For the most part I agree with your stance on this subject. I would probably consider myself somewhere in the middle myself. About the only thing I disagree with you on is what rights if any does the sperm donor (father) get. And this is actually where it gets tricky even in my own head. I as a male would like to have some say, but I also have to admit to myself I am not the one carrying the child for 9 months.

I have always had one problem with the pro-life’s stance on abortion. They claim that life begins at conception, yet I have never herd of a funeral for a miscarried child. Then again once the child is “born” if it dies even minutes after birth we do have a funeral for the child.

I have always felt that the proper course of action was to allow abortions early in the pregnancy, but only allow them for the health of the mother after that. And by health of the mother I mean death or serious permanent injury.

I am all in favor of using education and any other methods to work and reduce the amount of abortions that are done, but I am unable to side with people who want to ban them across the board.

Good luck with that. You might want to try something easier first-say getting Israel and Hezbollah to work together.

and the current SQ position on abortion is nowhere near any middle ground.

After Roe v Wade is overturned, the various states which reach various compromise positions on this issue. Until that happens, you are asking pro-lifers to essentially embrace a full fledged and permanent defeat.

And you intend this to be persuasive?

How about you give me everything you own and become my indentured servant? Sound appealing to you? It is one way to to end the deadlock on economic issues.

Abortion is murder. Its a non starter.
There is another word, however, that also starts with an A that I find curiously lacking in your supposed ‘rightward’ shift on this issue.

Say it with me people. ADOPTION.

If you dont want the baby youve been blessed with, give it up for ADOPTION. ADOPTION is an acceptable solution to everyone, or it should be. Its not because various groups hate poor people and would rather see them kill their children then breed.

And dont cry to me about how a mother now has to sit their for 9 months with a child she doesnt want. Tough. Maybe she will learn a lesson. Also, if the mother goes all crazy and starts drinking or drugging to kill her baby, Id charge her with murder if she does kill her baby and assault if she doesnt.

Let me even divorce the argument from any thing remotely spiritual. Every person born has a vast potential to make money and grow the economy. Murdering babies is akin to eating the seed corn. Its f####ing retarded.

Honestly, there is common ground for both pro-choice and pro-life people. None of them want to have an abortion and nobody thinks abortions are a good. As a pro-life Democrat, I run in pretty liberal circles. I’ve never met a pro-abortion person. I’ve met people who thing it shouldn’t be illegal, but never met someone who thought it was a good thing. For some reason, we don’t take that fundamental agreement that abortions and go from there. Instead of legislating it in courts, we work to make it an obsolete practice.

In my opinion, we need to focus on many other issues that could lead to a drop in pregnancy. We need comprehensive sexual education. Not a popular thing for most people, but it is a necessary evil. I’m not saying that it should be the schools who do it, but most adolescents should receive information on contraceptives and STDs to give them basic information in case they decide against abstinence, which does happen (even to those who take abstinence pledges). Also, there should be a push to help promote birth control by women. There are a large amount of different pills, or devices that can be used these days that are effective in preventing pregnancy. Furthermore, many birth control pills help in other aspects outside of sex, such as regulating periods and even helping with acne. We should work in promoting this as a methods of preventing pregnancies. Studies have shown that these programs are effective in preventing STD’s and unplanned pregnancies.

I know government programs aren’t necessarily popular here. But, this is a case where the government can get involved. Government should give incentives to promote adoption, and work to reform the adoption system and fund groups that perform this service. We should rework our foster care system, which is a joke. We should provide health care to pregnant women, and have programs to help aid single mothers. Programs like this can help to show that there are strong options outside of abortion, and help promote making a difference decision on the matter.

I feel that both pro-life and pro-choice people can come to some consensus on programs that help to prevent pregnancies and give strong options outside of abortions. I think that both sides have vilified the other’s position so much, we don’t really know what other sides stands for anymore. We just end up arguing at each other, instead of talking with each other. I know, that sounds like crazy hippie speak, but I truly think there is common ground here, we just don’t go there.

even though firearms are protected by the Second Amendment, some people disagree – so, it will be legal to own bolt-action rifles and pump shotguns, but nothing else? They would be furious and rightly so – you just took away the main right and gave them a pat on the head.

That is basically what you are doing here. Everything stays the same, except the father gets a say (which is good). It doesn’t reduce abortion or change anything. You won’t get much agreement here, because killing babies is wrong regardless of who makes the decision.

In what way does your plan reduce abortion in any significant manner? If you can explain that, it might help. I can’t see how it would do anything.

First let me thank you for clarifying because your last post left many questions do to it’s composition and the “on the one hand A but on the other hand B” approach.

Do you care more about the argument or the goals? Most of the people who have commented on my entry have issues with it because it’s not a Pro-Life argument and ignore the fact that it would actually advance Pro-Life goals. I assumed that the Pro-Life advocates were interested in achieving the goal of pushing back abortion however they can. If, however, it turns out that the Pro-Life advocates are happier to argue your argument – rather than actually achieving goals – then I am spinning my wheels here. But if you are actually interested in achieving the goals you argue for so passionately then consider the state of the abortion debate.

This is a much clearer statement of your position and I thank you for clarifying. I largely agree with you here and said in one of my replies to your last post that those that take an all or nothing stand on this are fools…we should be willing to settle for what we can get now and work toward getting more as we go forward.

The basic plan on both sides is to pack the courts with judges who are sympathetic to their views. That’s a fine plan, but it only works until the other side is able to regain the majority. Gaining such a majority in the courts would be difficult and that majority would be lost as the pendulum swings the other way.

I especially agree here…I do believe packing the Supreme Court in such a way that Roe V Wade is overturned would be productive and should be pursued because even the most liberal justices on the court agree it was bad law. Once overturned I think they would be loath to reenact it. But relying on packing the lower courts is a fools errand if a long term and permanent solution is the goal.

By addressing those concerns and using new arguments I think it’s possible for a more rightward abortion solution to be accepted by the majority in this country, but it’ll only be made possible by acknowledging that you won’t be able to get everything you want. There’s no chance of getting everything, but there’s a good chance of getting some of it, and some is better then none.

We part ways slightly on this one…Again I agree that we should be willing to move the ball where it can be moved as we go along…where we disagree is, “There’s no chance of getting everything”. This may be true for now…but it’s far from a foregone conclusion going into the future…Education is key here.

Once Roe V Wade is overturned, and the Pro Life issue is taken out of the hands of the judicial oligarchy, the fight could then be taken to the states. Grass roots pro lifers could begin an education program to inform the general public of fetal development and work toward using issues like clinical death definitions being applied to when life begins, when a fetus becomes a protected citizen under the 14th amendment and when a mother’s right to chose becomes invalid when her right to chose to impose her will on a separate and autonomous human being constitutes murder which should be punishable under law.

I refuse to accept the premise that we can never achieve all our goals…the Dems never acknowledge this as a possibility and neither should we.

I believe this attitude amongst Republicans is a large part of the problem because the Democrats relentlessly make gains against us as we continually claim victory when we stop them while they regroup…move the ball on another issue and come back and win the issue we stopped them on previously…

Until the Republican Party learns the lesson that the Democrats have taught us so well over the last 80 years and stop being satisfied with giving the Democrats half of what THEY want as opposed to getting half of what WE want, we will continue the long slow march into socialism and eventual slavery as we relentlessly give way to their agenda.

The “Big Tent” analogy isn’t the correct one…the correct one is a MAGNET…we need to be a MAGNET that draws these independents in who are sick and tired of what’s going on in Washington—Fred Thompson