“Looking in her eyes, I couldn’t come up with an answer to defend the exemptions for rape and incest…And over the course of the last few weeks, the Christmas holidays and reflecting on that…all I can say is that God was working on my heart.”
Twins at 12 weeks.
In The New York Times Sunday Magazine, Ruth Padawer reports on the rise of a procedure known as “twin reduction,” or the selective abortion of one of two fetuses. Advances in reproductive medicine and fertility treatments have created a strange paradox, Padawer explains: “In creating life where none seemed possible, doctors often generate more fetuses than they intend.” Now, women who are pregnant with twins and only want one baby are seeking out the procedure, too, stirring a heated ethical debate…
“[NBC’s Savannah] Guthrie asked if there was a “right to privacy” in the Constitution, to which Trump responded, “I guess there is, I guess there is. And why, just out of curiosity, why do you ask this question?” Apparently he failed to pick up on Guthrie’s reference to the legal principle that was key in the decision to legalize abortion in Roe v. Wade, and her pointed way of asking where he stood on the matter. “Well, that’s a pretty strange way of getting to pro-life,” Donald mused before adding, “What does that have to do with privacy?”
Mitt Romney on abortion - 1994
“The Social Security system, in my opinion, is a flawed design, period. But having said that, the design would work a lot better if we had stable demographic trends. We don’t have enough workers to support the retirees … . A third of the young people in America are not in America today because of abortion.”
I watched Freakonomics last night
I still need to read the book, but one thing I found incredibly interesting and timely was the “Donohue-Levitt hypothesis (pdf)”.
This hypothesis states that the SCOTUS decision in 1973 on Roe V Wade legalizing abortion is a big part of why crime rates began falling around 20 years later. Now they go to great lengths to explain that abortion is not a crime fighting technique, but rather that when women can legally control when they have children this leads to better home environments for the children they do have, which leads to these children growing up less likely to commit crime. The data they found during their study was obviously strong enough for them to make this assertion and propose this theory, and after reading up on it myself I am inclined to agree.
Google Seems to Think Abortion Is Murder
If you google “murder,” this is what comes up.
Continue reading… VillageVoice
Republicans violated a procedural rule that they put in place regarding citing the relevant Constitutional passage when putting forward a piece of legislation (the specific piece of legislation they were trying to put through was with regards to cutting funding for abortion clinics.) The Democratic Representative from New York, Anthony Weiner, called them out on it and spent 54 minutes arguing the point with them. I found it kinda fascinating to watch, if only because he’s clearly a motivated, clear speaker and it’s an insight into the American legislative process.
(via reddit)
I know I’m a dork, but I LOVE THIS SHIT.
I also love when Republicans trip themselves up in their own bullshit. And this chair is a complete fucking joke.
“The question is, and this is what Barack Obama didn’t want to answer — is that human life a person under the constitution?” he said. “And Barack Obama says no. Well if that human life is not a person then I find it almost remarkable for a black man to say ‘now we are going to decide who are people and who are not people.’” - In an interview with CNS News on Thursday, former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum invoked race in unleashing a questionable attack on President Barack Obama over the issue of abortion.
HuffPo
This year’s political field includes no fewer than five Republican Senate candidates who are so opposed to abortion that they would force women to bear their rapists’ babies. Among those who would grant no exceptions even in the case of rape or incest, you’ll find two Tea Party-favored women - Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell.
“12TH & DELAWARE” (2010) 9 P.M. (HBO) The filmmakers Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady visit Fort Pierce, Fla., where, at the intersection of Delaware Avenue and 12th Street, an abortion clinic stands on one corner and an anti-abortion organization, dedicated to heading off those who seek the procedure, on another. Writing in The New York Times, Stephen Holden called the film “a remarkably evenhanded exploration of the intractable divide.” - NYTimes
Fox News Inserts Footage Of Protesters Into Bart Stupak Press Conference
Fox News didn’t just insert video of health care protesters to take away from the moment of Rep. Bart Stupak’s press conference announcing that he had reached a deal with the Obama administration and, as a result, would be supporting the health care reform bill that was now all but certain to pass. Fox also added audio to make it sound as though the protesters were part of the event, threatening to drown him out.
“My Congressman, Bart Stupak, has neither a uterus nor a brain.”
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In Britain, only 8 percent of the population is Catholic (compared with 25 percent in the United States). Abortion there is legal. Abortion is free. And yet British women have fewer abortions than Americans do. I asked Cardinal Hume why that is.
The cardinal said that there were several reasons but that one important explanation was Britain’s universal health-care system. “If that frightened, unemployed 19-year-old knows that she and her child will have access to medical care whenever it’s needed,” Hume explained, “she’s more likely to carry the baby to term. Isn’t it obvious?”
A young woman I knew in Britain added another explanation. “If you’re [sexually] active,” she said, “the way to avoid abortion is to avoid pregnancy. Most of us do that with an IUD or a diaphragm. It means going to the doctor. But that’s easy here, because anybody can go to the doctor free.”
”T.R. Reid - Universal health care tends to cut the abortion rate - washingtonpost.com
via sexartandpolitics : southpol : ezraklein
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People who are anti-abortion and also anti-healthcare baffle me.
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(via caraobrien)
