screener about what she was calling about.”

Worley: “Yeah. She said she was going to ask a totally different question, something about Perlmutter….”

Corporon: “This is the desperation of the left.

Worley: That’s really awkward. I really do feel bad. We don’t purposely ever let a candidate have something like that happen to them. And you what, I think Joe handled it pretty darn well.”

On one hand, I don’t blame Corporon and Worley for being upset about a caller who allegedly lies to them about what they’re going to say, but the truth is, they didn’t offer us any proof that she, in fact, lied. This is a she-said-he-said situation.

Still, I actually think Worley’s call screener, and the KLZ hosts, are telling the truth. Why would they lie about it?

But, hey, welcome to talk radio. It’s all about people lying about who they are and what they’ll say. This unpredictability is part of what makes the talk medium so great. I mean, the guests, love them or hate them, are the best part of talk radio.

In any case, if Elkie’s question was a set up, it was a really strange one. You’d think an operative might have asked about why Coors flipped on personhood? Or why now, after being against abortion, even for rape and incest, he’s now ok with letting raped women have an abortion.

But even if you assume Elkie was secretly opposing Coors, Coors answer is still on the table. And the radio hosts should have dealt with it directly.

What evidence does Coors have to support his statement that it’s “typical” for the “Perlmutter camp” to spread “misconceptions” like Coors being anti-Semitic?

If this is a “typical” misconception, what are some of the other in-the-same-ballpark misconceptions that Coors thinks are being spread by the Perlmutter camp?

Does Coors really think Perlmutter himself would spread the rumor that Coors is an anti-Semite? If not, does Coors owe Perlmutter an apology?

Worley and Corporon should have Coors back on the show to answer these questions and others.

On KLZ’s Grassroots Radio Colorado last week, Rep. Robert Ramirez complained about a mailer pointing out that Ramirez is opposed to in-vitro fertilization.

Maybe I’m a bit more personhood-obsessed than radio host Ken Clark, but I know that Ramirez, who’s running for House District 29, supports the personhood amendment.

And, as I explain below, a personhood law would effectively ban in-vitro fertilization.

Hence, for those of you who remember your transitive principle (if x=y and y=b, then x=b), Ramirez opposes in-vitro fertilization.

First, here are Ramirez’s comments about personhood to the Colorado Independent:

Ramirez said he does support the personhood amendment.

“I signed the petition, but it has been voted down.” He says if personhood was introduced in the legislature, he would vote against it, because the people have already spoken twice. “I will sign it and I will fight for it every day of the week, but I won’t bypass the voters,” he said.

Yet, on the radio, Ramirez said he has no clue why his opponents would accuse him of being opposed to in-vitro fertilization:

KLZ HOST CLARK:  Well, I’ve seen some of those fliers and I’ve got to tell you, they are appalling—some of the things they’ve tried to , you know, no so subtly accuse you of.

RAMIREZ:  Mmm-hmm.

CLARK:  I mean, give me a break!  I mean, but—

RAMIREZ:  There’s one going out now saying I’m against in-vitro fertilization. Really? I’ve never even been asked.  [laughter]

CLARK: And you make it sound like that matters, somehow.

RAMIREZ: You know, if somebody wants to get pregnant and they go to their doctor and say, “Does this work?”   That’s their business, not mine….

I wish Clark had corrected Ramirez, because it does none of us any good to allow misinformation to hit the air waves unchallenged.

Here are a few passages from a carefully written research paper, co-authored by Colorado’s own Ari Armstrong, on how a personhood law would shut down fertility clinics in Colorado. (Armstrong is an independent blogger and sometime researcher for the Independence Institute).

In a section called “Bans on Common Fertility Treatments,” Armstrong and co-author Diana Hsieh, Ph. D.write:

In the context of a “personhood” law, the basic problem with in vitro fertilization is that often not all of the embryos are transferred to the woman’s uterus. Embryos in the lab could not be allowed to perish, nor languish in cold storage, as they would be considered persons with rights, and frozen embryos remain viable only for a few years. To eliminate such practices would render in vitro fertilization not worth doing for most infertile couples. So the practical result of Amendment 62 likely would be to shut down Colorado’s seven reproductive clinics and put an end to those births.

Finally, consider how Amendment 62 would change the legal status of all the frozen embryos now in existence: they would suddenly become “persons” under the law, with all the rights of born infants. Presumably, women would be forced to implant (or donate for implantation) all their existing embryos–or face criminal charges. Moreover, if the biological parents of a frozen embryo die, presumably the embryo has full rights of inheritance, thereby reducing the share of any born children, though how the frozen embryo will grow up to collect remains a problem.

This fantastical scenario highlights the absurdity of treating an embryo as a person in the law.

Ari Armstrong is on Clark’s radio show every now and then, and I hope Clark will ask Armstrong to discuss this issue next time he has the chance, the sooner the better, to set the record straight for KLZ listeners.