Some folks might try to re-jigger the meaning of the term to encompass some imaginary "public policy that keeps people in poverty and the infant mortality rate high" but I believe you would be hard pressed to defend that position. Is that what 'it should be extended to republicans' implied?
Let's begin with the definition. The primary blurring is in ignoring the meaning of the term eugenics: the use of state power to improve the racial, genetic, or biological health of the community.
If you believe in taking the lives of indivicuals to the purposes of the above, then you believe in eugenics. I think that
If, as in the OP, emoluments are provided to entice folks into making their own decisions, then "the use of state power" in the sense of force is not being used, then one could say that it is not a eugenic program.
Speak of implications, are you laboring (pun intended) under the misaprehension that the US has high infant mortality?
If so, it is because you have not looked into the matter.
While 40% of Americas infant mortality rate is due to reporting of infants who die on the day of their birth, many countries dont register such deaths at all. Other countries require specific size (Switzerland, 30 cm) and weights (Austria and Germany, 500 gms) to be listed as having been born.
Bernadine Healy, M.D.: Behind the baby count - US News and World Report
Rarely reported in comparing infant mortality rates it the negative effect of very pre-term babies, whose death rate is far higher than full term. When comparing the US infant mortality rate to such category-stars as in this NYTimes report of 11/4/09:
If the United States could match Swedens prematurity rate, the new report said, nearly 8,000 infant deaths would be averted each year, and the U.S. infant mortality rate would be one-third lower.
We find the usual anti-US slant of the Times, in not mentioning that race is the reason:
The use of this example highlights to disingenuousness of the authors. In their supposedly detailed report on infant mortality, they fail to analyze the most important detail: race. Unfortunately, African descent is a major risk factor for prematurity, and prematurity is a major cause of infant mortality. Therefore, it is hardly surprising that the US has a higher infant mortality rate than Sweden. The US has the highest proportion of women of African descent of any first world country. Sweden, of course, has virtually none. So our higher rate of infant mortality does not reflect poor medical care. It reflects factors beyond the control of doctors. Race is an uncontrollable factor; obstetricians and pediatricians have no control over assisted reproductive techniques. In fact, the data actually show obstetricians and pediatricians do a remarkable job of ensuring infant health.
Infant mortality report neglects the most important detail - AmyTuteurMD - Open Salon
One factor contributing to the U.S.'s infant mortality rate is that blacks have intractably high infant mortality rates -- irrespective of age, education, socioeconomic status and so on. No one knows why.
Neither medical care nor discrimination can explain it: Hispanics in the U.S. have lower infant mortality rates than either blacks or whites. Give Switzerland or Japan our ethnically diverse population and see how they stack up on infant mortality rates.
A Statistical Analysis of Maritime Unemployment Rates, 1946-1948. Just Kidding, More Liberal Lies About National Healthcare! - HUMAN EVENTS
