(From "Why Republicans should stop talking about Roe v. Wade.")
I'm in the 18%. I'm surprised I have so much company!
January 22, 2013
Where are you on the Roe v. Wade matrix?
(From "Why Republicans should stop talking about Roe v. Wade.")
I'm in the 18%. I'm surprised I have so much company!
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155 comments:
overturning roe just sends it back to the states no?
Althouse. Regardless of the moral rightness or wrongness of abortion, how can you possibly think that Roe v. Wade is good law? These unwritten "emanating penumbras" are the bane of constitutional jurisprudence.
I'm in the part where it's banned except in cases of mother's death.
Except for black people, since they're not really human. Abort away, soulless husks of parasitic monkey turd!
I am in whatever circle that says it is wrong to kill a baby.
Everytime.
Yeah, that 18% seems blinkered. How do you come down that way? It's a stupid decision, but maybe a classic compromise. I'm on the left side, wavering between is/is-not morally wrong, but with no doubt that the decision was wrong. I could see upper left, lower left, or lower right, but upper right is barmy.
I'm part of the 4%. I'm special. Yeah!
I generally ignore questions about "should we overturn Roe v. Wade" because the vast majority of Americans have no idea what the question even means.
The chart misrepresents the question asked.
And while they're at it, the Republicans should just shut up about that slavery thing, too.
What Revenant said.
And, I'm in the 25%. Used to donate money to NARAL, by the way. Thought hard about it and changed my mind.
"Not a moral question" is not equal to "Not morally wrong."
Maguro is right. Further, time is NOT on abortionists side.With each passing hour/day/week/month advances in science move the viability of the fetus back down the time-line towards inception. Whether "science" will ever prove conclusive is perhaps open to doubt, but science seems to be moving inexorably in that direction--a direction which will prove Michelangelo's depiction of "the touch" on the ceiling of the Sistine to have proved him to have been preternaturally prescient.
Yeah, that 18% seems blinkered. How do you come down that way?
Easy. The question they actually asked isn't the question the chart implies they asked.
The actual question was whether Roe v. Wade should be *completely* overturned. The morality question was similarly absolute.
So if, for example, you think that the few percent of abortions performed to save the mothers' lives are acceptable but the other 90-plus percent are not, and think the former are a right but the latter are not, then "immoral but don't completely overturn Roe v. Wade" is the appropriate choice.
The number who think it's immoral 43% vs. 46% are very close and I'd say worth fighting for. But I doubt there's hope for even tweaking Roe v. Wade until that number reverses.
I'm intrigued with other polls that highlight morality. I'd like to see such polls on debt and borrowing, affirmative action, and gay marriage. Not questions worded whether one supports this or that position but explicitly probing rightness and wrongness.
The basic problem that liberals are running into is that a lot of the Roe abortions are horrific. So, for instance, the poll that Garage linked to in an earlier thread said that Roe protects abortion during the first 3 months of pregnancy.
Yet we've also had 6 million abortions in the second and third trimester. And 500,000 abortions of viable babies after 22 weeks, including the baby murdered in Carhart II.
So supporters of Roe have to lie about what it says. Even their polls are a lie!
They have to suppress information.
I'm in the 4%; I have no problem with abortion but Roe was an idiotic decision.
What I'd like to see a poll that asked a question like: "The majority of abortions are peformed on healthy pregnancies from consensual sex. Should these abortions be more, less, or as restricted as they are now?"
With a follow-up of "do some believe a woman has a right to terminate such a pregnancy".
All you ever hear about, when Democrats defend abortion, is rape rape incest rape rape life of the mother". Uh-huh, but could we talk about the other 95% of abortions occasionally? Hell, those are the only kind anyone I know's ever had.
That used to be the norm.
That is was wrong to kill a baby.
Now people like Obama will kill a baby even after it survives an abortion.
Abortion and the fanatical devotion to it by the Democratic party has served to coarsen and debase our society in so many ways. We will never recover from it.
Soon enough our elites will dictate how many and what kind of children you can have just like China.
That day is coming if people like Barrack Obama and Thomas Friedman and Paul Krugman and Amanda Marcotte have their way.
Unfortunately it seems that they will.
We have lost our way.
Yet we've also had 6 million abortions in the second and third trimester.
That's deceptively phrased. It should be more like "5.9 million abortions in the second trimester and 0.1 million in the third".
This is a great example of how the questios skews the poll results. Here, it minimizes and makes positive the explanation of Roe - "[positive language] constintutional right to an abortion [minimizes - more accurately, abortion on demand for any reason for at least six months] for at least three months.
Then, if makes the anti-Roe position "completely overturn."
Thus, the questions clearly drive up the Roe support. Worse, the Pew people must be smart enought to know this. Bias is everywhere. Even my "on demand" language may be biased.
OT but shouldn't this article by the same author have been entitled: "Why Democrats should stop talking about Gun Control"? He relies on the same type of polling data to suggest an uphill partisan struggle. I'll bet pier pressure made him pussy out and call it "How The NRA Is Winning" instead to placate the Community Morganizers.
Even my "on demand" language may be biased.
"May be"? :)
I mean, for starters it implies the right to an abortion even if you can't pay for it and the doctor doesn't want to perform it. Granted that IS the Democratic position, but still.
Pro-lifers--and Republicans in general--are demonized as hostile to science. Yet who is fighting to suppress ultrasounds?
According to liberals, they just want to protect "choice." An ultrasound would help inform your choice, right? It's information, scientific information, about what is going on inside your uterus.
Pro-lifers love the ultrasound, because we believe it confirms what we are saying. The baby is a baby.
It's the "blob of tissue" crowd that hates the ultrasound. Actual science, actual truth, conflicts with what they have been saying.
Liberals are terrified that if a pregnant woman sees an ultrasound of her baby, she will choose life.
Thus, the ultrasound--a procedure that 99% of Planned Parenthood clinics routinely do, either before or after an abortion--is "rape."
That, too, is a lie. We just want the doctor to share the information he has with his patient.
It's basically like the Presidential campaign in 2012. We can just shut up and let the media control the debate. Or we can fight, fight, fight until people hear the truth.
Democrats literally have to demonize us as hostile to birth control. That's how bad abortion poll tests, apparently. They can't run on it, so they have to switch the subject.
I'm in the 4% who think the opinion in Roe is a mess and that this is an issue that should be handled at the state level. But I hope my state would permit it, and I have no moral qualms about women choosing it. In fact, I'll go further: Until every middle seat on airplanes is unoccupied, abortion should not only be permitted, it should be encouraged.
I suppose I'm in the 4%.
I think it is morally wrong but that is not why I think it should be overturned. It's bad law. Bad constitutional precedent. It has unnecessarily polarized our political dynamics.
Whatever regulations (or lack) the majority voters in my state decided on, would be acceptable to me.
Abortion is not just wrong. It is evil. People who protect it and endorse it and fight for it are actively doing evil.
You can not do evil without it exacting a price. On your soul.
I went to dinner last night after having not been in my favorite restaruant for about a month.
After a couple of hours at the shank of the evening our waiter confided in me that his wife had lost their child. After seven months. It died in the womb and could not recover. They had to take it. He was able to hold it. Kiss it good bye. Pray for it.
It could never do anything to make his loss less heartbreaking. But holding his son gave him some closure.
An abortionist would have just thrown it in the trash.
It should be more like "5.9 million abortions in the second trimester and 0.1 million in the third".
Certainly there are more abortions in the second than the third, but we don't have much actual information about what is going on in abortion clinics.
See, for instance, this MSNBC story about Dr. Gosnell's clinic, where newborns were routinely murdered.
Our information about what is going on in abortion clinics is provided by the CDC, who relies on information gathered by states.
As the Gosnell case suggests, many states simply are not regulating abortion clinics at all. No health inspections in Pennsylvania for 16 years, apparently.
The other information about abortion clinics is provided by the Guttmacher Institute, which is an affiliate of Planned Parenthood. It's rather like relying upon R.J. Reynolds for your lung cancer information.
Revenant -
I had not thought of "on demand" as implying free of charge, but you probably are correct. But it probably also is true that just about anyone can get a free abortion at planned parenthood, isn't it? I think the question still should be "unrestricted right" for a fair polll.
I thought your questions also would drive up negative responses. Desribing the right to abortion in the least sympathetic situation -- healthy pregnancy after consensual sex."
By the way, the Pew poll question on "moral" is also skewed because it follows the question designed to maximize support for Roe. Once the respondent expresses support for Roe, he/she is motivated to declare abortion moral. Such biased liberal tricks, even by Pew.
I'm in the 18% as well. Sort of.
I don't think abortion should be illegal. Is that the same as thinking RvW should not be overturned? Recognize the reality of life -- that abortions will occur and that prosecuting those who get one, or who perform one -- won't change that.
To add to your point, Governor Cuomo has pushed through a law which allows non-doctors to perform abortions. Physician assistants. Nurses. Maybe even janitors at abortion clinics. I wouldn't put anything past these people.
They put more restrictions on lemonade stands or first food soda cups than they want to put on abortionists.
Certainly there are more abortions in the second than the third, but we don't have much actual information about what is going on in abortion clinics.
Look, you can't make claims about how many second and third trimester abortions are performed and then fall back on "well we don't have good data about how many third-trimester abortions are performed".
I stand by the response I made in a previous thread. I thank all the people who told me how that response had opened their eyes on this abortion thing and really changed their mind. It's a difficult issue, and I'm just glad that the arguments and statistics I provided were so convincing.
Zemo, saying Cuomo signed a bill that might allow janitors to perform abortions makes you sound like a nut, especially when you don't source the claim.
Just an observation.
I'm in the 18%, I'm surprised it's not much higher.
Hmm. I was a 1%er, but now it seems I am a 4%er!
I am in the 25% quadrant with God.
Inga wrote;
I'm in the 18%, I'm surprised it's not much higher.
its the worst position to have. I'm surprised 18% of the population hold it.
Also in the 18%.
I tend to the libertarian right on most matters, so I find it disagreeable that people mock the "emanations and penumbras" privacy rationale on Roe.
To disagree with Roe on that basis, you have to hold to the idea that there are no rights except those explicitly "granted" by the Bill of Rights. That's the 'where did they find this alleged privacy right?" argument.
But that argument flies in the face of the 9th and 10th Amendments. It's usually the left that ignores these two, so it seems quite situational that folks on the right ignore them but usually, or most vocally, only on this one issue.
IANAL, but the SCOTUS privacy path flows from Griswold through Roe through Lawrence, and that line of thought seems entirely correct to me. There are some areas so private and personal that the government shouldn't contemplate laws about them. We would do well IMO to vastly expand the scope of these private matters untouchable by govt, not reduce them.
I don't want a world where abortion is illegal.
I want a world where it's unthinkable.
Like cannibalism.
I wonder what a similar graph of American opinion on slavery in 1830 would like? Not much different I surmise given the support behind the Missouri Compromise. BY the time of the Fugitive Slave Act and the Kansas-Nebraska Act the not immoral and not unconstitutional large minority would have shrunken considerably.
The bill allows "qualified licensed professionals to commit abortions."
You know like a food handler's license.
So it is not too farfetched for them to train a janitor to do it because doctors don't want to do it anymore. If you think that is crazy than you are crazy.
They will stop at nothing to commit abortions.
Brian O'Connell said.."I tend to the libertarian right on most matters, so I find it disagreeable that people mock the "emanations and penumbras" privacy rationale on Roe."
The problem is that the privacy rationale is neither rational nor consistent. It is only applied to the right to abortion. It cannot explain why the right is invalidated after "viability". I cannot explain why any other right such as the right to buy a large soda in NYC is not included.
It's a mess. It's sophistry. It is a crime against the very idea of a constitution.
Quaestor, it took Fredrick Douglas and Uncle Tom's Cabin to move some people into the anti-slavery camp.
I think it is late term abortions and the "its not a child, its a collection of non-viable cells" crowd to move people into the pro-life crowd.
Its ultra-sounds. Its the removal of a stigma to being a single mother.
Look, you can't make claims about how many second and third trimester abortions are performed and then fall back on "well we don't have good data about how many third-trimester abortions are performed".
Fair enough! I quote the data I find.
Many states outlaw abortions after 24 weeks. This has actually never been litigated. Pennsylvania, for instance, outlaws abortion after 24 weeks. Planned Parenthood said it was unconstitutional. But they decided not to litigate it in Casey.
The Supreme Court has said we can do "health" abortions until birth. That's a very vague standard. A lot of doctors don't want to flirt with violating the law. So they obey the 24 weeks rule. (In the states that have that rule).
But some doctors--Hern, Gosnell, Carhart--routinely do 3rd trimester abortions, and charge a lot of money for them.
100,000 might be too low, or too high, or just right. I don't know.
By the way, do you think those are homicides? And if so, are you upset?
This bill removes every single restriction on abortion.
Late term third trimester abortions while the baby can live outside the womb...no probem.
Parental consent...abolished.
Any restriction removed.
It's all fair game. Every weasel word lie that the baby killers come out with is out the fucking window.
What makes you think having a licensed abortion specialist who is also a janitor is so out of the realm of possiblity? I mean they will save a lot of money by multitasking.
I dislike the idea of the 18%. But I wonder why the 4% is so low. Roe vs Wade was a horrible decision. Even if you support abortion, you should hate this decision based on poor legal understanding.
Madison man rote:
I don't think abortion should be illegal. Is that the same as thinking RvW should not be overturned? Recognize the reality of life -- that abortions will occur and that prosecuting those who get one, or who perform one -- won't change that.
whether they occur or not, what do you think the outcome is should a fetus be aborted. Are you killing something or are you just ejecting a bunch of cells?
If on think its murder, because life begins at conception, then explain the logic of why it should be legal, and why another person should have the right to end that life. If its just a bunch of cells, then of course why wouldn't it be legal.
I can totally understand the position of those saying life oesnt begin at conception. But Inga's and Althouse's position strike me as callous.
You would think something is wrong but should still be legal if you thought the crime wa victimless. Ie we shold legalize drugs because people taking drugs are only hurting themselves (I don't necessarily agree, I m just pointing out the thought process but if you think the crime is not victimless, why would you say it shold be legal?
Inga for example thinks life begins at conceptipon. Meaning women are murdering their babies. Yet thinks tht should be legal. Explain that logic.
The bill allows "qualified licensed professionals to commit abortions."
You know like a food handler's license.
So it is not too farfetched for them to train a janitor to do it because doctors don't want to do it anymore. If you think that is crazy than you are crazy.
They will stop at nothing to commit abortions.
@Saint Croix/
Yes, that "health" provision includes/is defined as the "mental health of the mother" which has ALWAYS been regarded as a hole in the law big enough to drive the proverbial Mack truck thru and why many (indeed most) on the anti-abortion/pro-life side are so resolutely against most "health of the mother" provisions in any proposed changes in legislation--a MAJOR sticking point..
What makes you think having a licensed abortion specialist who is also a janitor is so out of the realm of possiblity?
Look, I said making that claim without citing a source made you sound like a nut. Repeating the claim while continuing to cite no sources makes you sound like a nut who can't take a hint.
My dad was an unwanted mistake. Don't know the story behind his birth, except a great aunt said once "what a sad situation he came from".
I am glad society didn't have the same views about life and abortion in the 1940s (when he was born) that they do now.
But I wonder why the 4% is so low. Roe vs Wade was a horrible decision. Even if you support abortion, you should hate this decision based on poor legal understanding.
4% sounds about right for the percentage of Americans who believe "I want it" and "I don't want it" aren't the same thing as "the Constitution requires it" and "the Constitution forbids it". :)
overturning roe just sends it back to the states no?
Yes, that's right. Nobody on the Supreme Court is fighting to recognize the baby's humanity, or to apply equal protectin to the child.
I think this is a horrible mistake, and why I have been so hard on Justice Scalia.
I think eequal protection would help us resolve this fight!
For instance, we could apply our death statutes and take the infanticide issue off the table. That would help a lot.
James: The problem is that the privacy rationale is neither rational nor consistent. It is only applied to the right to abortion.
Not true. In Griswold it was applied to contraception. In Lawrence it was applied to sodomy.
It cannot explain why the right is invalidated after "viability".
True, but there are competing claims there- namely the fetus's right to life.
I cannot explain why any other right such as the right to buy a large soda in NYC is not included.
Yes, but this is why privacy rights should be expanded and built upon legally. Don't say that the right to privacy should be discounted since it's so rarely invoked. Rather, let's use it as often as possible! Many on the right would love that, if it was followed through on. I would!
Brian o'donnell wrote:
True, but there are competing claims there- namely the fetus's right to life.
but you're arguing that the fetus has no right to life.
What about disparic (yes, spelling) impact? Where something causes more harm to a protected class, therefore it is illegal.
So if abortion affects African-Americans more than white folk, isn't it doing more harm to that community? Where is the NAACP on this? Or doesn't this issue raise the funds to pay for NAACP officers conventions in expensive hotels in nice cities?
Look, I said making that claim without citing a source made you sound like a nut. Repeating the claim while continuing to cite no sources makes you sound like a nut who can't take a hint.
Here's a link for some pro-life criticism of the Cuomo bill.
I was president of the pro-life group at an Ivy League university for 3 years. My views on abortion have not changed much. *But* I am now inclined to agree with you that the "prohibitionist" approach does not work very well. I can think something is "morally wrong" without thinking the most important thing in the world is for the government to ban it.
It cannot explain why the right is invalidated after "viability".
The reasoning is that the fetus develops rights of its own as it becomes viable.
Rick, I agree. You need to change minds, vs forcing it on people.
What about disparic (yes, spelling) impact? Where something causes more harm to a protected class, therefore it is illegal.
Your belief that anything with a disparate racial impact is automatically illegal is incorrect.
For example, have you noticed that drugs are still illegal and the prisons are still open, even though both disproportionately affect black people?
Similarly, Justin Bieber concerts disproportionately sell tickets to white girls. This, also, is not illegal.
Boy Rev you sure are a stickler about being the hall monitor.
Here is a link to Fox News which I am sure you will discount.
It describes how "licensed medical professionals" will now conduct abortions because most doctors refuse to do so. Saying a janitor might do is just push the envelope just a little. Just to illustrate how ridiculous lengths these abortionist will go.
But thanks for the unsolicited advice. It's always good to hear from you.
Here's a link for some pro-life criticism of the Cuomo bill.
Nothing at that link supports a claim that janitors may be allowed to perform abortions. :)
No who really opposes abortion will vote Republican if the party stops opposing it. The party will lose 25 % of its voters. That will really end it.
But the party could stick with its principles. In the end that will pay off because the African-American birthrate is now below replacement level. And government funded abortions done at Planned Parenthood are the leading cause. And the decline is accelerating because Obama has made it even easier for minorities to get abortions. In the end this will turn people away from the present Democratic regime's unqualified support for government-sponsored abortion. First it will go back to the states. Then more truth will come out about exactly what is really happening in abortion clinics to women. Then it will be abolished in some states.
If you support abortion ask yourself whether you support government policies which will eliminate the African-American race. Are such policies legal but should be immoral or immoral and should be illegal or is the real question: Where's blanky?
Rev....actually the courts ruled that we needed to reduce the sentences for crack cocaine offenses as blacks were more likely to be sent to prison than whites for smoking crack. Now, I would argue that opposite, that I want crack adicts out of my neighborhood.
So if abortion kills more blacks (60% of all blacks in NYC are aborted), and in Mississippi, blacks are aborted at more than twice the rate of whites, you have disparate impact.
This is incomplete. I think Roe v Wade should be overturned, and I think abortion is morally wrong in nearly all cases, but I am one of these rare birds who nevertheless prefers not to criminalize abortion.
There is a difference between one's view of what the law is and one's view of what policy should be. The Constiution does not protect a woman's right to an abortion - that is, Roe v Wade was wrongly decided - but not all moral wrongs are worth fighting with the blunt invasive instrument of the criminal justice system.
wild, Obama is about to legalize 11,000,000 illegal aliens, most of whom will vote Democrat.
Roe v. Wade, by the way, accidentally legalized abortions by non-physicians.
The Court said that there could be no regulations for the mother's health until the second trimester.
We couldn't require a doctor's license until the second trimester.
This is insane, no? And yet that's what Roe v. Wade says!
The very first case decided after Roe v. Wade had to fix this really stupid mistake. It's called Connecticut v. Menillio
The Supreme Court is slow, like a turtle. Took them almost 3 years to fix the mistake. According to the Guttmacher Institute (research group affiliated with Planned Parenthood), there were 2.6 million abortions in that time frame.
And people wonder why there are so few health inspections of abortion clinics. Read Roe v. Wade! Blackmun is calling for an "abortion free of interference by the state" in the first trimester.
So no health inspections, and (oops) no doctor, either. They accidentally legalized all the abortion mills.
Blackmun's new abortion statute for our entire country was incredibly sloppy, even as an abortion statute. Which, of course, is not his job.
I don't want a world where abortion is illegal.
I want a world where it's unthinkable
You want Utopia. As long as people exist, they will have pregnancies perceived to be unwanted.
I think a better tack would be for more shaming. Shaming of people who 'fall pregnant' (love that euphemism).
Prison terms for women who have abortions? Prison terms for Doctors who perform them? That's not going to sell at large scales, long term.
But the party could stick with its principles. In the end that will pay off because the African-American birthrate is now below replacement level.
The African-American birthrate is higher than the white and Asian birthrates.
If black Americans are dying out, the white ones are dying faster.
Some things are right and some things are wrong.
Political advantage should not factor into something so obviously evil.
But that's up to you.
Rev....actually the courts ruled that we needed to reduce the sentences for crack cocaine offenses as blacks were more likely to be sent to prison than whites for smoking crack.
You're a bit confused about the ruling. Crack cocaine and powder cocaine are the same drug, but the former is more popular with blacks and the latter with whites. Because most of the weight of crack is inert substances and because sentencing was done by weight, blacks were penalized more harshly than whites for possession of identical amounts of cocaine.
If the problem had been that drugs laws disproportionate sent blacks to prison, the law against cocaine itself would have been out on its ass. :)
If Obama legalized 11 million aliens that would take that issue off the table politically and then certain values they hold would emerge. I'm not so sure they would be reliable Democratic voters once they were citizens. They have a very strong work ethic; they want to own a house and a business; they save; they are aligned with the values voters on almost all issues. This is another reason for the Republican party not to self destruct on the eve of victory by suddenly supporting abortion.
PS.
And remember, the abolitionists were even less popular than the prolifers but they were the winning side because they were morally right.
Nothing at that link supports a claim that janitors may be allowed to perform abortions. :)
Menillo had no medical training at all.
Or consider California. It's the largest abortion state in the country. They refuse to give any information about abortion to the CDC.
And their state senate passed a law allowing nurses to give RU-486 to patients.
You know, like the school nurse?
RU-486 causes a miscarriage. And it also might result in an incompelete abortion (i.e. tissue left behind in your uterus).
It might also cause breast cancer.
but with love and counseling, and a firm understanding of the third person intimately involved in the procedure, we can help them overcome their self hatred and choose life.
How many unicorns are involved in this process?
Lady, we can't even get people to stop killing human beings that can actually walk, talk, and think. You think conversation and happy thoughts are going to convince everyone that the ones who *can't* walk, talk and think have a right to live?
I love it when complex moral issues are presented as x/y diagrams. They make things so clear and easy to understand.
People need to stop panicking about the 11 million illegal aliens.
Reagan amnesty'd millions of illegals, too. That didn't give the Democrats a lock on the country by any stretch of the imagination. What did happen is that some of the Democrats -- and let's not forget that a big chunk of Democrats hates amnesty -- jumped ship for the Republicans and never looked back.
Unions are dying out rapidly. Unions hate amnesty and hate immigration. Where do you think the votes of blue-collar workers are going to go then their union shuts down and cheap immigrant labor is making it hard to find work? Hint: rhymes with "Shmipublicans".
By the way I'm not saying amnesty won't be bad, just that "ZOMG Democrats will rule 4 evar" will not be the outcome of it.
Revenant,
The white birth rate is a flat line - the same since 1973 - about 1.8, 1.9. But the black birth rate line is pointing down, falling steadily. It's now below replacement level, has been since 2006, and still pointing down. It's not a flat line like the white birth rate. And the black family has collapsed. So how will that rate stop falling?
Only if Republicans are elected and they begin the attack on abortion by refusing to allow government funding abortions on the grounds that this funding is having a genocidal effect.
Wanting to overturn Roe v Wade is not the same as wanting to outlaw abortion. I think abortion is morally wrong, think Roe v Wade should be overturned, but think abortion should be legal by virtue of legislation. That doesn't seem to be one of the options.
This is a pretty article on why it's a horrible idea for nurses to give out RU-486 like it's aspirin.
Romans had an orgy culture, with lots of infanticides.
Christians defeated them with love. (And reproduction).
t/y to ann and meade too, for forgoing the heavy delete button in this thread.
Althouse has always been an awesome advocate for free speech and free thought. One of her best attributes.
Nothing at that link supports a claim that janitors may be allowed to perform abortions. :)
Menillo had no medical training at all.
Menillo was convicted and sent to prison. If you want to change the claim you're defending to "janitors will illegally perform abortions and go to prison" I'll agree that's not "crazy", per se. Highly unlikely, though.
Or consider California.
We're discussing Cuomo's new abortion law in New York and a particular nutty claim that it would allow janitors to perform abortions.
Pointing out that nurses in California can give out RU-486 is interesting in a Trivial Pursuit sort of way, but it isn't actually relevant to the topic. :)
Menillo was convicted and sent to prison.
Dude, he was convicted under the old law. The state supreme court was releasing all the non-doctors who were performing abortions. Why would you think they were arresting anybody in the 1973-75 time frame? It's an abortion free of interference by the state!
If you want to change the claim you're defending to "janitors will illegally perform abortions and go to prison" I'll agree that's not "crazy", per se. Highly unlikely, though.
Gosnell's clinic had non-doctors doing abortions. Who believes in unicorns now?
I'd overturn Roe, and vote at my state level to make it legal up to around twenty weeks.
I don't see anything in the Constitution about where life begins.
It's immoral to end a developing human life, but can a society this irresponsible be trusted to care for congenitally defective persons (people?) throughout their lives, if they require institutionalization?
Also absent an 80% or so pro-life consensus, I wouldn't impose my views on others through the law.
The white birth rate is a flat line - the same since 1973 - about 1.8, 1.9. But the black birth rate line is pointing down, falling steadily.
The lifetime fertility per woman, as of 2008:
2.91 Hispanics
2.13 Blacks
2.07 Whites
2.06 Asians/Pacific Islanders
1.84 Native Americans
Source: US Census Bureau
Abortion is morally wrong unless it's my teenage daughter that I'm trying to get into a good college.
Dude, he was convicted under the old law.
Dude, the Supreme Court upheld that part of the old law and sent him to prison. :)
The appeals court made a dumb ruling, the SCOTUS pointed out that their ruling was dumb, and the appeals court then upheld the conviction.
So, again, if you want to change your argument to "lesser courts may make dumb rulings and get overturned", all you'll get out of me will be a "no shit, they've been doing that for over 200 years". :)
Gosnell's clinic had non-doctors doing abortions. Who believes in unicorns now?
They were performing those abortions illegally. I'm fairly certain I never said anything that could be interpreted as "nobody will ever do anything illegal".
I'm just mocking your insane belief that Cuomo legalized the janitorial abortion industry. :)
Often an unwanted pregnancy is simply a mistake, a mistake that threatens to ruin the lives of the parents
If you decide to keep the baby, how is your life ruined?
If you decide to give the baby up for adoption, how is your life ruined?
On the other hand, an abortion can ruin your life. For instance, if you have an abortion, you might damage your reproductive system.
Abortion is the leading cause of Asherman's syndrome.
And, like some birth control pills, it might increase your risk for breast cancer.
Not too mention the guilt and the dramatic increase in the suicide rate.
All the bad stuff with abortion happens to women. Except for guilt, men don't have any suffering at all. But I believe Roe has made us far more glib about sex, and also undermined fatherhood in a horrible way.
no child is ever a 'mistake'.
Pregnancy, not child. :)
"Abortion is morally wrong unless it's my teenage daughter that I'm trying to get into a good college."
1/22/13, 8:39 PM
Why not prevent pregnancy in your teen age daughter, and enable her to take advantage of birth control, of she is sexually active? Know your own kid, keep lines of communication open by not judging and being overly controlling. It's far better she be on birth control than have an abortion, isn't it?
it's a life, not a thing. at least be honest when selecting your terms.
Is English your second language? The word "thing" quite clearly referred to abortion, not human life. Did you really think she was saying "I can think human life is morally wrong without thinking it is the most important thing in the world for the government to ban it"?
Spend a little less time coming up with new ways to say "every life is a precious snowflake" and a little more time paying attention to what people have actually written.
This ad has to be one of the most repugnant things I have ever seen.
Happy Birthday Baby.
They were performing those abortions illegally.
They were performing those abortions out in the open, in a health clinic that practiced on a street corner, with the apparent approval of our government.
In other words, all the dangers of the back alley abortions, along with tacit government approval.
Some of the harshest criticism in the indictment against Gosnell was the failure of the government to protect the health of our citizens. For instance, not doing a health inspection for (IIRC) 16 years.
I'm just mocking your insane belief that Cuomo legalized the janitorial abortion industry. :)
Somebody else said that. I think Cuomo wants to expand abortion, and he's willing to allow non-doctors to do the practice. He's probably thinking of the RU-486, and thinking it's safe, and thinking that all we need is a nurse. He's an idiot.
Why not prevent pregnancy in your teen age daughter, and enable her to take advantage of birth control, of she is sexually active?
Did that sentence fall through a time warp from the early 20th century? Every woman in America already has the ability to take advantage of birth control.
Revenent, do you know any fundamentalist Christian families?
What happened to Sarah Palin's daughter?
And Revenent do you know anything at all about teen girls? Many will not seek birth control on their own. They are scared, some are ashamed.
Viability of a fetus isn't all that relevant unless you consider health care a right.
They were performing those abortions out in the open, in a health clinic that practiced on a street corner, with the apparent approval of our government.
Congratulations on figuring out that the city's law enforcement system is corrupt. My point that the abortions were illegal stands.
Also, if you're going to use "the government doesn't enforce the law" as the basis of your argument, why should we give a shit what law Cuomo signed? Obviously you think it'll be 24/7 janitorial abortion regardless, right? :)
Revenent, do you know any fundamentalist Christian families?
If they keep their daughter under constant supervision, how's she managing to have sex with her boyfriend? Is there some sort of voyeur kink in this scenario?
And if they aren't keeping her under constant supervision -- welcome to America, land of easy-access contraception.
Revenent, there are ways teens find to get together, even in the strictest of families. Some teen girls do not live near Planned Parenthood Clinics, are afraid to access them, or afraid their parents will find out, or have no adult in their lives they confide in.
Sexual attraction and hormones and the "moment" alone with boyfriend trumps this fear. Girl gets pregnant.
Your response reveals you know squat about teen girls.
I'm in the 25% but and do not support the poor decision of Roe v. Wade but would vote at a state level for legal abortion provided their is no taxpayer funding.
Revenent do you know anything at all about teen girls? Many will not seek birth control on their own.
The fact that a person chose to do the wrong thing is not evidence that the person was unable to do the right thing.
The appeals court made a dumb ruling
It's not an appeals court, it's a state supreme court. And three of them made the exact same ruling, not one.
You think Connecticut wanted to say that non-doctors could do abortions? Don't be an idiot.
They were forced to let Menillo go. Why? Because they were trying to follow Roe v. Wade.
Here is Harry Blackmun giving examples of what regulations can be done, starting in the second trimester:
“Examples of permissible state regulation in this area are requirements as to the qualifications of the person who is to perform the abortion; as to the licensure of that person; as to the facility in which the procedure is to be performed, that is, whether it must be a hospital or may be a clinic or some other place of less-than-hospital status; as to the licensing of the facility; and the like."
You can't do any of these regulations in the first trimester!
Elsewhere in his opinion, Blackmun does say that "physicians" will be doing first trimester abortions. But he also says, quite specifically, that states cannot license them until the second trimester.
Read the damn opinion before you opine on how smart it is.
Revenent, there are ways teens find to get together, even in the strictest of families.
They should try getting together at the drugstore and spending a couple bucks on a couple condoms and some spermicidal lube.
Skip the waffle fries at the romantic Chick-fil-A dinner to cover the expense. :)
Yeah, shoulda coulda woulda, won't prevent unwanted pregnancies, and abortions that may follow.
abortion is morally and ethically wrong. Period. There is no debate in this matter unless you are a eugenicist leftard loon. Should Roe v. Wade be overturned. Yes, simply because it is such horribly written law.
They were forced to let Menillo go.
He was free pending appeal, then went to prison when the SCOTUS reversed and the CT courts upheld the original sentence.
Why? Because they were trying to follow Roe v. Wade.
I don't know why they ruled the way they did, but it is impossible to read Roe. v Wade as overturning a requirement that medical procedures be performed by doctors. That follows neither the logic of the ruling nor its specifics. The section you quote references licensing and qualifications specifically for the procedure, not for medical procedures in general. I.e., in the second trimester states can require that *additional* licensing and qualifications be obtained for performing abortions.
Now, if you're done whining about a forty-year-old incorrect decision by the Connecticut court, can we return to New York in the 21st century? :)
Yeah, shoulda coulda woulda, won't prevent unwanted pregnancies, and abortions that may follow.
If a person could have used birth control and didn't I don't really care what becomes of their reproductive health as a result.
I care that they are allowed to do the right thing. What they actually do is on them.
abortion is morally and ethically wrong. Period. There is no debate in this matter unless you are a eugenicist leftard loon.
Which is odd, because I've seen you debate it several times.
In 1990 the African-American birthrate was 2.5; in 2000 2.2; in 2010 2.0. See what I mean by saying the line is pointing down? In 1990 the white birth rate was 1.9; in 2000 1.9 in 2010 1.8. See what I mean by "flat line"?
http://www.prb.org/Publications/Datasheets/2012/world-population-data-sheet/fact-sheet-us-population.aspx
The African-American birth rate fell below 2.1 first in 2006, then it wiggled up and then it went on falling. And if you look at the lines from 1973 on you can see the white birthrate has been a flat line since 1973 while the African-American has been falling slowly but steadily for the same period.
Darwin will tell you that this is how groups end. So I think attention should be paid, Republican though I am. But I notice our lefty friends on this blog are silent about the destruction of the African-Americans resulting from their policies. Come on - just say you don't care and MoveOn.
it is impossible to read Roe. v Wade as overturning a requirement that medical procedures be performed by doctors.
I don't think that word means what you think it means.
3 state Supreme Courts read Roe to outlaw all health regulations in the first trimester. Because as dumb as that reading is, that's actually what the opinion said.
It's like your boss gives you an insane order. Do you follow your boss? Or do you do what you think is right?
Hence, Menillo. Which, according to you, can't happen. It's impossible!
in the second trimester states can require that *additional* licensing and qualifications be obtained for performing abortions.
That's a very smart reading, and maybe plausible. But of course Roe doesn't say that specifically. What it does use is language like "an abortion free of interference by the state."
Would you want a surgery without any state regulation at all? Because that's what we had in Dr. Gosnell's clinic.
Why do you think state health boards did not regulate Dr. Gosnell's clinic for 16 years? Can we blame Roe v. Wade for that? Or is that another impossibility?
Those stupid state health boards! Those stupid state supreme courts!
Weird how this smart judicial opinion keeps inspiring this stupidity in the people who are trying to follow it.
I'm with the 58% that thinks it's wrong and/or it should be overturned.
And the 18% is an untenable position.
Godwin alert:
It's like one of those "good Germans" who made a great show of looking down their noses at the Nazis (sotto voce, of course), even though they put on the Waffenfarbe and the litzen and served at Minsk or Oradour.
PS Anybody else notice they're short 11%?
Wow! Count me very firmly in the 4%.
I see that a great many Althouse readers are in the 4%, and I am not the least bit surprised.
Very nearly, I suspect that a majority of the United States Supreme Court would place themselves in the 4%. Among that majority are some truly great legal minds. Chief Justice John Roberts. Associate Justice Antonin Scalia. Associate Justice Samuel Alito. Scalia, I suppose, might be expected to placem himself among the "morally opposed" quadrant just across the quadrangle. But I also think that Scalia would resist any call to his personal morality.
One of the things that Justices Scalia and Thomas remarked on in Lawrence v. Texas (the case that found Texas' anti-sodomy statute unconstitutional) was that while they thought the statute "uncommonly silly," they would no more require states to abandon such statutes than they would require states to enact such statutes.
Not sure if I have any liberals reading my book. Inga, Rev, Garage, if any of you would like to take a peek at it, I would really appreciate any feedback.
saintcroix1@gmail.com
He was free pending appeal, then went to prison when the SCOTUS reversed
Do you have a link for this? Or are you guessing?
Rick7 wrote:
I can think something is "morally wrong" without thinking the most important thing in the world is for the government to ban it.
well when you think abortion is morally wrong what is morally wrong about it? Violating someone's rights is morally wrong, but isn't that exactly the time tht the law is supposed to step in to protect those rights?
Isn't law supposed to safeguard people's rights?
Libertarians talk about how govt shouldn't criminalize victimless crimes. But if there is a victim then its not a victimless crime, is it?
Would you say you may think that murder is morally wrong without thinking the most important thing in the world is to ban it? Is that your morality, that law is tyranny if it protects victims?
So again I ask you, what do you find morally objectionable about abortion? is it icky to you, or do you think, like Inga and Althouse tht abortion is essentially murder (since the baby is alive from the moment of conception).
What's the title of your book, St. Croix, is it availble on Amazon?
Does the 18% percent think abortion is wrong or that Roe v. Wade is morally wrong?
It's not clear in the chart what "it" is.
Two different things. Roe is a interpretation of the constitution while abortion is a act.
Hey Inga,
No, I haven't published it yet. Trying to get some Althousian feedback before I sent it out into the world!
I'm calling it The Baby/Abortion Paradox
Anyone here seen the Happy 40th Anniversary, Baby video message featuring Mehcad Brooks?
Jaw-droppingly satanic.
I like how the bottom of the graphic says that the Supreme Court found avortion to be legal, at least in the first three months. How about months 4-9?
Do those 18% think that abortion while morally wrong should be legal there too, or are they pro life from months 4-9?
And if THAT'S the case how are they not trying to get into women's uteruses and reproductive rights?
Lets see the poll numbers for months 4-9. Or at least get those on the boards who are saying they are in the 18% let us know what their stance is for later stages of pregnancy.
So, it's official then?
Despite 42% of the country (similar percentage in recent years to the ultimate majorities supporting an end to cannabis prohibition and gay marriage bans) and the plurality favoring legalization, Catholic theology will replace science and cells are now persons because, you know, human life?
At least the only vituperative one left on this is Methadras.
One point not addressed by that chart is that most people, if allowed to state their real opinion and not choose from a Chinese menu, think abortion is wrong, but can see situations where it might be necessary or at least worthy of consideration as an option - life of the mother, rape, incest.
To not include that as a choice makes the whole thing phony.
Personally, I get my embryology advice from Richard Santorum.
He told me, "Life begins at erection."
To not include that as a choice makes the whole thing phony.
Or at least it spares us the philosophical canoodling of Akin, Mourdock, ad infinitum.
Rob,
Ummm... seriously????
You know, on most airlines you can pay a bit more and not have any middle seat--and no one has to die in the process.
So in 1947 everyone should have just shut up about desegregation?
Don't say that the right to privacy should be discounted since it's so rarely invoked. Rather, let's use it as often as possible! Many on the right would love that, if it was followed through on. I would!
I despise unelected dictators. You want the unelected branch to simply invent rights, on the basis of what they like? Including the right to terminate the weak and the helpless?
It's just bizarre how some people think Roe is libertarian. Did you miss Harris v. McRae, where you "libertarians" wanted to impose a right to abortions paid for by the state?
If you grant the unelected branch the authority to dictate whatever libertarian policies you like, at some point they will start dictating the socialist policies they like.
How do you not know that?
O Ritmo wrote:
Catholic theology will replace science and cells are now persons because, you know, human life?
so then why did the Supreme Court bring up the whole point of viability? There are 9 months of development and the baby isn't a clump of cells through most of it.
I'm in the 4%, but the basic problem with this poll is that there is no measure of intensity. The political judgment has to be made on the proportion of people who will change their vote. I suspect the intensity is with the pro-lifers.
Bogus poll.
But my favorite part of this whole thread is "pier pressure."
Normalizing abortion is a strategy embraced by a superior race to invite an inferior race to voluntarily commit generational genocide.
It is not a question of morality, which is an ambiguous concept defined selectively to conform with an individual's immediate interests, which are tempered and oriented in a functional society.
It is a question of evolutionary fitness. It is an issue of a minority interest possessing the superior ability to manipulate an inferior people to forsake their own future.
Americans murder their progeny at a rate of around one million annually, for the most capricious of causes including preserving wealth and welfare, and over half the population supports (pro-abortion) or does not oppose (i.e. pro-choice) this willful genocide.
This is hilarious! There is no need for ovens when women place their material, physical, and ego gratification before their desire to procreate, and are applauded for their narcissism by inferior males. From the poorest to wealthiest, a majority of Americans are motivated by material greed and the basest of desires, or they are simply unwilling to assert their will.
In any case, there will not be a review of abortion on its merits and "morality". Americans, in the majority, will elect to exchange their liberty and future for submission with benefits and dreams of instant or immediate gratification. The value of human life has been devalued by a progressive minority.
I predicted 400 posts in the first abortion thread. But Althouse outfoxed me with three abortion threads. She's the Rommel of bloggers.
Add up the three abortion threads, plus that one extra abortion post I threw on the Scalia thread, and crap I lost count. It's 390 something.
I wonder why Althouse blogs on abortion so much? It's one of her frequent topics. You would think, if she feels like it's a settled issue, it wouldn't be an interesting topic for her. Yet we circle around to the subject again and again.
I find too that she often adds to my knowledge, blogging on stuff I haven't heard about.
I think maybe Althouse likes the ideology of choice, but she does not like the reality of abortion. And so keeps returning to the issue in the hopes that she can resolve her own conflict over the subject.
Or, another possibility, she's not conflicted at all! She just knows her audience and likes to spur us on.
n.n., that might be the best post of yours I've ever read.
I'm in the 4%, which is only so low because most Americans think that that the standard the Supreme Court uses and should use for deciding cases is what the Justices think is right and wrong.
According to another poll many Americans don't even know what Roe v Wade is, a percentage thought it had to do with school desegregation.
Even if the decision was somehow reversed, abortion wouldn't be illegal, it would be regulated much like gun laws are by cities and states. More importantly, we wouldn't have to freaking hear about it every four years, at least not to the extent we do now. Mississippi would probably have the strictest abortion laws, California and New York would have drive through abortion clinics.
Images of animals in the womb:
https://www.google.com/search?q=images+of+animals+in+the+womb&hl=en&client=safari&tbo=u&rls=en&tbm=isch&source=univ&sa=X&ei=tPP_UJrgPIfH0QHH4oHgDg&ved=0CDMQsAQ&biw=1156&bih=615
They don't look like clumps of cells to me Ritmo.
If you show that to almost anyone they say "Ah so cute" or "The Wonder of Nature" or some such. Yet when it comes to abortion it's just a clump of cells.
We can use the same technology on babies now you know.And I imagine we can use the same technology during an abortion even, so we can see the expressions on the clumps of cells faces as they are offed.
I wouldn't mind seeing that. Wouldn't you?
Kelly wrote:
Even if the decision was somehow reversed, abortion wouldn't be illegal, it would be regulated much like gun laws are by cities and states.
Regulated eh? Even the supremes made a distinction between first trimester abortions and second and third trimester abortions (which suggests that they too are about restricting womens reproductive rights) but at the very limit it does point the way for some regulation right?
Second trimester and third trimester abortions should be the equivalent of owning a tank or a machine gun for gun owners.
Even though the second amendment allows for a right to bear arms "shall not be infringed" we still ban machine guns.
Abortion is nowhere written anywhere in the constution and yet for many any restriction on abortion (which most say should be "rare") amounts to an assault on womens liberty.
Who are the extremists again?
What the 4% see is the line that leads inexorably from "emanations from penumbras" to a "right to define one’s concept of the universe."
Which is to say, once Constitutional jurisprudence is no longer solidly anchored to the actual text, there is no telling where it may drift- yet we can reasonably expect that it will drift far, far away from what the document actually says.
Amending the U.S. Constitution is intentionally difficult, yet radical Court interpretations of it have essentially the same effect. Roe v. Wade is wrong because it repudiates the notion that we are and shall remain a constitutional republic- that is, one that is not subject to the gaseous whims of judges.
'I don't know what you mean by "glory",' Alice said.
"Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. 'Of course you don't — till I tell you. I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!"'
'But "glory" doesn't mean "a nice knock-down argument",' Alice objected.
'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'
'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things.'
'The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, 'which is to be master — that's all.' "
-- Lewis Carroll, "Through the Looking Glass"
Saint Croix:
Thanks. I'm not certain why I care about other human beings, their dignity and lives, despite the fact they each and cooperatively represent a competing interest, but I do. Perhaps this is one of those mysteries that can only be explained through faith.
Anyway, while my strategy remains unchanged, the tactics I employ evolve as I complete a comprehensive characterization of the problem set.
For instance, many people do not share your [Christian] faith, which ensures that arguments on that basis will be ineffective. Many people accept evolution as a description of origin (i.e. article of faith), but not evolutionary principles. Many people are unconcerned with a progressive devaluation of human life (erroneously believing that it is selective and they are indemnified from its consequences within their lifetime). Many people are unwilling to assert their will, or believe that all forms of asserting a collective will are equivalent. Most, if not all, people have egos which are easily bruised. Attacking their ego (or self-esteem) may be the most effective approach to eliciting a meaningful response. Then again, it would be a mistake to presume that dreams of material and physical gratification do not take priority over ego gratification. We are, after all, sentient, sensual creatures.
Professor Althouse has stated that she considers abortion, or at least elective abortion, to be an act of premeditated murder. She has also stated that she is pro-choice in order to preserve individual liberty and expression of individual conscience. It seems that she shares our goal to recognize and establish universal human rights, but also recognizes the danger of using coercion to enforce a collective will (e.g. universal morality).
I have no reason to doubt her integrity, and will assume that she does not possess an ulterior motive.
Life is an exercise in risk management. Our development, from conception to grave, is an evolutionary or chaotic (i.e. bounded with a stochastic intermediate behavior) process.
Peter:
Semantic games. Selective science, history, morality, and reality. We have indeed passed through the looking glass. Lewis Carroll is insightful, but not prescient.
The human condition has not fundamentally changed from its conception.
We are still largely boorish and selfish creatures, but have evolved sophisticated tactics and technology to obfuscate our base nature.
4% here.
It's bad law. It should never have been decided at the federal level. It should be a state-by-state issue.
As should most things these days.
Overturn. Let the states sort it out individually.
Won't happen, I suspect. One-size-fits-all, fits badly.
Is there a sub-category for "morally wrong, Roe v. Wade should be overturned, but abortion should still be legal"?
I mean, there are 3 questions: one ethical, one jurisprudential, and one on policy.
Of course, seeing those last two as separate is difficult for the vast majority of non-lawyers, and probably only a slightly less vast majority of lawyers.
So, I do have a question for 18%ers. Does the severity of morality change with the age of the fetus? If so, why, and if not why?
I was talking with two interesting people today, one a born again Christian guy, who believes life begins at conception. And I told him that women auto-abort all the time. He demanded to know "Which Trimester?" I said probably most usually the first trimester. And then I asked him "Why does it matter?" If life begins at conception, taking a life is taking a life.
And for that matter, is it any worse at 2, 4 8, or 10?
I can imagine not even realizing, or caring that much, that a fetus was aborted a couple of days after the egg was fertilized. It happens naturally, and all birth control pills that I've read about have "Anti-Attach" hormones in them.
So what's the big deal? Kill a 2 year old or a two day old. Any difference in morality of it?
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