When you spend a couple of days in limbo — which I believe is the theological term for a management retreat at which people are going on about advertising categories and circulation zones, and you’re shoving a 16-penny nail into your palm to stay awake — you fall behind on the news.
In such circumstances, press releases received via e-mail are frequently the first I hear about news developments. Such was the case with this one, which sounds fairly significant:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Wes Hickman or Kevin Bishop
April 18, 2007Graham Applauds Supreme Court Ruling
Upholding Partial Birth Abortion Ban
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) made this statement on today’s Supreme Court ruling upholding the partial birth abortion ban.“As a long-time opponent of partial birth abortion, I am very pleased with the Court’s ruling. Today’s decision was a hard-fought and long-overdue victory which reflects the will of the American people.
“While Americans may be divided on abortion policy in the early stages of pregnancy, limiting abortion in the last months is overwhelmingly supported.
“I’m very pleased we can now stop a procedure that an overwhelming majority of Americans find repugnant and unacceptable. That is an abortion in the last days and months of a pregnancy when the unborn child is clearly viable.”
“The Court’s ruling is a step in the right direction when it comes to abortion policy in the United States. The partial birth abortion ban is now the law of the land and for that millions of Americans are thankful.”
####
Oh, and it appears that today at least, Mitt Romney is also against abortion:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Kevin Madden
April 18, 2007STATEMENT ON TODAY’S SUPREME COURT RULING
Boston, MA – Today, Governor Mitt Romney issued the following statement praising the U.S. Supreme Court ruling upholding the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act:"Today, our nation’s highest court reaffirmed the value of life in America by upholding a ban on a practice that offends basic human decency. This decision represents a step forward in protecting the weakest and most innocent among us."
… but that’s always subject to change, so check back frequently.
Related Posts
So what is the punishment for the doctor who might continue to perform such a procedure? Is the “crime” defined – murder, manslaughter, child endangerment? Is the mother an accomplice? What penalty will she receive?
OK, just to be inclusive, the following folks also weighed in:
So far, nothing from politicos on the other side of the issue…
Re Steve’s comment:
It’s interesting how folks who oppose a law — banning smoking, or partial birth abortion, or requiring drivers to buckle — so often fixate on the punishment. Their idea usually is to suggest either that it’s too harsh, or unfair, or won’t be effective. (“What are you going to do? Have smoking police?”) One generally hears this stuff from people of the libertarian persuasion.
They ignore the main way in which laws are effective: They prevent people from doing the proscribed thing.
Most people, believe it or not, voluntarily obey the law. Consequently, far more of these procedures will be prevented by the procedure merely its being illegal than by anyone being punished.
My question is why aren’t the influential people who are responsible for getting hundreds of thousands of innocent people killed, punished? Why do corporate newspaper editors get off the hook when they are at least indirectly responsible for the deaths or serious injuries of tens of thousands of American soldiers?
Maybe you would like to come the smoking break area where I work and talk to the parents of our soldiers now in the field. You’re welcome to come to my table and talk to my friend and coworker (not colleague) Jesse about his son in Iraq. You can lecture myself and the other veterans about how you think our little smoking area should be outlawed. Why don’t you bring DeMint with you to explain how his free trade policies are really benefiting us despite what we know to be true? Bring Mayor Bob and the university presidents with you to explain how diverting lottery money from K-12 to endowed chairs is in our best interests. Perhaps if you could actually lower yourself to come and listen to the working class people that you have thus far successfully exploited, you can then experience some kind of epiphany and change your errant ways.
Wrong, Brad. I oppose partial birth abortion.
I asked a simple question. If you don’t know the answer, say so. Does this bill define who the guilty parties are and what the crime would be? Or is it merely for show?
This is from Amanda Marcotte, at http://www.pandagon.net. I think she gets to the heart of the real motivations behind the “partial birth abortion” ban and its supporters.
The 2004 March for Women’s Lives was originally supposed to be called the March for Choice. The name was changed under pressure from SisterSong and Loretta Ross, who argued that the issue of reproductive justice was too large and multi-faceted to be squeezed into the word “choice”. Thus the name was changed to something that got closer to the fundamental issue behind the struggle between pro-choice and anti-choice sides, and it’s a definitional issue almost. At the heart of the debate is the question of whether or not women have independent value, value aside from our functions as reproductive machines, sex objects, or servants. The idea that someone has rights stems from the notion that someone has independent value.
Today’s Supreme Court decision upholding the ban on “partial birth abortions” is the finale of a radical manuever by anti-choicers to strike at the heart of the issue and establish legal precedent devaluing women as human beings. It’s a smart move. The mushy middle on the issue of choice swings on the issue of women’s value—the mushy middle believes that women have value but they can also be wigged out by some sex paranoia. So you see a lot of “compromise” positions that pay lip service to the idea that women have an independent value as humans (rape exceptions, health exceptions) but still people tolerate the law putting a bunch of obstacles and headaches between women and getting abortions, because hey, who wants to stand up for the rights of Sluts Who Should Have Kept Their Legs Closed? In sum, we have a situation where a lot of laws like waiting periods and parental notifications establish the notion that having sex voluntarily should be a punishable offense for women, but not one that incurs a death penalty. (And that we can keep our hands clean by letting nature do the dirty work.) The problem with these compromises from the anti-choice view is that they are too soft and permissive with the daughters of Eve, and more to the point, if you allow that women have value and shouldn’t be forced to die because of pregnancy or shouldn’t be forced to bear a child because of rape, then you open yourself up for the argument that women have rights. Once you agree that women’s lives should be respected, it’s a downhill slide to agreeing that women are equal to men and should be free. We know that, because we’ve seen it happen over history.
So this bill skips the preliminaries of dismantling women’s rights one at a time and instead gets to the heart of the matter. Late term abortions are performed for maternal health reasons, full stop. Sometimes it’s a fetal health issue, that it’s dead or will die as soon as it’s born, but in the end, it’s still about not forcing a woman to go through labor and delivery, which are dangerous, for no reason. And sometimes they are performed because the mother will die, be crippled, or have serious mental health problems if she delivers. The concept of “choice” isn’t really part of this discussion so much. This is about the concept that women deserve to be treated as full human beings who deserve proper medical care despite their current situation of being in a state only women can be in. That is what was on trial and the answer is no.
It’s a strike at the concept that women have independent value. If you reduce a woman to a baby factory, then one who needs a late term abortion is malfunctioning in her purpose somehow, so if she dies, she’s scrap metal, I suppose. Or scrap blood and tissue, as it were. I hate to be blunt like this, but there it is. They skipped over the preliminaries about what kind of rights women should have and attacked the idea that our very existence and health matters if we’ve failed in our duties as fetal incubators.
I don’t have much to say on the legal ramifications of this, but I had to get that off my chest. Even if you follow the fight for women’s lives as it plays out every day in this country, you can set aside how profoundly disturbing it is how much people can hate women for merely living—and by living I mean having a Self, a mind, desires, hopes, and a reason to live outside of service to others. And then you get reminders like this, reminders that you’re really hated just because you know from the word “I” and that has value to you, and it’s utterly depressing.
Now, that’s a long piece, although its worth reading (and really well written besides) but there might be some people who don’t want to read it all, so I thought I’d excerpt what I think is the core issue. In the piece, Ms. Marcotte says:
“So this bill skips the preliminaries of dismantling women’s rights one at a time and instead gets to the heart of the matter. Late term abortions are performed for maternal health reasons, full stop. Sometimes it’s a fetal health issue, that it’s dead or will die as soon as it’s born, but in the end, it’s still about not forcing a woman to go through labor and delivery, which are dangerous, for no reason. And sometimes they are performed because the mother will die, be crippled, or have serious mental health problems if she delivers. The concept of “choice” isn’t really part of this discussion so much. This is about the concept that women deserve to be treated as full human beings who deserve proper medical care despite their current situation of being in a state only women can be in. That is what was on trial and the answer is no.”
And that’s what the “partial birth abortion” ban is fundamentally about. The procedure is performed for serious reasons, often involving the risk of death or serious injury to the mother. The “partial birth abortion” opponents, in celebrating today’s decision, declare that they don’t care if women die, that they don’t care if women are seriously or permanently injured, that they don’t care if women are forced to carry babies that they know will die at birth, and watch them die. The opponents of the “partial birth abortion” ban care that thinking about the procedure makes them uncomfortable, and they are willing to sacrifice the lives and health of countless women to spare themselves that discomfort.
Here’s the money quote that explains why this is a purely political move and will do ZERO to affect the number of late term abortions performed:
“The procedure at issue involves partially removing the fetus intact from a woman’s uterus, then crushing or cutting its skull to complete the abortion.
Abortion opponents say the law will not reduce the number of abortions performed because an alternate method — dismembering the fetus in the uterus — is available and, indeed, much more common.”
So all that has been accomplished is changing the way the fetus is killed.
If only all the time, money, and energy wasted on this issue was put into abstinence and birth control programs…
Well, Carol Hathaway, alias M.R., alias Mike Toreno, or whoever, would you mind substantiating your claims about partial-birth abortion for the mother’s health by plain facts, giving a list of cases? There needs to be one after the other, along with the number performed nation-wide, and some kind of medical substantiation of what you are saying.
Otherwise I have the gut feeling that this is another attempt to fog up the obvious, common sense view of the brutality of this procedure with all kinds of Pharisaical proof-texting. It’s the same kind of stuff we are getting on the the confederate flag threads, all about Civil War history, blah, blah, blah, in order to avoid the obvious meaning of this symbol in today’s world.
You have yet to convince me that you care about women, because you have yet to convince me that you care about, or respect, human life period.
Brad writes:
“It’s interesting how folks who oppose a law — banning smoking, or partial birth abortion, or requiring drivers to buckle — so often fixate on the punishment.”
It may be interesting but the penalty goes to the heart of the matter when it comes to abortion. The other issues Brad cited are very different. Let’s take the seat belt issue. The point of a belt law is to increase belt usage and ultimately reduce the number of people who are killed and injured. No body is comparing a person who fails to wear a seat belt to a murderer. The same can be said for smoking bans. A small fine will bring about the desired result. A $25 fine is probably adequate to accomplish the desired effect for both of these problems. See how easy that is. I’ve spelled out an appropriate fine without any “fixation” issues.
But abortion is different. A small fine implies the crime is not what the pro-lifers have always claimed it to be, murder. Nor would a small fine accomplish the goal, reducing abortion. On the other hand, a murder conviction carries a very significant penalty. After all, the pro-lifers constantly compare abortion to murder. But once you concede that the penalty should be less than a murder penalty then the pro-life argument falls apart.
Right, Bud.. the case against abortion should be made not by threat of prosecution but through education and logic. Abortions will take place no matter how many laws are enacted. The number of abortions may drop but then we as a society will have to deal with more unwanted children.
Brad, please explain what this ban on one form of partial birth abortion has done to save the life of a single baby.
Speaking of Lindsey Graham, today’s (4-19-07)article about the situation in Iraq would have been hilarious if it wasn’t about such a serious issue. Why does the State Editorial board continue to include his constant blathering about “progress in Iraq” when there is clearly no actual progrerss? On a day when 183 people died in multiple bombing incidents the Graham article should not have been featured. It simply shows the ridiculous pro-war bias of the State.
Mr. Brasher, I don’t know who these people are that you’re talking about. I do know that I am quoting and expressing a widely held sentiment, based on years – decades – of observations of the words and behavior of opponents of “partial birth abortion”
If you want to gain insight into the real circumstances surrounding late term termination of pregnancy, please visit this URL:
http://preview.tinyurl.com/2mrlg
It is to a Boston Globe article entitled “My Late Term Abortion”, by a woman named Carol Voss. Carol Voss is a real woman who underwent a real late term pregnancy termination in order to alleviate, insofar as was possible, real harship and real suffering. If I have to choose between indulging your “gut feeling” and your “obvious, common sense view”, and honoring the genuine experiences of Carol Voss, I’m going to have to choose Carol Voss. I’m sorry if my citation of her experience doesn’t bear out your view of the motivations of women who undergo late term pregnancy termination, but I am a slave to truth.
You should go to the link and read the article, but here are some excerpts that I found particularly notable:
EXCERPT 1
As we sat there, she said that the ultrasound indicated that the fetus had an open neural tube defect, meaning that the spinal column had not closed properly. It was a term I remembered skipping right over in my pregnancy book, along with all the other fetal anomalies and birth defects that I thought referred to other people’s babies, not mine. She couldn’t tell us much more. We would have to go to the main hospital in Boston, which had a more high-tech machine and a more highly trained technician. She tried to be hopeful — there was a wide range of severity with these defects, she said. And then she left us to cry.
We drove into Boston in near silence, tears rolling down my cheeks. There was no joking or chatting at the hospital in Boston. No fuzzy kittens and kissing dolphins on the ceiling of that chilly, clinical room. Dave held my hand more tightly than before. I couldn’t bear to look at this screen. Instead, I studied the technician’s face, like a nervous flier taking her cues from the expression a stewardess wears. Her face revealed nothing.
She squirted cold jelly on my belly and then slid an even colder probe back and forth around my belly button, punching it down every so often to make the baby move for a better view. She didn’t say one word in 45 minutes. When she finished, she looked at us and confirmed our worst fears.
Instead of cinnamon and spice, our child came with technical terms like hydrocephalus and spina bifida. The spine, she said, had not closed properly, and because of the location of the opening, it was as bad as it got. What they knew — that the baby would certainly be paralyzed and incontinent, that the baby’s brain was being tugged against the opening in the base of the skull and the cranium was full of fluid — was awful. What they didn’t know — whether the baby would live at all, and if so, with what sort of mental and developmental defects — was devastating. Countless surgeries would be required if the baby did live. None of them would repair the damage that was already done.
EXCERPT 2:
But on that Wednesday afternoon, President Bush never addressed what, exactly, the ramifications of the bill would be. His administration portrayed it as a bill aimed solely at stopping a “gruesome and barbaric” procedure used by healthy mothers to kill healthy babies. That portrayal served to spark a national, emotional knee-jerk reaction, which precluded any understanding of the practical outcome of the legislation. But it was those very real practicalities that immediately prompted three lawsuits and got three federal courts to prevent the bill from actually becoming law, starting a fight that will probably drag on for years.
EXCERPT 3:
“So what does it all really mean? It means that all abortions after the first trimester could be outlawed. No matter if the fetus has severe birth defects, including those incompatible with life (many of which cannot be detected until well into the second trimester). No matter if the mother would be forced to have, for example, a kidney transplant or a hysterectomy if she continued with the pregnancy. (Legislators did not provide a health exception for the woman, arguing that it would provide too big a loophole.)
In the aftermath of the signing of the bill, its supporters spoke about having outlawed a medical procedure and protecting the nation’s children. “We have just outlawed a procedure that is barbaric, that is brutal, that is offensive to our moral sensibilities,” said Bill Frist, the Senate majority leader. Its opponents bemoaned an unconstitutional attack on legal rights. “This ban is yet another instance of the federal government inappropriately interfering in the private lives of Americans, dangerously undermining . . . the very foundation of a woman’s right to privacy,” said Gregory T. Nojeim, an associate director and chief legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union.
But lost in the political slugfest have been the very real experiences of women — and their families — who face this heartbreaking decision every day.”
EXERPT 4:
He explained the procedure to us, at least the parts we needed to understand. Unlike a simple first-trimester abortion, which can be completed in one quick office visit, a second-trimester termination is much more complicated, a two-day minimum process. He started it that day by inserting four laminaria sticks made of dried seaweed into my cervix. It was excruciating, and he apologized over and over as I cried out in pain. When I left the examining room, my mom and my husband were shocked — I was shaking and ghostly white. The pain lasted throughout the night as the sticks collected my body’s fluids and expanded, dilating my cervix just like the beginning stages of labor.
The next morning, Dave and my mother took me to the hospital in Boston. I was petrified. I had never had any sort of surgery, and I fought the anesthesia — clinging to the final moments of being pregnant — as I lay in that stark white room. As I started to drift off, my doctor held one of my hands, and an older, female nurse held my other, whispering in my ear, “You’re going to be OK, I’ve been here before, lean on your husband.” It was my last memory. When I woke up, it was all over.
EXCERPT 5:
I wrote my doctor a long thank-you note on my good, wedding stationery. I thanked him for his compassion and his kindness. I wrote that it must be hard, what he does, but that I hoped he found consolation in the fact that he was helping vulnerable women in their most vulnerable of times. He keeps my note, along with all the others he’s received, in a large bundle. And he keeps that bundle right next to his stack of hate mail. They are about the same size.
EXCERPT 6:
But even the short-term situation is bleak. The doctor who performed my termination has stopped doing the procedure, worried that he might get caught up in a lawsuit. He is not a lawyer or a politician, and he doesn’t know what this law means for him right now. “I may go to jail for two years,” he tells me. “They can suspend my medical license. It would cost me a fortune to have a lawyer to defend me.”
EXCERPT 7
The doctor who performed my termination talks about the women he has helped through the years — the pregnant woman who was diagnosed with metastic melanoma and needed immediate chemotherapy, the woman who was carrying conjoined twins that had only one set of lungs and one heart, the woman whose baby had a three-chambered heart and would never live. Now, he is turning these women away. “Now, today, I can say no, but what is she going to do?” he says sadly. “What is she going to do?”
END OF EXCERPTS
Again, be sure to read the entire piece, at
http://preview.tinyurl.com/2mrlg
And I put it to you, Mr. Brasher. The woman who needs immediate chemotherapy, the woman who is carrying conjoined twins with one set of lungs and one heart, the woman carrying a baby who has a three chambered heart and will never live – what are they going to do?
What are they going to do?
What are they going to do?
Wonderful comments Carol! Wonderful because your comments demonstrate to me just exactly who you are. I vehemently oppose the partial birth murder of fully viable babies, but neither I nor anyone I’ve ever heard who opposes this barbarism has EVER said that we don’t care whether women die or are seriously injured. This is obviously hyperbole and a canard on your part, and yet it is exactly the kind of silly rhetoric that you immediately go to when you want to paint those of us who oppose this cruel and inhumane procedure as anti-woman ideologues. Here’s a challenge for you: You cited Amanda Marcotte as some sort of “burning bush” on this issue and to buttress your support for the murder of semi-delivered babies…why don’t you do this…why don’t you cite one, just one single legitimate Medical Doctor who can explain exactly how delivering all but the skull of a baby, and crushing his skull sucking the living babys’ brain out while his head is still in the birth canal is EVER a procedure that is necessary to save the mothers life? Or even to protect her physical health? Answer? You cannot get a legitimate Doctor to say it, because it NEVER is necessary for the mothers’ health. Clearly, once a baby has been delivered except for his head, the toughest part of the delivery is over! All that is left is to pull his head out…and this is NOT done for one reason and one only: When you do that, you have a living and independent human and you can’t suck his brain out then…that would be murder wouldn’t it? Partial birth murder is now murder and always has been murder, and the the ruse that it is done for the health of the mother is now and always has been a bald faced lie. Surely there are women whose health prevents them from going through a pregnancy and/or a delivery. But once a woman has gotten through a pregnancy, and through a delivery to the stage that the babys’ head is all that remains in her, her health is never the issue. This barbaric and inhumane destruction of innocent life may be done because the mother doesn’t want the baby. It may be done to generate cash for the abortionist…but WHATEVER the reason, it is NEVER done for the health of the mother, and I challenge you to cite a legitimate Doctor who says it is. Ed
Mr. Ross, your point is sound, but I want to emphasize to you that prohibiting or restricting “partial birth” abortion or any other form of late term abortion is unlikely to have any effect on unplanned pregnancies, because most late term abortions are terminations of pregnancies that went gravely wrong, or in which the health of the mother would be endangered from continuing the pregnancy. Late term abortion, for the most part, is not a measure aimed at terminating unplanned pregnancy.
Carol,
Agreed. It appears that abortion opponents, having failed to make the case to outlaw abortion outright, have decided instead to work backwards from the least common procedure… clutching and grabbing for each toehold they can attain while they still control the Supreme Court.
Ed, I am not going to answer your question until you:
(1) learn about and use paragraphs
(2) tell me about the oil leprechauns. It is unfair of you to raise my interest so high by tell me that you know about these magical forces producing new oil, yet cruelly refuse to supply me with any details.
OK then, Carol. Here’s a short paragraph for you…maybe short enought that even your gnat-like attention span can stay focused. I take it that my point about the truth of partial birth murder is right on target because you can’t come back with anything more salient than the last inanity you wrote. I write a piercing and spot-on piece of truth about partial birth murder and you respond by sticking your tongue out like a six year old. Way to go…I would say that I wasted my time, but saying the truth is never really a waste of time ~ it just doesn’t benefit nitwits like you. Ed
Ed, I could, of course, provide the information you seek with a single word. I won’t, though, for the reason I stated before. You cruelly refuse to provide me with further information about the oil leprechauns. You have shown me a glimpse of a revolutionary scientific discovery, one that shatters our previous view of the nature of time, space, and matter. You have raised my hopes to the skies. Yet you obstinately sit in silence, refusing me further enlightenment about these magical beings.
I want to know about the oil leprechauns. Until you tell me about the oil leprechauns, I will not answer your questions. I asked my question first. You ask my question, then I’ll ask yours.
If you seize on my silence to pretend that you have a legitimate reason for prohibiting a procedure that is the best and safest procedure in appropriate cases, thereby exposing women to increased risk of death or serious injury, so be it. You know and I know, of course, that your real motivation is hostility toward women and a desire to “punish sluts”.
Carol, you aren’t worth the time it’d take me to reiterate what I’ve said to another. Again, since you’re clearly sitting in the “slow” part of the class and get to ride the “little” bus to school, if you want to believe in the peak oil myth, have a great day! I don’t know where the “sluts” comment came from…that never crossed my mind, but it IS interesting to see where YOUR mind is. In any case, it isn’t just me that supports the prohibition of the barbarism and murder feminists dress up by calling “partial birth abortion” (doesn’t that just sound so guiltless, clinical, neat and tidy?), it was the Supreme Court. Well, better stop there…can’t let these paragraphs get too long or your little mind can’t stay focused. Ed
Carol,
I read your first entry, but admit that I did not read your longest entry, so I apologize in advance if you have already addressed what I’m about to ask.
Are you aware that the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act includes the following language?
“This subsection does not apply to a partial-birth abortion that is necessary to save the life of a mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, physical illness, or physical injury, including a life-endangering physical condition caused by or arising from the pregnancy itself.”
Mr. Swearingen, I don’t understand why you were unable to read my post, or, better, to go to the link to the article from which the post was mostly excerpted. It describes the real experiences of a real woman who underwent a late term abortion? Don’t you care about the reality of late term abotion, as experienced by those who undergo it? Don’t you care about the view, informed by searing personal experience, of persons most imtimately affected by the prohibition of “partial birth abortion”?
Anyway, to address the point you are trying to make, suppose a woman finds out during pregnancy that she faces a 35% chance of suffering permanent paralysis from carrying a prenancy to term, that terminating the pregnancy through D&E carries a negligible risk of death, and that terminating the pregnancy through the next safest means carries a 1% risk of death. So if I am to understand you, you would force a woman to choose between a 35% chance of permanent paralysis, and a 1% risk of death, in order to prevent her from undergoing a procedure that will spare her the risk of paralysis without risking her life, solely in order to spare you from the emotional discomfort of contemplating the safer procedure.
I think that tells us everything about you, and about your attitude toward women, that we need to know.
Carol,
Wow! I didn’t realize that my comments implied all that about me. My attempt was to show that the law contains an exception that addresses the worst of scenarios. Regarding your hypothetical, I don’t know. Abortion is a difficult issue to which I freely admit I don’t have all the answers.
Carol, as a fellow commenter, I appreciate your more civil tone than was earlier the case as M.R. And I’m afraid that I don’t have the time at present to go into fully the example that you mentioned. I think though you have shown your flag pretty well on this thread as Mike Toreno. Forgive me if I am wrong, but your vocabulary and style betrays you as the same Mike Toreno over at Bob McAlister’s blog.
In any case, “Mollie” has spoken well to the topic, as also Ed did to the brutality of the method of abortion in question above, a method which defies all common sense and humanity. Kathleen Parker addressed the issue briefly in her editorial in the State newspaper this morning about the false idea that partial birth abortion is primarily practiced for the health of the mother, which it is not. She maintains, and rightly so, that the state (the institution, not the newspaper) has an interest in the preservation of human life. Disdain that, if you will, as dehumanizing women. I maintain that you are doing exactly that with your viewpoint. But more later on that subject.
Mr. Swearingen, so, let’s follow the example through. Suppose that there are 200 women in the situation I mentioned earlier. If D&E is allowed, none of them is paralyzed and none of them die. None of them has to make a choice between rhe risk of death and the risk of serious injury.
Now, if D&E is prohibited, as you appear to advocate, all of them must make a choice between the risk of death and the risk of serious injury. Suppose 100 decide to forego terminating the pregnancy. 35 of these are permanently paraiyzed. The other 100 choose to undergo a procedure that is not the safest possible procedure, but is the safest procedure available under the law you appear to advocate. One of them dies.
And what is gained by the paralysis of 35 women and the death of one woman? Not the survival of a viable fetus, because abortion can be totally prohibited at any time after viability. No, the only thing that is gained is to spare you discomfort from thinking about a medical procedure undergone by persons who are strangers to you.
So, you “don’t know” whether or not 35 women should be paralyzed, and one woman should die, in order to spare you some emotional discomfort.
Well, I know. No, they shouldn’t.
Mr. Brasher, again, I don’t have the slightest idea who these people you are talking about. What does it matter, anyway?
“And I’m afraid that I don’t have the time at present to go into fully the example that you mentioned.”
No, I’ll bet you don’t. Neither the time nor the courage, I venture to say. I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t have the courage to face women like Carol Voss and tell them that I, not they, should decide how they are to face the loss of their pregnancy. The difference between you and me is that I wouldn’t presume to intrude myself into their lives.
I don’t know who is this “Mollie” you refer to, but all Ed did was to say, repeatedly, that the procedure was “brutal” and to say, repeatedly (but without presenting evidence) that the procedure is never done to spare the life and health of the mother. I don’t see his assertions as authoritative.
The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology opposes the prohibition of ID&E on the grounds that the prohibition endangers the lives and health of women by denying access to it in appropriate cases.
In opposition to that opinion, you give us Kathleen Parker, who is, perhaps, the least authoritative commentator on any issue who has ever walked the earth. This, for example, is what she has to say on rape and sexual harassment in the military:
“This is not to say that men at war are expected to behave badly, but there are possible explanations for some of these questionable liaisons that bear closer scrutiny.
Clearly, some of what is considered sexual harassment falls into the category of harmless sport — the usual towel-snapping that is, in fact, a way to neutralize sex.
But more overt sexual aggression may be the product of something few will acknowledge, at least on the record: resentment.
Off the record, in dozens of interviews over a period of years, male soldiers and officers have confided that many men resent women because they’ve been forced to pretend that women are equals, and men know they’re not.
The lie breeds contempt, which leads to a simmering rage that sometimes finds expression in aggression toward those deemed responsible.”
An apologist for rape is not an authority I would choose to cite if I were trying to show that I respected women. I might, however, choose to cite her if I felt contempt for women but were trying to pretend I didn’t.
Once again, you have done nothing but wave your arms around and claim that the truth of your point of view is “self-evident”. I’m sorry, but if your point were self-evident, or even if you were trying to argue in good faith, I would think you could present some evidence in favor of your point of view.
You asked me (in what I still consider to be rather a pompous and imperious tone) for a list of cases. I provided you with a list of cases. Can you do me the courtesy of either providing me with some genuine evidence in favor of your point of view, or else admitting what I believe to be the case, which is that you are motivated by hostility toward women and a desire to “punish sluts”?
Yes, Carol, I plan to do what you ask. But I know in advance it will do no good, because I know from your tone, as well as from experience that anyone who disagrees with you is guilty until proven innocent, and evidence to the contrary will not be admitted as such. So I’m wasting my time, and energy, right?
Anyway, I will admit that my tone was a little “pompous” — in this you are correct. I do get carried away sometimes, that I’ll admit.
Here ya go, ed:
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/WomensHealth/story?id=3057704&page=1
Mr. Brasher, it’s now been 3 days since you promised to provide evidence (beyond the word of the rape apologist Kathleen Parker) that what you refer to as “partial birth abortion” is not performed to preserve the lives and health of women. During that time, kc has provided a link to statements by experts that “partial birth abortion” is performed to provide the lives and health of women.
Am I safe in assuming from your long silence, particularly in the face of kc’s evidence, that you are aware that “partial birth abortion” is indeed performed to preserve the lives and health of women, and that the true reason for your opposition to the procedure is that the lives and health that are preserved are not lives and health of anyone you care about?
No, Carol, my long silence is connected with the fact that I have to work for a living, and it is extremely busy at present. I simply do not have the time to do in-depth research on the topic, though I do note that there are plenty of folks whom I trust out there who maintain what I am pretty sure is true, and that is that dismembering a baby is not a needed method to protect a mother’s health, nor are most cases done for that purpose.
You will, of course, notice the loaded terms that you use, such as “rape apologist,” or “life and health of anyone you care about” are typical partisan smear tactics. You can get away with that on this blog, but I notice that as your alter ego, Mike Toreno (yes there is a chance I am wrong, but the vocabulary, innuendo, and style is the same), your comments were deleted over at this blog, where such tactics are not tolerated. Inferring from someone’s position that they “do not care” is neither right, nor honest, and Mollie rightly called you on it. It is interesting that it is possible, under the right circumstances, to have a halfway decent dialog, even on emotionally-laden subjects such as this.
Mr. Brasher, please, PLEASE tell me that the link you provided is not the best evidence you can supply in support of your position. Please, PLEASE tell me that you have something better. None of the information I found in that link is credible, none of it even represents an attempt at honesty. THIS is what you provide us, THIS is what you furnish us against the opinion of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, cited by me, and the link to expert medical opinion, provided by kc? THIS?!? THIS?!?
This information may be provided by people whom you trust, but WHY do you trust them? Forgive me for saying this, but I believe that you trust them because they tell you what you want to hear. You don’t care about the lives and health of women, you believe that every woman should be forced to carry any pregnancy to term, wanted or not, healthy or not, safe for the mother or not. Given that viewpoint, you don’t care if claims that “partial birth abortion” or any other kind of pregnancy termination are never done to preserve the lives and health of women are true, you just care that they are MADE. You don’t want the truth, you just want a claim you can cite in support of your position. You want to use terms like “dismember” and “brutal” and have that be the end of the argument, so you cite to claims that you want to believe, and ignore claims that have greater scientific credibility, or are based on personal experience, if they give you information you don’t want to believe.
You can talk about “partisan smear tactics” all you want, but all I’m doing is giving you my considered opinion, arrived at after careful thought. I referred to Kathleen Parker, for example, as a rape apologist because I quoted an apologia for rape written by her! Let me quote it again:
“Off the record, in dozens of interviews over a period of years, male soldiers and officers have confided that many men resent women because they’ve been forced to pretend that women are equals, and men know they’re not.
The lie breeds contempt, which leads to a simmering rage that sometimes finds expression in aggression toward those deemed responsible.”
Tell me what YOU call it, other than an apologia for rape. She says that men resent “false” claims of female equality, and that this resentment manifests itself in “agression” (rape and sexual abuse, in the context of the piece).
I call Kathleen Parker a rape apologist because that is what she is. So now, what does that make you? It makes you someone who cites a rape apologist with approval, using her unsupported word to support your argument, according her opinions a greater weight than those of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
All you care about is supporting your viewpoint. The quality of the evidence you adduce to support it isn’t important to you; the only thing that’s important to you is that it says what you want it to say.
I’ve set forth the personal story of Carol Voss. kc has provided a link to expert medical opinion. You have provided nothing.
I don’t have time right now. This is the best I can do. Good research takes time. And it may be awhile.
The excerpt you quote from Kathleen Parker does not prove to me what you say it proves. Just from reading it here, it seems to be me she may be saying that women are not equal to men in combat, and indeed, I would concur with that. But as I say, I really don’t know, because this excerpt is too short to really know.
Your conclusion is, as always, to put the worst possible spin on any statement that somebody makes that you disagree with. So whatever I write, it will be spun so that it looks bad. “You don’t care.” Really? How do you know whether I care? Because you don’t know me, and I am not about to roll out my inner workings, or for that matter, my outer workings on this blog. But you will make your conclusions as to my character, even very little evidence. And you will say things like “we have heard all we need to know.”
The purpose of this blog, as I understand it, is to debate issues, not to decide whether you think a person cares or not. And I am really not sure how much I care that you think I don’t care, because I really, right now, am not sure that I care what you think.
Mr. Brasher, you say that the excerpt from Kathleen Parker does not prove TO YOU what I say it proves, but I don’t think the reason for that is that it doesn’t prove to AN OBJECTIVE OBSERVER what I say it proves. I think you know this, and you demonstrate that you know it when you focus on one element of it and deliberately ignore others. You are trying to wish it away. Here, again, are pertinent elements of Parker’s column, which is entitled “The Fog of Rape”:
“But more overt sexual aggression may be the product of something few will acknowledge, at least on the record: resentment.
Off the record, in dozens of interviews over a period of years, male soldiers and officers have confided that many men resent women because they’ve been forced to pretend that women are equals, and men know they’re not.
The lie breeds contempt, which leads to a simmering rage that sometimes finds expression in aggression toward those deemed responsible.”
Now, what YOU take from that is that Parker is saying is simply that women are not equal to men in combat. But to reach that conclusion, you have to ignore significant portions of the material.
Think about it. Parker is explaining what she sees as a possible source of “overt sexual aggression”. This agression arises from the fact that, according to her, men have been “forced to pretend that women are equals”. (You added “in combat”, which Parker didn’t write, suggesting to me a desire on your part to distort the piece to make it appear less offensive). And the key point, that being forced to “pretend that women are equals” breeds “contempt,” which leads to “a simmering rage”, which in turn leads to “agression toward those deemed responsible”. Overt sexual expression, in light of the first sentence of the excerpt.
So the excerpt clearly does NOT indicate what you pretend it does, that Parker is simply saying that women are not equal to men in combat.
She is saying that women are not equal to men, and that forcing men to pretend that women are equal causes men to feel contempt for women, and that this contempt leads to a rage that in turn leads to agression (“over sexual aggression”) toward women, who are, in Parker’s view, held responsible for the pretense into which men are forced.
To put it in a more condensed way, forcing men to “pretend” that women are equals, leads mean to resent women, and this resentment leads to rape.
I am astonished that you are not appalled by such a view, and the fact that you are not appalled by it perhaps tells us more about your attitude toward women than you would like for us to know.
The occurrences of “overt sexual aggression” by men toward women in the military can be explained in much more simple terms than Parker uses. Men who engage in “overt sexual aggression” toward women are bad people. I don’t care if they are exposed to, or even to articulate, views about women’s status that they don’t agree with, the idea that being exposed to or forced to articulate those views leads them into fits of uncontrollable rage that causes them to harm women in any way whatsoever would be laughable if it weren’t so appalling. Soldiers who commit violent acts against their fellow soldiers are soldiers that I don’t want in the military.
Can you provide me with any kind of honest analysis of Parker’s piece that refutes the claims I make about what she is saying? An analysis that takes into account both the parts that you want to believe or to excuse, and the parts that you don’t like?
You say that I don’t know you; that’s true. But I know some important things about you. I know you wish to discount claims that women have grave and serious reasons for seeking “partial birth abortion”, that you grasp at weak evidence that supports your position, while ignoring and discounting weighty and expert evidence that undercuts your position. This behavior suggests to me that you are the sort of person who is less concerned with the truth than he is with upholding his previously determined viewpoint.
You cite Kathleen Parker as an authority. I cite the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology as an authority. The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology says that denial of “partial birth abortion” will endanger the lives and health of women. Kathleen Parker says it won’t. You choose to believe Kathleen Parker.
What am I supposed to take from your choice? What kind of person takes the word of Kathleen Parker on such an issue, over the word of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology?
Only the kind of person who realizes that denial of “partial birth abortion” will cause harm, just not to anyone he cares about.
I am not trying to “put the worst possible spin” on your statement. I am telling you what I think. If I am wrong, show me where I am wrong. Don’t tell me, SHOW me. Don’t TELL me that your intentions are honorable, don’t complain that I’m not accepting your good faith, SHOW me where I’m wrong.
Well, Carol, I will tell you also what I think. it has taken me awhile, and I’m pretty certain that my opinion won’t matter to you, but I’m afraid that your arguments don’t convince me, either.
At first it seems that Carol Voss’s story has weight, but (apart from the matter that one experience doth not a principle make) when one reads a bit further in the field, there is some interesting dissension. First of all, one reader’s (a woman’s) response (admittedly a minority, but an important opinion, nonetheless):
Then some more comments, albeit of an earlier time, but still relevant:
As former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop and other eminent medical authorities told Congress:
I’m afraid that even quoting the illustrious non-profit organization The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology is not convincing, especially when equally qualified medical personnel maintain the opposite. All this proves is that the ACO&G wants to defend a particular position on the issue. Those in the medical profession can also err, as C. E. Koop pointed out years ago:
I close with a quote from John Piper, pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis. I realize that none of this will convince those who are entrenched on the other side, but hopefully those who are open to think about the issue will consider it:
“You shall not kill”
If we are starting with absolute truth, how about let’s start with the 10 commandments, Carol. Now, legislating morality in a world that doesn’t like to be told what to do, by God or anyone else (including government, which is an institution that He set up, according to Scripture), is a very complex business, which is why we discuss issues like this here. But for you it is not complex, I realize. You issue a fatwa from heaven, and everybody who disagrees with you, or “science,” as you call it, is just plain stupid.
But I don’t feel in the least put down by your position, no matter how erudite you may be, or condescending in your tone. Your presupposition is that you are Lord over human life, and nobody tells you what to do with it. The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology is made up, by and large, of doctors who eveidently think similarly as you do. Thankfully, there are some doctors who think very differently, whose presuppositions involve respect for human life.
There have often been times, Carol, when the vast majority of people chose bloodshed because it was convenient. The OT prophets got into trouble for calling to attention to it and criticizing idol-worship that included, among other practices, infanticide. Don’t get on your high and mighty horse too high, just because such practices still bother some of us today. You may be with the majority. The majority doesn’t decide what is right or wrong.
No, I don’t think so, because Rev. John Piper is a pastor who has given his life to caring for people, applying God’s Word, and living it out. He doesn’t call women “sluts,” nor does he treat them that way. You used that term. It is part of your regular vocabulary.
I can just imagine that Pastor John Piper has done a lot more good for humanity than you have done, especially if this is the way you normally treat those who disagree with you. But sadly, I didn’t expect any other response, now did I?
Ms. Hathaway,
The answer is no. The Physicians’ Ad Hoc Coalition for Truth (PHACT), a coalition of over 400 physician-specialists, including former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, says that “Partial-birth abortion is never medically necessary to protect a mother’s health or future fertility. On the contrary, this procedure … can pose a significant threat to both her immediate health and future fertility.”
I realize that this position has no credibility with you, but you adopt the position of the ACOG, because as you state, it does not make the “sweeping claims” that the PHACT makes. But that begs the question. If “partial-birth abortion is never medically necessary, then it is never medically necessary. That leaves us with the question as to whether it poses the least risk to the mother. Dr. Koop disagrees with the ACOG. That’s one against many. But Dr. Koop is not just anybody, but the former Surgeon-General of the United States, who pioneered in pediatric surgery. Dr. Koop has demonstrated a balanced approach to this whole question, refusing to allow his position to be politicized or misused by either the left or the right of the political scene. He also refused to publish a report supporting the idea of negative psychological affects of abortion upon women, saying that the evidence did not support that (as to why this would be important, I do not know, because the right or wrong of a decision is not based upon what anybody feels about it, but rather whether it is right or wrong to begin with) and that cost him his job with the first Bush administration.
Is the ACOG the pristine body that you contend that it is? Does it make its decisions based solely on scientific evidence, or is there another agenda? It pretends to speak for its members. Who is in charge of this organization? Have the members actually voted on this position, or was it decided by the leadership? I suspect the latter. Admittedly, I do not know that for sure. But to contend that it has no bias is a faulty premise. Ruth Ginsburg said that, in the recent majority decision of the Supreme Court, the majority’s opinion “cannot be understood as anything other than an effort to chip away a right declared again and again by this court, and with increasing comprehension of its centrality to women’s lives.” This is the fundamental issue. It is not, I think, primarily about science, but part of a larger agenda, and that is the right to kill in the name of personal freedom of choice, and kill, more often than not, for the sake of convenience, not for the sake of the health of the mother. And you, Ms. Hathaway, have demonstrated in the past that you are opposed to any restrictions in this area, so evidently you share the agenda.
No, I could not, because any authorities who would not agree with what you want to hear, according to yours, and Justice Ginsburg’s agenda, are not credible. They would be dismissed out of hand.
The current practice of PBA is certainly not limited to instances of preserving the life of the mother. Ron Fitzsimmons, executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers (1997), estimated that the method was used 3,000 to 5,000 times annually. “In the vast majority of cases, the procedure is performed on a healthy mother with a healthy fetus that is 20 weeks or more along, Fitzsimmons said.” (The New York Times, Feb. 26, 1997, p. A11.)
And, that larger agenda includes condoning a method and procedure that defies common sense as to any semblance of morality. To make a comparison: Is it sometimes necessary to practice capital punishment? Maybe. Is it necessary to dismember and decapitate someone in order to do that? No, there are other methods available. So what if I would argue that dismembering and decapitating the criminal was the best method as far as the mental health of the executioner is concerned, would that make it the better method? Is there any place for consideration of the morality of a procedure? Is there any place for consideration of the person who is being executed? I think there is, and it wouldn’t matter if the ACOG, or the ACLU, or anyone else, said otherwise. That they claim to be experts is beyond dispute. That their position is right, because of their claim to be experts, is not.
So I contend that the case you used of Ms. Voss was a very tragic, but also very convenient one. You might be able to make a case for partial birth abortion, in such extenuating circumstances, as the best one for Ms. Voss. But does that make it right? Does that mean that the state has no interest in limiting the use of what is plainly a very questionable procedure? Is this the way human life should be treated? Is this what it means “to follow Christ,” as you put it?
I think not.
Judging by the lack of response by an otherwise verbose Ms. Hathaway, Mr. Brasher (and ed) has handily dissected, countered, and destroyed her strident “arguments.” She complained when you didn’t respond after 3 days, yet it has been mre than a month and one half at this writing and the silence is deafening.
Clearly, she is used to out shouting her opponents or overwhelming them with reams of rhetoric about “oil leprechauns” (still trying to figure that one out by the way). Confronted with the truth about her beloved, yet barbaric procedure, she is mute, stunned into submission. I am sure that if she is married, her husband is grateful.
Kudos, Mr. Brasher! You too, ed!!