We should just refer to our elections as abortions tbh. I call it Abortion Day instead of Election Day.
Really very excited that we are doing communism and bankrupting the country just so that 3 women per year don’t have to drive to Illinois to get an abortion. You people are such frivolous morons.
So true. But honestly, it’s republicans fault for STILL not getting the messaging right…on abortion and most other topics. I’m losing hope in republicans keeping the house and winning the senate. And as much as people love Trump, to the point of idolizing him, he’s ruining republicans chances of taking over the White House. He sits back on his throne while the others duke it out, acting like he’s the winner already while doing no campaigning! I voted for him twice and I’m praying I won’t have to vote for him a third time.
Get it together, Republicans voters! Choose someone else and let’s move out of the crappy bickering about Trump. There were a few people on the stage last night that are capable of doing what he can do. He’s in it for himself and I can’t believe people still don’t get it. Finally, we need a more moderate president. These extreme policy makers have caused division to the highest degree. Obama caused Trump which caused Biden. Is anyone else sick of this?
Trump's POLICIES were great for all Americans. It's his character you don't like. At least he had it out there, for all to see. Not like Obama -- great glibness, rotten Marxist policies.
Well, true...and I will vote for Trump’s police’s again if I must. His character bothers me greatly. But then, so does Biden’s. Weary. I am so weary of everyone. Reagan made me cringe a bit too, but good grief! Look at what he accomplished after the sweet but incompetent Jimmy??! I was young then. Young enough to note how much my life circumstances improved beginning in 1981. And the man came from California!!
I’m not saying his policies weren’t good, but he’s not the right guy for now. Things are very different. He’s older, you can see in his eyes that he’s more tired, and his mind is on one thing, which is himself…getting back at those who did him wrong as well as his legal battles. That’s not good enough for me.
Ditto. We need a statesman/woman. Not a boorish braggart. I voted for him in the past two elections but if it is between these two I’ll vote for him again. Anyone else besides Cackalot / lying, crazy uncle Joe. I never liked Trump though some of his policies were helpful to us and he did strive to put Americans first. Our government should be serving our needs first and foremost. I do care about ppl beyond our borders but we need to play the long game. We and I mean all humans are closer to world war and that should concern everyone. I’m pretty certain that the air strikes we made yesterday were to assure the citizenry that Biden can be tough but it’s been clear from the beginning that he isn’t the man pulling the levers behind the curtain. I think ppl have gone off the rails in the past decade and our ability to come together gets worse every year.
The whole abortion issue has been so overblown. It should always have been up to the states. Even RGB confessed that Roe didn’t honestly bear proper legal scrutiny. I used to be a serious pro choice screech but came to some revelation that changed my mind. I think a total ban is ridiculous but stuff like partial birth abortion is clearly murder. Termination of pregnancy to save the life of the mother has always been upheld as well as pregnancy resulting from incest or rape. I don’t understand the inability of leftist screeches that can’t consider a compromise.
Women better wake up. If we diminish the reverence for life too much then pregnancy itself can be discounted for consideration. Too many women are championing the invasion of womens sports to mediocre trans athletes. We are leading the charge to our own destruction. Well, as usual I have exceeded the reasonable limit for yapping so I’ll shut up now and hope for the best.
Yap away! You articulated in 3 paragraphs exactly what I feel! Thanks, I don't have to type a comment now you did it for me! Honestly, I can't agree more with you, especially about the women in this country who are one issue voters, specifically, abortion.
I think it was a good yap! Yes, leave abortion lines to the states. Further, drawing a line at say, 15 weeks (or wherever a state says), is not an "abortion ban" but an "abortion allowance".
And, when the WSJ publishes articles on scientific work being done to make a "male" egg so that people have "more options" and when no one seems to agree that "male" and "female" mean anything in biology (unless you are working to make a "male" egg or a live womb transplant into a man maybe) then you know that real pregnancy itself can be discounted for consideration.
In addition to unfairness in sports the Republicans might talk about parents rights regarding GI and the Frankenstein school and medical communities.
"Legislation Protecting Minors From Medical Transition Could Have Unintended Consequences:
Society Must Also Become Aware of the Truth about Transition!"
Me too I had high hopes when he first announced his campaign but the media smeared him so badly and unjustly and then Trump attacked him like some rabid dog that his support just disintegrated.
I hope he can find a way to climb back up on the dog heap if not this time then in the future. I also really like Tulsi Gabbard. She’s a straight shooter and intelligent lady but tough enough to spar with the liars. My dream ticket would be them both. Her party turned on her at the behest of HRC aka the wicked witch. I hate that woman and I try not to be a hater but she makes that hard.
Well we all better be praying for the future if not only our country but a world spinning out of control. When a misguided child can become the face of geopolitical manipulation we might be past the point of no return. I think her name is Greta Thornberg but not sure.
I think the entire US citizenry will benefit if he can root out those who have bet it all on destroying him. His personal vengeance is just another consequence. What the career bureaucrats in the executive branch have done is a coup. They refuse to be accountable to their boss. Pure and simple. And their Congressional
lapdog laps it up. It is a true Constitutional crisis and the Republic hangs in the balance. The only people I see with the skill to address it are Trump or Pompeo.
His tormentors are not good for the American citizen. If you have doubts contemplate the lengths they went to to assure the election of JB. Then contemplate the lengths they have gone to to destroy Trump since 2020 and ask yourself why. I want them brought to heel before the Republic is no more. If doing so gives Trump personal satisfaction, so be it.
I agree with you, Lynne. But we should also remember the lengths those same leftists went to, beginning in 2015 and continuing thereafter, to keep (1) Hillary from being charged with crimes (James Comey dismissed as "careless" and non-criminal her willful destruction of more than 30,000 subpoenaed emails plus the hardware and software she'd used to transmit them), (2) Trump from being nominated, and then (3) Trump from being able to fulfill his Article II duties by fabricating the Clinton Collusion Concoction to subvert his Presidency. By the time of their "attempts to destroy Trump" in 2020, they'd been at it for at least five years -- and all in the name of "preserving our democracy."
He was a professional activist with a serious case of narcicism. His only qualification for president was a one term senate stint and I don’t think he had some stellar legislation advances to his credit either. All that aside he was a better leader than Joe. I almost can’t believe we are duking it out over these two again!
Republicans “messaging” problem is that all messaging gets filtered through the PR arm of the Democratic Party (also known as “mainstream media” and “big tech.”
Polls show a vast majority of people support parental rights in education and not indoctrinating children into the gender religion. However, when a popular bill does just that the whole world calls it the “Don’t Say Gay” bill to this day.
Look even at the GOP debates. Not a single question about domestic issues the public cares about. All questions are asked from the left and designed to poke every soft spot with the most controversial framing.
You can’t really “out message” that in any meaningful way.
You bring up good points. Maybe they should do a little more emotional campaigning that get to peoples feelings…or lying. Dems have been great at both.
The deep state’s ugly face. They haven’t been fair to Republicans since the first half of the last century. They are tied to the evil creeping of socialism. Many are sleeping at the wheel and others will do ANYTHING to maintain power.
Just listened to Megan Kelly’s podcast episode from yesterday. She went off about the messaging of republicans and how the party is in danger of losing in 2024, and I 100% agreed with her. She was on fire. It’s well worth the time listening.
The only way republicans lose is if they don't get their mail in ballot strategy in line. In Pennsylvania, the dems had 400,000 votes in the bank before the polls opened.
Why does that make a difference? I’m not questioning you but rather that idea. I’ve never understood that. All votes should supposedly be counted, so what difference does it make when? I always enjoy voting on “Election Day”, but I need to rethink…just not sure why.
How many of those 400,000 "voters" do you think even read the ballot names, or actually signed them? When in Rome, do as the Romans do. And before anyone accuses me of encouraging voter fraud, democrats have assured us there is no such thing.
In Chicago the mailmen/women delivering to 2 or 3 story apartment buildings walk-ups are often too lazy to open each individual mailbox and sort through whose mail is whose.
Instead they throw all the mail on the floor and let the tennants find their own. Now imagine the millions of ballots out there for anyone to fill out, return, or stuff ballot boxes with.
When Colorado began to mail ballots to all registered voters, the parties paid people to go through the dumpsters at apartment complexes to recover ballots thrown away. I don't think they destroyed those ballots.
The film 2000 Mules showed people in Georgia stuffing bunches of ballots into collection boxes. When the state attorney general's office investigated they were able to identify three people from the film. When questioned, they said they were just delivering ballots for family members, which is legal. There is no way to prove they were lying, once the ballots are in the box and mixed with all the others. So the law has no teeth.
Most European countries don’t allow any mail in voting due to the ease in which it can be fraudulent. They also don’t have voting systems that are tied to external systems as it’s nearly impossible to ensure absolute integrity and security otherwise.
It makes a difference because it is so much easier to get a ballot someone isn't going to use, fill it out and mail it in, rather than going to the polls and pretending to be that person in order to vote for them.
That is like abortion, the question is where is the line in the sand. I am good with properly authorized mail-in ballots for legitimate reasons. I am not okay with improperly vetted mail-in ballots. And I am not okay with random drop boxes for mail-in ballots. I am.not okay with harvesters helping people fill out the ballots and mailing or dropping off the ballots for others. See for example
Thanks for the tip. I’ll listen cause I liked her. We don’t get Fox News anymore due to changes in our service but she left anyway. And yeah, the GOP is flailing when it should be a cakewalk. 🫠
I think you would be around the bend too if what had been do e to him was done to you. I do not use the term.persecuted lightly but IMO it is persecution. And it begs the question why?
CNN is reporting that the Bad Orange Man is getting over 20% support from black voters; contrast that with single digit support for Milquetoast Mitt and $&L McCain....it seems like there are significant portions of the PRO-crime democRATs assumed constituencies that are realizing that it's results that matter, not personality. Especially after Joetato's slur that if you don't KNOW who to vote for, "you ain't black".
Good point, whether criminal (low level pot busts, speed "traps") or civil (false accusations/perjury - divorce court anyone?) I agree, there's a lot of people who see the disparity in the legal system on full display.
I'm not sick of it. Trump was the best president of my lifetime. Get serious for one second. It's the "but muh mean tweets" people who are the reason we're in the mess we are.
No one can do what Trump has done. Not one of them has the grit or stubbornness. Trump is holding rallies continuously. I am so thankful to finally have a fighter for America and Americans. TRUMP 2024
I will tell you one thing. America has been turned into Hamas surrogates. I don’t see any difference between them and the leftist mob and media other than they aren’t kill us yet. It may not be long. All the people that died fighting for this country had made no difference. I am losing any hope that this nation will rise up and face the peril we are facing. There are too many brainwashed idiots to fight at this point of no return. The communist leftist have poisoned our nation. The progressives have wreck our country. If anyone can see any hope, tell me how. I’m with Elon, let’s get off this planet.
It’s a joke, really, isn’t? This one issue has completely exposed vacuous nature of progressive thinking. I believe the truth is that they are tools for Obama’s fundamental transformation of America to a “neomarxism.” He is just arrogant enough to believe he can do it better than Marx, Mao and all the others.
I too am losing faith but I don't think it is a messaging problem. You can't have a message about an ever shifting issue. And even something as straightforward as abortion is multi-faceted by whoever runs the Democrats. Is it anti-woman to be concerned about a fetus? Sometimes. Is it a denial of healthcare? Yes according to them. Is it oppression of women to have concerns for women? According to Dem marketing strategy yes. Is it only a matter of the pregnant woman's preference? According to said marketing strategy, yes. With the caveat unless of course it is a pregnant man.There are so many things that are valid responses to all of this. But to engage is pointless I think because it is like trying to reason with the pro Arabs we now refer to as Palestinians. They do not want a solution. Rather they want those who do not cave to their demands obliterated.
Maybe that’s the idea. Could it be the truth is something else? Perhaps the algorithms are controlling a preferred narrative to demoralize Republicans.
Yup. Maybe we’ll get lucky and one will be raptured (or both). I was hoping Tulsi Gabbard would give it another go. I’m a registered Republican but I’d gladly vote for her regardless of her party affiliation.
It will never happen. Most American can't tell you who we fought against or why we fought our war of independence. We are a nation of dolts and I am not talking just about Dem/Socs, like the inarticulate moron who claims she teaches at Idiot U. the school of the not so bright.
Okay so for example Jacob Blake (D) was a rapist with a knife getting into a car full of kids attempting to flee from officers he had just physically assaulted while drunk and high. Those would be details.
I think our modern lifestyles have not helped people improve anywhere. We still have some serious winners in the sciences, we have millions of really great ppl. It’s just that the jerks are the loudest. Really talented ppl tend to be a bit more mellow/humble.
There are incredible ppl in every nation and I hope ppl everywhere can feel some pride in their country.
Consider this: Reproductive health is central to women’s healthcare from the time they begin menstruation to menopause. It’s more than abortion care. It’s access to contraceptives, it’s managed pregnancy and miscarriage care, and it is connected to emotional and mental health for women, too. For 50% of the electorate it is important to have bodily autonomy and freedom to make decisions without govt interference. Driving to Illinois is not simple or affordable for most people who could otherwise get support within a few miles from home to manage their reproductive health. Minimizing the importance of what this issue means for women is dismissive and quite frankly blind.
I appreciate your perspective. The truth is that we women have been used and abused by this industry, and it is an industry, for more than 60 years.
It started with the lie that women can have sex without consequences. It was never true and it’s not true now. Chemical contraception and abortion in all stages have truly only made men’s lives free if reproductive consequences, but the same is demonstrably not true for women. Furthermore, it’s made pharmaceutical companies and abortion providers very, very wealthy.
I say this as a woman who’s been around for awhile. I’ve seen women truly suffer from the very real medical, mental and emotional consequences of abortion and chemical contraception.
Betty Friedan is a very interesting woman to read about. She was a leading feminist in my era, but fell out of favor when she began to see the path her own advocacy was taking. It wasn’t a path that has brought greater contentment and happiness to women, quite the contrary. And yet we still see women selling the same lie.
But as women, can we separate our own actions and really look carefully at what is truly the path which will bring women toward greater contentment? What can women contribute using our own unique gifts for the betterment of society as a whole? Has abortion and chemical contraception contributed to the destruction of family life in the world?
I believe what is driving the abortion debate is the fact that most women have had or know of someone who’s had at least one abortion. We don’t want to feel badly about ourselves or make others feel badly so we will just continue to lie to each other. We’ll continue to vote so nobody has to feel badly about their abortion. We’ll justify it as good healthcare when it’s anything but for ourselves much less our babies. We’ll rail against women’s care centers because they don’t provide abortions- when they actually provide more legitimate health services to women than Planned Parenthood.
In essence, we’ve become complicit in our own demise.
The same is true for Covid vaccines, cigarettes , marijuana, street drugs, alcohol etc etc. Who likes admitting they might have been wrong or mislead?
I was having a casual conversation with my mother one evening and she said unequivocally that abortion is murder. That sent me into a rage that I couldn’t shake for days. In an effort to better understand my reaction I had to analyze the anger which is ALWAYS a fear based response. I didn’t want to think that I would murder a baby but eventually I was able to confront my delusions and make peace with it. It cost me years of self esteem issues, gave me a whopping infection that threatened my ability to conceive years later and yeah, no free rides in life. Gotta own it before you can let it go.
I don’t think most people understand why they get so angry. If you react that way to anything you have a fear behind it. Every time and it’s always tied to losing something you have or not getting something you want.
And BTW, abortion ends in death every time. Maybe not the mother but life begins with rigor from conception. To say otherwise is simply scientifically incorrect and denial.
I will never understand the disconnect from these people. In the same block you have an abortion clinic, and down the road from the clinic you have an animal shelter that when it gets overcrowded has to euthanize animal's. What entity do they protest?
About Betty Friedan-- it was actually Larry Money who pushed her to add abortion to her list of women’s rights. He convinced her that her agenda wouldn’t go through without it. At one of the first NOW meetings, the group split on the abortion issue and the women against abortion walked out.
You make it sound like women all have the same opinion on this issue, yet years and years of polling show that not to be true: women are split pro-life vs pro-choice at about the same rate as the overall public. Look at pictures from the annual pro-life march in DC and you will see many many young women. What’s more interesting to me is that those polls suggest the public consensus position on abortion is roughly equivalent to the EU average (legal until 12-15 weeks, sensible regulations, restricted after that point with the usual exceptions) and hasn’t changed much in decades, yet in the post Dobbs environment that potential consensus is nowhere to be found in policy, which is de facto total bans in red states and on demand until birth in blue states. Republicans that try to push that consensus view get creamed as much as those pushing for a total ban. I don’t really understand what’s going on.
"Reproductive health care" is a euphemism for abortion, and everyone knows it. No one is restricting access to contraception (free market conservatives have argued for years to make some birth control pills available over the counter). There have been scare stories about miscarriage care, but not enough info to judge what’s actually happening (nor do I trust NPR to tell me).
I will admit that the ‘driving to Illinois’ portion of this argument will be more persuasive when the maniacal central government that you are erecting based on this frivolous niche issue makes it so that you can’t afford a car or gas anymore.
Come to think of it, there’s gotta be 20 million women in rural areas, at minimum, where the nearest abortion clinic is 300+ miles away. What about a fleet of mobile clinic abortion vans? Since ‘not having to drive that far’ is a Human Right we should probably drop a couple billion dollars on Federal Government Abortionmobiles.
"For 50% of the electorate it is important to have bodily autonomy and freedom to make decisions without govt interference."
This! Somehow so many conservatives who always say they want government to bug off don't get this when it comes to this issue. Majority of women will never need or get abortions. But the idea that government can decide what happens to their own bodies elicits a visceral reaction. All the people who can't even stand a government imposed vaccine somehow suddenly want women to all allow the government to decide on the biggest decision regarding their whole body. I don't understand why they can't see that. They never address this part. As long as they never address this, they can keep harping on about the unborn but they'll never win over the women vote.
We cannot see that because you are wrong. We are not stupid. We believe your right to yourself ends where another life begins. It is so very simple and yet it is you who refuse to see the truth. Stop pretending abortion is a last desperate resort for a few women. It has become an inexcusable form of contraception...except of course contraception means preventing life, not ending it. It is you who are blind as well as wrong.
Firstly, I at least did not say you're stupid. Secondly, what you got here is two conflicting sets of moral values. You believe you're right and the other side believe they're in the right to the same degree. They can't convince you anymore with their moral arguments than you can convince them with your moral arguments. Question for the GOP is, where to go from here? Are they going to be a single issue moral defending organization? In which case why not just become a nonprofit advocacy organization? Or do they want to win elections and govern?
You said you cannot see how we woman who are prolife cannot align that moral position with our political choice for less government etc. My response is based on that & I concluded you must think we are stupid. Blind=stupid in this case. I apologize if I offended you. My morals do inform my politics. That is why I would greatly prefer a President I can respect on all levels. I respected Jimmy Carter personally but totally reject his politics. In reverse, I have no respect for Donald Trump’s personal life but I fully support his policies…except I do not want him to run again. Republicans are in a horrible situation, again. On that, I think we can agree.
QX did not say anything about "we women" just that until there is recognition that there are varying POV the Republican party cannot "win over the woman vote". Personally I think that is unrealistic anyway but I see the point. But I think the larger point is that there really is no one right answer here. You are correct that abortion is being used like contraception by some. Which is beyond harmful In many, many ways. But there are likewise women who are faced with concerns that they have considered and made an informed decision to terminate a pregnancy. Who are you or I or QX to question that?
I'm not offended. I just want to be clear that I don't think people who are pro-life are stupid. If anything, I understand where they come from much more than the average prochoice voter. I'm also not saying that the prolifers are contradicting themselves when choosing moral stand over politics. To clarify, what I meant was that they are not seeing how for women voters who are not prolife and don't hold the same moral position, to them this is a government intrusion on personal rights issue at the very fundamental level. It's hard for me to understand how they don't see this in the view of their opponents, not themselves of course.
It's because people don't trust the GOP on the issue. Look what happened in Florida: DeSantis signed the so-called "compromise" 15 week limit, then immediately after he got re-elected, he quietly signed a 6 week ban. You best believe people paid attention to that bait and switch, just as with the bait and switch about Dobbs simply "sending the issue back to the states", when immediately you had Republicans talking about federal bans.
you assume that all abortions are the results of "casual sex" since you are not a fetus you cannot know what they feel. only what you are told. but I agree 15-16 weeks is a good cut off date
since i have sat with women many times i can tell you that is not what happens. and with the morning after pill even less.. but still if you are not a fetus you cannot know what they feel you can only imagine
It's not "their own bodies." It's another person's body: the baby's. The whole point of abortion is to end the baby's life.
Everybody understands this basic point. Hence the need for euphemisms like "reproductive rights."
Abortion is a human rights issue. Someone has to speak up for the children who can't speak for themselves. If "harping on about the unborn" loses votes, then so be it.
The issue is not about the life of the woman but the life SHE created. I don’t get the leftist mentality that declares that it takes a village to raise a child and they don’t “belong” to you as a parent but when it comes to in vitro you’re all my body, my choice.
After 12 weeks it’s a baby honey. You can delude yourself and keep the lie going but facts are facts. Maybe you shoulda considered the ramifications before you indulged.
Wait, what? Take responsibility for your actions and choices? Every choice has a consequence, for good or bad.
This has long puzzled me too. How can the party of small, limited government and personal responsibility insist on controlling such a private matter? OTOH how can the party of all government, all the time for even the most trivial matter be hands off on the wholesale slaughter of fetuses? It was actually my wake-up call that there is something rotten in Denmark.
actually in Denmark abortion up to 12 weeks ( yes I get your bard reference). wholesale slaughter? what. I ran an abortion clinic for years. there was no "wholesale slaughter". just women who were desperate and needed services..of courser most here would call them whores for having "casual sex". just so not true
I know about Denmark. It was a Shakespeare reference. I am not you enemy on abortion as I see both sides of the argument. I wish you, and millions of others, did. Wholesale slaughter is one end of the spectrum. Not justified under any circumstance, period, end of discussion, is the other. IMO both are wrong. As for JUST desperate women in need of services. Sure.
Oh please. Every woman in this country has free access to various kinds of contraceptives. Stop pretending! You sound so pious about government interference, but see no problem with their interference elsewhere. The issue is a simple and moral one--not political. And yes, men have full access to contraceptives too. This issue sickens me. Women hiding behind tired slogans about our rights. Please. Every woman & every man has a moral choice to make. And do NOT bring up rape please. Of course it is horrible and wrong and an attack every woman fears and any woman so attacked should have free access to “the morning after” pill. We all know as well that women raising children alone has become the norm. Men get a free pass and it is disgusting. But please stop claiming a higher moral ground just because you are a woman. The vast majority of abortions right now are a form of contraception. And to pretend that is not so is just plain wrong.
Oh please, if abortion is the most important issue in your life I feel sorry for you. I don’t get how the right to end a life you willfully started keeps you up at night.
Access to contraceptives is NOT tied to the issue of abortion. Most republicans support legal abortion in the first trimester. After that it’s just unacceptably selfish and a crime of the soul unless there is a medical necessity for the life of the mother.
Have you ever had one? Would you encourage a person to have one? Aren’t you glad your mother chose life? I can answer yes to two of these questions but only have some regrets about the one.
Tracy, yes and let me add to your statement. No one likes to be TOLD I can’t do something, especially adult women who, up until 45 years ago, had to have permission from a husband to get a damn credit card. People have short memories.
Please show me your proof. I am 68 and have been married for 45 years and I can assure you I came into my marriage with my own credit cards and at no time did I need my husband’s permission to get another one! What a stupid thing to say! I wish my mother were still here. She would tell you the same and she was married in 1952. Get my father’s permission indeed! Every woman my age knew to continue to keep at least one credit card in our own name only, for a wide variety of reasons.
In 1974, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) prohibited discrimination against credit applicants based on gender, among other factors. For the first time, women could own a credit card in their own name. - Did I miss something?
Yep. I think you did. ECOA may indeed have helped some women and men. I would not know. Prohibiting discrimination has rarely prevented discrimination…this I know because I moved south in 1973. I had no trouble getting a credit card and neither did my mother. I am not claiming that everyone was so lucky (??) but I do not find your argument convincing. Outrage over women’s rights is such a tired argument in my opinion. And I find it particularly galling in this age when defining what is a woman appears to be beyond the intellectual abilities of many in leadership positions. We now have bigger fish to fry. And in my opinion, moral positions will always inform political positions. Of course compromise is necessary politically. But separating our full moral stance from politics is disastrous, as we are now seeing.
It is blind to not see why Obama didn’t codify Roe during his entire tenure when he heavily campaigned on doing it Day 1. I’m sure you can recall his many excuses when he was pressed for action. Democrats have the perennial fish on.
no kidding. this is what the moralists here just dont get.. this ONE issue will drag us into wars and graft and corruption and yes death of humans children and adults already here on earth. the Dems are riding high on the ONE issue. I used to be a single issue voter ( pro choice). now I am still pro choice but understand that abortion is the touchdown that will win the game for the Dems. ONE issue.. while the economy and our privacy and our freedoms are ebbing away. ONE ISSUE
I’m sorry but this isn’t true. There are hundreds of women’s care clinics offering a huge range of reproductive health services, just not including chemical contraceptives or abortion.
There are 20 Federally Qualified Health Care Centers to every 1 Planned Parenthood. They offer contraceptives, prenatal care, mammograms, STD testing, and a whole host of other health care services on a sliding scale. These are not religiously affiliated-- run by government-- and offer women and others of lower income a VASTLY better healthcare alternative to abortion clinics.
“...bodily autonomy and freedom to make decisions without govt interference...”
THAT should have been the basis for a “constitutional right” to abortion from the start! Roe’s “right to privacy” never made any sense from a legal perspective, and seems more prone to creating bad laws. The concept of bodily autonomy is a far firmer basis, related to foundational legal principles like habeas corpus.
Abortion restriction laws do not impact access to contraceptives, miscarriage care, or pregnancy care. That’s a lie that the pro-abortion lobbyists tell you so that you are scared into voting for abortion.
Bodily autonomy is important, but it does not justify abortion. We limit bodily autonomy for all sorts of reasons. Most people do not support late-term abortion, which is often done for elective reasons not for any medical emergency. If we accept the bodily autonomy argument, then to be consistent logically, you must accept abortion on demand for all 9 months of pregnancy. And this could even justify partial-birth abortion. Are you prepared to support this?
Most honest people say no, which means that they DO accept limits to bodily autonomy.
Except those poor dears want, nay demand, government support to facilitate the convenience of reproductive health care you so elegantly articulate. Then demand family leave when they deign to birth a child and subsidized child care. It makes one wonder how on earth civilization evolved to the 20th century without it.
The only real way to fix this is for people to stop lying.
It isn’t a woman’s body. It is a second human body that grows inside the woman’s body. Babies are not delivered by storks.
Restricting this termination of a nascent human life to 15 weeks is a reasonable compromise, but first you have to stop lying.
That aside, since there are 78,000 ways to easily avoid getting pregnant, if getting pregnant is going to be a problem for you, abortion is the most petty and frivolous issue to base your vote on. It’s like voting for Democrats because you prefer their position on dealing with people who are harmed by lightning strikes.
From a woman: the life growing inside of me deserved every right that I possess. There. From a woman: there are a million and one ways to avoid pregnancy. Basing your voting choice on a ‘woman’s right to choose” ie, a woman’s right to kill the life growing inside her--is just stupid. Use your moral outrage elsewhere. Gah.
The right to choose isn't about the moral obligation a woman has to the life growing inside her. Every woman understands at some level the moral obligation. It is profound. Still. We must preserve the choice. These are two different things.
I disagree. Profoundly. However, I do sincerely appreciate your cordial reply. I wrote in a rage and that was inexcusable. Thank you for tolerating my stupidity. Every woman has a right to choose to use contraceptives. Our government makes sure such things are available everywhere to both sexes. The choice to preserve life is different. People in Canada are now free to choose mercy killings of the elderly and poor and hopeless via suicide or euthanasia. Soon, the mentally ill and drug and alcohol addicted will be added to their growing choices to kill. MAID is one of the most evil ideas based on choice to enter our world and it is just across our border. Beware. It is indeed a slippery slope.
What is it then Kevin? Is your medieval perception that a woman's body is of no consequence over protecting the life inside it? Would you just put the woman in a coma until the baby is full-term? Whether you like it or not, you do not have control over this situation. You simply do not.
“It” is a unique human being at the very earliest stage of development. It has its own unique DNA and possibly different blood type. A woman’s immune system has to be repressed during pregnancy because her body naturally recognizes the fetus as a DIFFERENT BODY than its own. Scientifically, “it” as in a zygote, embryo, fetus is a uniques and individually different body from the woman’s body.
I really don't know how people stop lying and say "It isn't a woman's body" will win over votes. If anything, it'll scare even more women voters into voting against Republicans.
The other point which you've made many times about why people don't use contraceptions more is much more valid and both sides don't like talking about it. It really should be brought out into the open.
“A state’s antiabortion attitudes, which likely contribute to the enactment of restrictive abortion laws, are a major factor in inducing greater use of highly effective contraceptive methods.” Restrictive abortion laws, antiabortion attitudes, and women’s contraceptive use. Social Science Research, Vol 41, Issue 1, January 2012
“Fewer abortion providers increase the likelihood of women using the pill.” Utilization of oral contraception: The impact of direct and indirect restrictions on access to abortion. Social Science Journal, Vol 51, Issue 1, March 2014.
“Our findings reveal that restrictions on abortion funding have a significant and positive impact on a woman’s decision to use the pill.” The Role of Restrictive Abortion Legislation in Explaining Variation in Oral Contraceptive Use. Clinics in Mother and Child Health, 2015, 12:4.
“Women in states characterized by high abortion hostility (i.e., states with four or more types of restrictive policies in place) were more likely to use highly effective methods than were women in states with less hostility.” State Abortion Context and U.S. Women’s Contraceptive Choices, 1995-2010. Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health, Vol 47, Issue 2, June 2015
Seems like low contraceptive use is tied to abortion availability. No need to be strict on contraceptive if abortion is an option.
I'd say 12 weeks, but no need to split hairs. The problem is that none of these laws properly protect women from terrible situations.
For example, the 6 week Florida law does not allow a woman to induce labor for a fatal fetal abnormality starting in the third trimester. This scenario is technically considered an abortion. Why do politicians want to force women to non-viable pregnancies to term? The risks to the mother greatly increase as the pregnancy progresses.
When it comes to the states, women are choosing fetal viability as the line over 6 week bans implemented by men.
All of the information about the problems this is causing is coming from hospitals and doctors who receive basically all of their income from the federal government and as such are some of the biggest donors to the Democrat party.
You don’t need an abortion for a fatal fetal abnormality in the third trimester. Do everything you can to care for mom and baby, and then deliver baby when needed and provide perinatal palliative hospice care. Preliminary studies on palliative hospice care show better outcomes of mental health from grief for parents.
I would agree with you. However, this is the crux of the issue that most people don't understand. The term abortion simply means ending a pregnancy. Democrats corrupted the term "abortion" to include medically necessary procedures for either mom or baby that prematurely ends the pregnancy while the baby is still alive. Medically speaking, what you described is an abortion...and is generally prohibited in most states with 6 week abortion bans.
Abortion technically is the “ending of a pregancy” by active killing of the fetus. This can be done by starving the embryo of nutrients, suffocating the embryo, (this is essentially what a chemical abortion does) or dismemberment of the fetus (a D&C or suction abortion.) Pro-abortionists have changed the definition of abortion to obscure what it really does. Medical procedures that treat things like ectopic pregnancies are completely different medical procedures and even coded differently in hospitals and clinics. (See https://secularprolife.org/2022/12/do-pro-life-laws-endanger-womens-lives/.)
By definition, a producer is an abortion only if it results in a dead baby. Any procedure that tries to save the life of the mother by separating the mom and baby (either child is able to live or die) is fundamentally different than an abortion. Doctors know this, it’s been done all the time before all the hysteria after Dobbs decision, and I repeat, no 6-week abortion ban and no later week abortion ban prevents any of these life-saving procedures. Pro-abortion lobbyists call them “abortions” to confuse people. But they are not. It is vastly different both intention and medical procedurally to separate a mom and child in a medical emergency and fail to save the child, than to actively kill the child to save the mother.
It’s not just “GOP” men who are pro life, millions of decent women are. You do not speak for all women when you say this.
And I speak as someone who believes abortion should be legal, available, but RARE. With over 60 million babies aborted since Roe v Wade in the US alone, it is NOT rare. It’s now a form of contraception.
Millions of us still believe in the sanctity of life, our humanity, we have a soul. We do not believe abortion any time even at the point of birth, which is tantamount to murder, is a society we want to live in or one that will survive.
If winning elections is more important than the sanctity of life, there is no hope. I’d prefer to lose every election in good conscience than lose my soul. Ohio will reap the wind.
Sorta gave the game away by saying it’s “GOP men”. Too bad she didn’t say “GOP straight white men who are physically fit and successful”.
😂😂
When you see 60-year-old women screaming in the streets about abortions, that’s your first clue that this is about a psychological derangement based on a particular personal resentment and not actually about abortions.
The best compromise is for women to stop sleeping with men that don't support women after impregnating them, and for men to stop sleeping with women that would consider killing a healthy fetus after 16 weeks.
Since you continue to mansplain, I will womansplain. Europe has nothing to do with a woman's body. We always have a choice. Always. Choice is embedded in the universe. Only humans take it away. I would like to believe that I wouldn't abort a fetus, but I don't know that I wouldn't either. But, I would never allow you or any other to take that choice away.
Well I hope you’re smart enough to avoid any such conundrum. It’s not rocket science but after 12 weeks that ball of cells has a beating heart and can feel, hear and is hard wired to live. Just like you are.
What about the choice to own a slave? What about the choice to kill my neighbor because I want to take his car? What about the choice of Hamas to kill women and children for “freedom”?
If I were a candidate being asked for my position, I'd look the questioner in the eye and say, "the question you should be asking is, should there be a time limit on a woman's right to an abortion or should she be able to dispose of a baby up until the instant it takes its first breath? The answer to that isn't mine to give, it's a burden that every voter must bear, and I pray that before they answer it, each of them takes a long, hard look in the mirror”.
Yes, the incessant Dem ads in VA were all about the GOP supposedly wanting to ban abortion in all cases. The GOP ads didn't even mention abortion, much less point out that the Dem party line is for legal abortion up until the last second (or a bit after) for any reason, as all of their purported limits invariably have an exception for "health" which is a loophole big enough to sail a carrier through. That could have been an effective answer but instead the GOP let their opponents define them, with unsurprising results.
And yet it saddens me that so many will vote for unrestricted abortion, basically on demand vs some level of what I would define as morality. Even sexually progressive European countries have placed limits on the abortion industry. But we have this Ll or nothing mindset.
We, meaning the vast majority of Americans, aren't choosing the all or nothing prospect. The establishment is forcing us to choose between the lesser of two evils to keep themselves in power. It's a demented game.
no one votes for "unrestricted" abortion as these are limits in all legal abortions. determined in some cases by the medical team of doctors trained in this and the woman and hopefully her partner. there is no "abortion on demand". it is just the kind of hyperbole that is used to whip up votes for either side depending
The abortionist messed up and killed a woman and in the investigation admits that she checked “mental health reasons” for giving a 6-month abortion even though she agreed that she didn’t even check if the woman actually had any health or mental health issues. This happens ALL the time.
This article shows how data from records that some women in Minnesota have had up to 10 abortions. There is no way a woman is having 10 abortions for anything other than because she wants to (probably using it as a form of birth control.) this is just Minnesota, but I’m confident this happens all over.
Wake up. Women get abortions for no good reasons-- which is essentially on demand-- all of the time.
Or we can just rename the GOP the Prolife Party, since they seem to care more about this issue than anything else, to the point of losing all elections and power.
Sorry Kevin. You're sounding like the Democrats here when they blamed women for not voting for Hillary. You keep blaming women voters but women don't work for politicians or the government. It's the other way around. When women's votes on this issue is so loud and consistent, then it is the elected officials's job to serve the constituency. Not for the constituency to shut up and serve the politicians.
And why blame women instead of Republicans wanting to push laws so restrictive and ban abortions altogether? The principle and morality reason doesn't stand when the subject is winning or losing elections because those who support the right also believe their position is one of principle and morality by their standard. So you're left with either women give, or the candidates give. Why only blame women and not blame the GOP for pushing these bans and extreme restrictions that even some conservatives don't want? They could've won soundly for two Novembers now but insist on not listening to the voters and get clobbered.
Whichever way anyone feels about abortion, the right to decide for themselves is what women voters are saying they want and it's not negotiable. In a democracy, why shouldn't the elected politicians serve the very people they're running to represent when it's so obviously clear that's what the majority wants?
To you the issue is frivolous but to them the matter is personal as these laws directly interferes with their right to make choices about their own lives.
False. I’m not blaming women. I’m blaming the ones who base their vote on abortion, along with the men who do so, because that’s a preposterous thing to do and they need to grow up.
I’m going to save the email notification for this one and hopefully I will remember to return to this thread to tell you “You were wrong, obviously.” in about 12 months when you are proven wrong.
That will be a great day actually because I’m rooting for Democrats to sweep in this particular one so that they can make things so much worse that we will then be able to cleanse the party from society.
Kevin, clearly it’s not “frivolous” if it’s the reason we keep losing. To your point, we are careening towards a future that may very well see a bankrupt communist America. I think it’s time the Republican Party gets its priorities straight and realize if we want to keep America free we are going to have to give up on the abortion issue, it’s just not worth it.
The situation it creates where Joe Biden grows a short mustache is not frivolous, obviously. But that’s not the thing I’m calling frivolous.
Imagine if I could avoid paying taxes by taking a pill and wearing rubber gloves at the bank, and I was in the street holding a sign screaming about taxes. That would make me an insane person.
Ha, I happen to agree with you KD so please restrict your “you people” to “some of you people.”
No matter what your views are on a terribly divisive issue, what does it say about the Democrat party when its rallying cry is “we are the party of unlimited access to killing the unborn”?! How soulless, but the descendants of Margaret Sanger carry on, ghouls that they are.
When people protect their rights by voting for them they are "frivolous morons"? Sounds like taken directly from the playbook of tyrants and dictators.
That's what democracy is all about. The people are deciding and no bigoted, superstitious sweet little Jesus freaks are deciding for them. On this day we witnessed a victory of democracy over theocracy and tyranny! And You better respect the will of the people instead of mocking it!
The US is like Albania (or one of those especially basket case former Soviet satellites) where you can’t buy a grapefruit or an avocado for under $100 but by golly you can get an abortion.
While this is a blunt way of making the point I am equally disgusted with single issue voting. Two things: 1) people are telling us abortion is the reason and it may be simply the way they phrase questions to the voters after the polls 2) most voters are in favor of choice but not to 9 months gestation. There is a compromise. Abortion will not be 'solved' by prohibiting it entirely. That's a losing stance. The conservatives have to fight this one in hearts and minds not with legislation to ban anything.
The right to life movement has hijacked the Republican Party. It is sickening as there are far greater issues facing this country — open borders, China’s imperialist march across the world, inflation, Iran’s funding of terrorism, fentanyl crisis. My list could go on.
If a woman makes the difficult decision to have an abortion, it is not my affair. We fought for the right to vote; think we are brilliant enough to know what to do with our uterus. One issue voters will be the demise of this republic.
But, on the other hand, the Dem's complete obsession with the ability to kill babies at any point in the pregnancy makes me crazy! I think they are the ones with intractable, sickening views.
True. However late term abortions of a healthy pregnancy is extremely rare and I have never heard of this happening anywhere. First trimester abortions are not rare. The GOP is stupid if they think women will accept a 6 week abortion ban to stop a hypothetical late term abortion.
This shows a bunch of research studies about late-term abortions, and various quotes from abortionists that do late-term abortions.
Yes, they are rarer than abortions < 15 weeks, but they do happen.
Polling actually shows that most Americans support a 15 week ban, so you have to wonder why Dems and pro-aborts push unlimited abortion so strongly.
Late-term abortions (or later abortions) are really NOT hypothetical. And data shows that most are NOT done for medical emergencies. (In any case, during a medical emergency, after 20 weeks, a C-section is much faster and safer than an abortion anyway, so there is NO good reason that any later abortion ever needs to happen. Which then makes you wonder why so many pro-abortion folks push it— like do some of these doctors just like killing babies??)
your term "abortionist" says it all I think the words you are looking for are medical professionals. otherwise those procedures are illegal and dangerous
You are just playing semantics. A medical professional who performs an abortion is an abortionist. Majority of Ob/GYNs do not perform abortions. Those that do (unless they work in a hospital for women’s health), tend to mostly do abortions and do not offer comprehensive pregnancy care to women.
Pro-abortion lobbyists are even pushing for abortions to be done by people who do not have a medical degree. So clearly, the terminology isn’t really the issue here.
I am not familiar with the WPHA. Haven't read the bill. Don't know what it provides, other than a Google search suggests it seeks to expand whatever existed under Roe and Casey. Politically that is likely never going to go anywhere.
Because I believe there are two "lives" involved in a pregnancy, I think both sides of the debate need to recognize that reality. Is there a point where the certainty of a successful human live birth is so high such that an abortion should not occur? Of course. However, I have wrestled with this for decades. Have whipsawed back and forth on how to handle. But, I will never be pregnant so my specific autonomous rights are not involved. I say this as the father of 3 great offspring. End of the day, I'd let a woman decide though I'd want some restrictions after about 25-28 weeks. Certainly not what some folks are doing, however rare, when there is a clearly human baby being aborted.
The left's position on late term was a reaction to the right's relentless push to limit abortions after Roe v Wade. Everything is an organic chain of action and reaction. Plus the issue has been hijacked by the far extremes on both sides so whenever one side wins something, the other side will move even farther go the extreme to one up the opposition. Reality is most women are not insane to want late term abortion at all barring extreme circumstances, whether the law allows it or not. Who wants to undergo a major procedure like that for fun?
You're misunderstanding what I said. Whether intentionally or a honest misunderstanding IDK. I didn't say the 15 weeks pushed them to the reaction of late term. This happened way back during the Plessy case. 15 weeks was essentially Roe v Wade. But the pro-life faction wouldn't have that, so they started chipping at it through courtrooms and litigation strategy. Then they lost big with Plessy which expanded abortion right to viability. If Roe v Wade was left alone, we would be at 15 weeks, and now some in the GOP is getting to where we all started. The whole thing just came a full circle.
No, it has not come full circle. SCOTUS removed it from the federal stage. It is now a State issue and is rightly being debated in each state jurisdiction. Pro-life voters will hold their stance or cave to the impatience of the pro-choice people who can’t wait for everyone to debate it at the state level. Both sides are trying to legislate the issue. The voters will decide in each State what there limits or allowances will be. We will have to accept those results and each side can go back and try again. It will never be resolved completely.
I’m just curious and I can’t assume from your moniker, but are you a woman?
To someone who believes in abortion rights but wants to protect our country among other extremely important issues, for which the Democrats are failures, the GOP needs to change! Get this off the platform and get back to governing.
I agree with you. I hope to see a GOP rise out of the ashes that respect that different parts of the country will feel differently on this and allow good candidates to run on other issues and win. The GOP in the Northeast and West Coast is dead as they keep putting up people who are moral scolds rather than pragmatic winners. Democracy has a way of ending debates and creating new candidates.
Yes, our adopted son was one of five born addicted to meth. He will never outgrow his mother’s abuse. I have been to family court and know its horrors.
One thing that really puzzles me: why were voters so eager to give up parental rights as evidenced by the stunning losses of those who ran for school boards on this issue? In Loudon County, VA (where a two girls in two different schools were raped in the girls restroom by a male claiming to be transgender) only two of nine candidates won on this issue. In rural Spotsville County, VA, these candidates lost, giving up the majority.
Have we gone so far that people trying desperately to protect against government overreach in parental authority cannot even win?
If these were legitimately run elections, this us depressing, indeed.
Not sure that's really accurate. Of the 9 member Loudoun school board, 7 didn't even bother to seek re-election and the 2 who did, lost. I'd say they all paid a political price. The awful, awful Soros district attorney who got herself in the middle of it also appears to have lost her election.
Spotsylvania is a good example of how things can go too far in the other direction. That Board was a mess, with an overly aggressive attack on any book with sexual content. It's one thing to go after prurient graphic novels, but high schoolers reading The Canterbury Tales shouldn't raise any eyebrows. Plus the Chair of that Board (who lost) is under indictment for fraudulently altering a contract to increase the Superintendent's salary without consulting the rest of the Board.
I can tell you that in my Virginia county we handed the last of the Covid-era diehard kid-maskers an ignominious defeat.
My comment above was meant as irony, of course. Nowadays 99% of pregnancies can be prevented by contraception, but lots of people don't bother and make all sorts of excuses for their irresponsible behavior.
I saw the same thing in my CT town. A slate of Dems and even a write in won the school board election - so they could continue to push the DEI equity issue in the schools, along with trans madness - over two Republicans that they managed to paint as extreme. And worse the RINO Republicans in the town went along with the Dems. The candidates were not extreme - they simply stood for principles that a decade ago had near unanimous approval.
I am honestly at a loss as to how any sane person could even entertain voting for Democrats. First, their party is led by a senile imbecile who is demonstrably corrupt and viciously divisive, not to mention incompetent. Second, the Democrats all robotically vote as a block, so they are complicit with Biden and his stooges. Third, they have opened our border, leading even Democrat mayors to wail at the consequences. Without a border we can't have a country. Fourth, the cost of everything has gone up; this did not happen by magic, it was Dem policies and spending. Fifth their policies are destroying our energy industry and jeopardizing our electric grid. I could go on but you get the picture. And yet they win elections. Sure the media lies for them and carries their water but that can't be all it is. This is madness. Maybe a national divorce is the only answer.
People aren’t sane. We invent realities that don’t cause cognitive dissonance. The press gives narratives to support these hallucinations. Trump is very valuable in that sense. Orange Man Bad, so you can ignore these other things and Vote Dem, which you have always done and want to do. Changing parties is very painful psychologically. People avoid pain.
My philosophy rings true every election: "People are stupid, and consistently vote for people and issues that are against their self interests because it FEELS good"!
With the granddaddy of them all being abortion. Overall public opinion hasn't really moved much over the past 50 years. The extremists will continue to shout either "Abortions for all, any time, any where", while the other side shouts "Never!" with the majority sitting somewhere in the middle. Is it really any surprise that this is crystal meth to politicians who have no discernable grasp, let alone stand, on the real issues of which you only partially enumerated? It is the most sublime of misdirection.
We also need to differentiate between small government, libertarian conservatives vs. social conservatives. Much hay is being made about the hypocrisy of the Right simultaneously crowing about government overreach and promoting more local or individual liberty instead, while at the same time engaging in shared fever dreams of a total Federal ban on abortion. The culture wars are being fought by the SoCons, not the libertarians. What the SoCons and the GOP party leadership seem utterly incapable of grasping is that the SoCon wing has been steadily loosing power for the past 20 - 25 years. This is not the 1980's. Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell no longer set policy. If the disaster of the 2022 midterms wasn't enough to wake them up to reality then I'm afraid nothing will. Certainly not Tuesday night.
I live on the border with KY. Andy Beshear is fairly well liked plus his dad was also governor of KY not so long ago. That’s why he won reelection. Otherwise KY is pretty red. Next governor will be a R, I’m sure.
Beshear won because Cameron and the R’s ran an awful campaign. Beshear was The Boy Dictator during Covid. He closed churches, wrecked small businesses. Day after the primary in May there should have been ads showing the KY State Police writing down license plate numbers of people who went to church on Easter Sunday 2020 at Beshear’s direction. Instead Cameron did nothing and Beshear immediately began attacking him over the abortion issue. R’s won every other constitutional office going away. Cameron thought Trump’s endorsement would be all he needed, he underestimated the Trump hate in Louisville & Lexington. Sad part is there was a R that could have won. Not sure I’m that optimistic about a different outcome in 2027.
It's not abortion -- directly! It's the baggage -- which you list -- that comes with it! And until someone figures out how to reach the single-issue voter, we're screwed. Could the unpleasantness on the middle east -- or anything else -- provide a wedge? Far too soon to tell.
No, I’m with you! I’m baffled at how people can vote Democrat as well. And your points are exactly why. Republicans have a real messaging problem. And Trump seriously won’t help no matter what the polls say. I’m so over him.
Bruce, it's really not a puzzle, and voters are not all stupid. All the GOP needs to do to win is drop the abortion issue. Or at least stop pushing insane bans and restrictions. And stop making it an election issue until they can make a better case for restrictions. Right now, they make no convincing case except "morality". But that isn't convincing to people disagree with them on this. All the issues you raise are pressing. But when it comes to a woman potentially dealing with her own immediate body and her own life, all these issues are a far distance. The border literally feels like a foreign country comparing to their own wombs. National gas prices and grocery prices don't mean squat to a woman when it comes to her immediate life. Even whoever is in the White House is a distant issue in comparison. Until people running elections get this, they'll keep losing.
It is becoming harder and harder to get young women to choose not to abort because 1. they were raised by parents who didn't give consequences for bad choices and 2. they were raised by parents to be narcissists. Nothing matters except themselves. Who could possibly convince them that self-sacrifice is the height of love? Adoption, not abortion. There are tens of thousands of couples waiting...
Are you actually saying Republicans aren't smart enough to come up with an answer if the Dems raise the issue for them? If they're that incompetent that they can't have a good answer when the opposition is baiting them, then they deserve to lose because what happens when Xi JinPing or Putin decides to bait them?
Please. Give your side more credit. In every loss they incurred this week, it was due precisely to the GOP pushing the issue.
Chris Christie and Nikki Haley both gave answers on this last night when baited that independents, moderates and even Ds find acceptable. Maybe the dumb ones you want to support can take a lesson?
“All the GOP needs to do to win is drop the abortion issue”
And do what, adopt abortion on demand as their platform? In New York you can LEGALLY get an abortion right up until the baby takes its first breath and it makes no difference how New Yorkers vote so your theory needs a bit more “womansplainin”. How about republicans adopt ALL of the democratic platform policies – open borders, government censorship, codifying a federal injustice department, increasing the $31 trillion debt… The pathetic joke is that dems still wouldn’t vote for republicans. If you’re gonna lose, at least lose with your principles intact because the time is coming when that’s all you’ll have left.
I really don't know how NY or CA are relevant here. We're talking about losing local and state elections where GOP should have won in November last year and this year. You're being really obtuse to jump from me saying drop the abortion issue until they can make a more convincing case, to the GOP adopting Dem policies. Is everything this obtuse and black and white with you? If so I really don't know what to say.
Keep anti-abortion on your platform them, and make the same arguments that are completely ineffective to persuade voters. Personally I think they can regroup and pursue some better arguments that are relevant to today that can put some restrictions on abortions. But everyone who are prolife seem to care about about their own virtue signaling and expressing their personal moral outrage than convincing voters. Keep losing then. It seems you're all willing to die on this hill.
"Personally I think they can regroup and pursue some better arguments that are relevant to today that can put some restrictions on abortions."
Like what? Is 15 weeks long enough? Virginia Governor Youngkin worked his ass off promoting that and republicans still LOST. NY and California may be lost causes for republicans but states like PA, Michigan, Nevada and Arizona are where the next presidential election will be decided and if you bothered to check, access to abortion in any of them is hardly restrictive. Nevertheless, dem strategists will claim otherwise and their obtuse constituents will shriek accordingly.
In one sense, you and I agree, Republican messaging needs to be improved so voter turnout next year isn’t as pathetic as it was Tuesday night. Democrats have no such problem. Clearly, for them, the ability to shred a baby up until birth is a clarion call.
How about I answer you sincerely instead of us bickering?
I5 weeks is a good benchmark and quite universal but I don't think persuasion would come from this. The issue is trust. The two parties have been fighting to the bitter end on this for so long, pro-choice voters and liberals do not trust the GOP at all even if they say 15 weeks. Especially not when there are some other GOP politicians harping about bans in other states. There's deep mistrust and they side-eye any suggestions to compromise even if 15 weeks is arguably reasonable and most voters have a consensus on this.
If conservatives want to curtail abortions, they have to take a different approach entirely and start having a more honest, non-biased and non-judgmental discussion about this issue, which either side can but the Ds won't because they're winning. Nikki Haley is really right on this one.
Let me give you an example: most people didn't used to know what a fetus look like in any stage of development. They have some vague sense that the fetus will form to viability some weeks before pregnancies, but until recently, we didn't even have ultrasound. Now an ultrasound (the old kind) might look lovely to new parents, but to most people it's just a blob. You can't tell the difference between it or the stuff they showed us when Malaysia Airline lost MH375. But with digital advancement, how a fetus appear has improved a thousand fold. I was literally spooked last year when a friend showed me what her niece's unborn child looked like in digital image. You can actually see the face. I don't think most people or young women have ever seen that before. If people can see what a fetus looks like in late stage, it would be much much tougher for them to be ok with late term abortion.
The next thing people can discuss is viability. That also changed over time. Historically a baby must be born and can die with the mother in childbirth. But viability has become earlier and earlier. It's definitely a social discussion to be had to flesh this out. An honest discussion about this may convince people that abortions should not be done beyond 5-6 months barring health and medical reasons.
Add to that is the Republicans need to be more sincere addressing health and medical reasons. They say the exception is there but they really haven't been that sincere in fleshing out what that means, and how doctors can be sure they won't get criminally sued. It may be that a compromise has to be given to trust the doctors, instead of suspecting doctors will all want to perform abortions for convenience. Here's another case of deep mistrust here standing in the way.
And they can do some kind of campaign drive to encourage use of contraceptives like how there used to be campaigns against drunk driving and smoking, both succeeded against all odds. But conservatives don't want to do that because they don't actually approve of sex before marriage or casual sex or something, so they don't really care to push contraceptives either. There is also some level of sexism too. There is a degree of vindictiveness by some conservatives on this. It's not uncommon to see some anonymous posters all over the internet calling women sluts and they should keep their legs closed, with no mention ever about how men can also stop abortions now by not having unprotected sex unless they want to have children with that woman. All this won't help persuade voters. If they really want fewer abortions, then something's gotta give because they can't stop people from having sex the way they want. They'll need to stop openly judging women and also promote contraceptives.
Another thing is they can honestly point out how much society has changed since the 50s, 70s, or 80s. Back then a woman's reputation and life will in fact be totally destroyed if they are pregnant but unwed. There is also no stigma for women to ask men to use protection, or use protections themselves. There are many options now for women who want to avoid getting pregnant. Further, they can actually take a pro-woman stand and reframe the conversation to young women that they don't have to give in to the pressure of "sex positivity" which is something they are facing and being shamed for if they don't subscribe to it today. There's already a low level backlash by some GenZ women on this. Look up Louise Perry. Instead of waving the finger at women, they can actually take a different approach and talk about how this liberal "sex positivity" idea is severely harming women. It's not even wrong. It hasn't proved to be empowering, but exploitative. There are even far left women who find this harmful. They can offer the throwback idea that sex is something intimate for two people in love. It would sound a whole lot more reasonable than sex is only morally right between married couples.
You may ask why is it the GOP's obligation to do all these grunt work. The answer is they're losing elections. The solution left is to change hearts and minds, not law. So they can either figure it out, or go home.
Thank for your sincere response. I’m not sure what cohort you’re basing it on but it’s clear to me that there is NOTHING that republicans can do or say that will change the voting habits of the single, young women driving recent election results. The sooner republicans accept that and focus on issues that persuadable voters care about, the better they’ll do.
Are you a man or a woman? Not being a smart ass, just wondering about perspective. Because Republicans don't have a problem with the male vote but we have a big problem with the female vote.
The problem with the issue of abortion is we are once again being run by the extremes at the state level.
The pro abortion wing ( and that seems fair since the push is zero restrictions) has trumped the “its murder wing” ( lets ban it at 6 weeks or less) for the average voter.
The average voter fears the “right” on this issue far more than the left. It is far to restrictive and while voters might abhor the idea of a 35 week abortion intuitively voters know that they dont happen.
Its the reverse of gun control. The voters knows the goal of the gun control and anti abortion advocates is to ban them so they instinctivly reject restrictions as slippery slopes.
As with both issues most voters will never use a gun nor require an abortion but they dont want the option removed.
The unintended consequence is we are amending constitutions by a majority vote which is terrible governance. The Ohio gov tried to point this out but failed. Had he pushed and passed a law allowing abortion to 20 weeks BEFORE the election instead of promising to work it out after he would have had credibility.
The GOP has to get abortion off the ballot which means they have to give up the fight. They should.
Technology as in “Pharma abortion drugs” have changed the entire landscape ( like it or not). The percentage of abortions done this way must be enormous. Late term abortions are primarily truly health induced. One can morally be appalled but the fact remains abortions are never going away.
The right wanted it returned to voters. Voters are deciding.
The problem with that “give up the fight” from my perspective is to essentially give up on protecting the very most vulnerable of society. I see it as a descent into a world where people are expendable essentially because someone has determined they have no value. Are they too small? Too old? Too frail? Too sick? Are they the wrong sex? Wrong color? Too dumb? Too ugly?
Is it really unrealistic in this day and age, after all we’ve seen these past three years, that we could easily end up in a place where governments decide whose life has value and whose doesn’t? Who lives and who dies?
This comment (and others) about “giving up the fight” show that these people really don’t view the fetus as a human being. Because debating about a human life that is 10 weeks old versus 40 weeks old is equivalent (morally) to debating between the value of a human life that is 10 years old and 40 years old. So clearly, these people DONT see the unborn child as a HUMAN BEING.
The slippery slope you hint at is already happening. Unborn children diagnosed with possible Down Syndrome are aborted (I.e. killed) 67% of the time.
Most of the current state abortion laws have a civil lawsuit brought against a doctor with a $10,000 fine plus paying for legal fees. Sometimes the hospital or clinic is also charged a fee, and sometimes the doctor/abortionist could lose their medical license.
The woman is never charged. Most pro-lifers see the woman as a second victim. There are many statistics that show a majority of women feel pressured or coerced into abortions by their partners, friends, or family.
However, if a woman does something like take a bunch of drugs in order to induce a miscarriage and the baby dies— then she can be charged, because that’s fetal endangerment and those laws are already well-established.
But that’s the thing that makes abortion so insane. It’s against the law to knowingly put a fetus in danger (say with drugs, or a person who hits a pregnant women can be charged with fetal endangerment) and yet, if a doctor fatally dismembers a fetus in abortion, then it’s somehow legal? No, abortion laws should be brought in line with fetal endangerment laws, because it’s still a human being that’s being killed. The only different legally should be who is charged, and in an abortion, the doctor/nurse/clinic should be held accountable.
I believe the medical professionals are the ones who are complicit. No matter what the procedure, a patient must be given the truth about possible consequences. Abortion has very real long term negative consequences to the woman. She also deserves to know precisely what is happening with abortion- it is ending a unique human life.
Perhaps beginning with a legal requirement to inform would be a good start, even without changing the law as it exists now.
Did you know that when a woman sees their child in an ultrasound as a part of informed consent in abortion protocol, the majority of the time she will change her mind?
You are making the social moral argument , not a legislative one, The bans dont say so them an ultrasound and let them decide; they say you cant have one.
OK, they you are agreeing abortion is Ok, and not murder as long as everyone gives consent. My guess is you will get little disagreement from the average voter.
You essentially said, I wont charge them with anything. That was my point
What I am saying is that so much if this “abortion-on-demand” water has gone over the dam that perhaps an incremental approach to punishment of healthcare providers would be prudent.
I am not giving up on the idea that we should protect the vulnerable. You cannot legislate morality. If abortion is murder then pass a law treating it that way. But no one really wants that. Not even pro lifers inspite of their rhetoric. So who really is giving up the fight?
Instead abortion can be available but we as a society can abhor it, do all we can to make it something no one wants nor should they celebrate. That is the fight, not legislatively but morally.
But the reality is a woman is in one tough situation sometimes and she should have options. Thats all.
Laws are all about morality. We have laws against killing grown humans, how is that not legislating morality?
The only reason abortion law is not passed as a law like murder is because “people don’t want it that way” and people make the laws. But that doesn’t mean it’s right or good. (How many bad laws has this country had in the past?) And people don’t want this abortion law because they have all been duped by the pro-abortion lobby from the 1970s that lied to Americans about the nature of abortion, lied about how many women died from illegal abortions (they said 10,000 when it was more like 200), and continues to lie to women that their life would be better if they kill their own child for “freedom.”
Killing your own child should never be an option. There are other much better options to help women in a tough situation. Killing shouldn’t be one of them.
We agree that laws are about morality and we have a law against murder and we charge people with it.
The problem with the abortion discussion is that individuals who want to ban abortion use the argument that it is a human life but will not pass laws saying that. They pass laws that ban it after a certain time period and specifically preclude the mother from being charged with anything. What message does that send about your morality argument?
I am not some pro choice zealot by any means, I am saying that the legislative effort by the "abortion is taking a human life" crowd is both hypocritical and ineffective to advance what they contend is such a clear cut moral issue. They say one thing but legislate as if its less than that. They lose the moral high ground ( and would never get a law passed in any event. )
The other problem I see is the people "Celebrating" these laws with no restrictions and partial birth abortions! I read a ridiculous self proclaimed "Trans" saying they couldn't wit to be the fist to get impregnated..... to have a public abortion.... how SICK is that ???
The Glee on their faces as they march is stunning and despicable to me.
Having read the thread: All y'all are ignoring that which caused the pregnancy. Tools exist to prove the identity of he who was the cause. Make him financially responsible. Wild idea, huh?
Agree completely. Women have deserted the Republicans in droves. We Republicans have to be smarter. Abortion is not a hill to die on. Plus as a guy in his 70s, I believe - and have always believed - that a woman must have some right over her own body. Men would not stand for such a denial. Does a balance have to be achieved between that and the murder of a perfectly viable fetus? Of course. But that is a political debate. And those just saying "no" are not helping the cause. And, yes, those who support both abortion and the vaccine mandates are idiotic hypocrites. Sauce for the goose.....
Yes, to everything you said. I live in OH and voted for the abortion amendment. Why? Because the 6 week heartbeat bill is just dumb. If Rs want to move forward on the conservative agenda in other areas, they need to shut up about abortion. Let women do what they need to do. In the end, the woman is the one who has to live with her decision.
Well, sh*t! If you didn't like the law - change the legislation .... don't flippin' Amend My Constitution for your selfishness! Did you realize that it also gives children access to abortions and "gender affirming care" WITHOUT parental permissions? Thanks a FN bunch for your ignorant vote.
"The average voter fears the “right” on this issue far more than the left. It is far to restrictive and while voters might abhor the idea of a 35 week abortion intuitively voters know that they dont happen." I think this is false. They don't happen every day perhaps but they happen.
“We have to know the difference between good and evil,” Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under Trump, said. That’s the only way, she added, that we can “go back to the soul of America.”
——————————————————
Nothing sets off my Vague Manipulative Horseshit Alarm™️ more than “soul of America”.
That said, this isn’t about knowing “the difference between good and evil”, Nikki. Almost everyone knows that. This is about knowing whether or not it is a smart idea to have the same parasitic dipshits, who have lost 17 consecutive wars, lead a bankrupt country into 3 more wars, all at the same time.
"That said, this isn’t about knowing “the difference between good and evil”, Nikki. Almost everyone knows that." Boy! You really whiffed on THAT one, Kevin Durant?! As Americans march for the Hamas Death Cult, and approve of killing babies at the time of birth or AFTER birth in the ovens in the south of Israel, do you REALLY think most people know the difference between good and evil? I sure don't!
No most of those people know it is evil and are themselves evil. There’s really only a small percentage of insane people who just don’t know right from wrong.
Seriously, almost everyone knows that? But you think its fine to be friends with someone that is an unabashed anti-Semite? Because when they are not denigrating people based on intractable characteristic, and likely wishing for the death of 10 million people worldwide, they are a nice person. Do you think perhaps you are too eager to pat yourself on the back there? And, you know, get your own shit in order, before presuming to condescendingly lecture others on it?
‘Hardcore antisemite’ was probably an overstatement or at least unclear. I shall clarify. She’s not ripping down posters. She’s not genocidal and doesn’t support Hamas or have a Palestinian flag. She’s nowhere near Rashida Tlaib. But she has many of the standard cliched antisemitic beliefs.
I’m also friends with Democrats who support a two-state solution, which is basically a genocidal antisemitic view and it is 1,000x more dangerous to Jews than my Muslim friend’s weird offensive beliefs. But a majority of left-wing Israelis, who are themselves Jewish, also support a two-state solution.
I have a bunch of friends who believe a couple of dumb things that are going to get lots of people killed because most of the people in the country have dumb beliefs that are going to get a bunch of people killed. My Muslim friend’s antisemitism is offensive but not dangerous.
I will continue lecturing everyone condescendingly because I am literally always proven right.
Relative to the elections, the lovely Mrs. Guy, who is not highly conservative, had this comments-
“I can’t believe that a bunch of women would let this country go to hell on the off chance that they might want to scrape some cells out of their uterus.”
One issue voters will kill this country and, in doing so, the world.
Agreed. But I think there are more moderate D's who vote exclusively for pro-abortion candidates than moderate R's who exclusively vote pro-life. For some reason wanting to abort a baby up to birth is classified as mainstream, which it is not. I think the left wants to avoid the obvious fact that most citizens are ok with some type of limit to abortion. I know the right has a vocal anti-abortion component but I don't think it is as large as the left's pro-abortion component. Nor does it control the agenda as much as the left's. It's important but not dominant. I see most R's as wanting to find an acceptable limit. I see the left as not wanting to engage in that discussion because it is the only issue they have left now which to run.
Do you get it now, GOP? The red wave that turned into a red drip. The losses Tuesday in red states. You continue following the same doomed strategies that will assure you lose the big prize again in 2024.
All because of you are so out of step with the majority of the electorate on abortion. Stay the fuck out of everyone’s bedrooms and doctors offices and you’d be surprised at how many more votes you could pick up.
When you sacrifice lives and your moral compass for votes, you're no better than your opponents. Furthermore, Democrats are 100% against compromise.
They want to control the message: "Vote for us because they will take away your right to choose, sending single woman to back alley, medievil, dangerous practices."
Dems: Except stay in doctors’ offices when it comes to being forced to inject zero-liability, novel vaccines that don’t stop transmission. Make sure people who don’t comply are fired, cast out of society and colleges, and subjected to vile ridicule by such intellectual giants as Jimmy Kimmel and Howard Stern. This is what passes for liberalism these days. As pathetic or more than any holy rollers. Fauci is my church! I bow down!
Vivak gave an unbelievably true statement at the debate. Look for it on TikTok or Youtube. He's 100% right and I don't even support him. The GOP are a party of losers and if they don't wake up they will lose again in 2024.
Honestly, I thought Vivek was the only one who was saying everything on our minds the press won't cover. The moderators sucked. The press and goons they interviewed were all like oh this was the best debate and substantive blah blah blah. But all the questions were freakin inane and treading old grounds. As a result, we heard nothing new from anyone except Vivek. Nikki Haley didn't tell us anything we don't already know. Given those questions, all she did was repeat the answers she already gave in the last two debates. And I don't know why people say DeSantis polled higher after this. Every time he started speaking, my ears tuned out and all I could focus on is how much he looks like a pug bobblehead. Why does he keep scowling when he starts to speak? And what's with all the head bobbing? Even the two Indian-Americans on stage wasn't doing that. He didn't project presidential to me. He just looked evermore provincial. He loses me more the more I see him. Tim Scott was totally forgettable. Chris Christie had some very interesting thoughtful things to say, which makes me think he wouldn't be bad in some kind of cabinet position but maybe he should best serve by becoming a university professor. He can help educate the next generation and do more good there.
But Vivek. I love that right off the bat he called out the RNC for choosing these awful moderators. He was absolutely right Tucker Carlson should've been there instead. And I'm not at all a Tucker fan.These liberal moderators never ask any questions the conservative primary voters want to ask if it doesn't fit their agenda. They keep saying oh woe ratings are low because Trump wouldn't show up. How much do they want to bet the ratings would shoot up if Tucker was the moderator? I'm not sure Joe Rogan is the right person as he's not a press person, but hell yes, Rogan would've brought in his millions of viewers. Bring on Megyn Kelly too and THAT would've been a primary debate people would watch even if Trump is no show. But that RNC chairwoman wants to bury these candidates as she's a Trump appointee. Which begs the question, why are we even wasting time on these debates then?
Multiple times Vivek started talking about things that are under a media blackout. He may not be ready for the presidency, but he was the only one who said anything pressing on the primary voters' minds. Except for the two digs at Haley. They both sounded rehearsed and if he can't do it well off the cuff, he should stop that. Those digs don't hurt her but him as they sounded rehearse and thus phony.
In Praise of the Dobbs decision, this is what Democracy looks like. What made Roe such an abomination was that there is no right to an Abortion in the United States. Let me define a right as two-thirds of the House and Senate along with three-fifths of the States. That never happened with Abortion. The Vote was 7-2 with a total of nine, not the score of 435 or 100 or 37 states. It was a group of people on the court who felt they knew best rather than letting Democracy decide.
Now it is. The country, for the most part, is Pro-choice, and these state amendments will settle the issue. As a student of History, especially American History, issues get debated, and once one side wins, the issue gets resolved. Soon, we will start having pro-choice Republicans who should use the old Clinton line of safe, legal, and rare to speak about Abortion. It's a personal issue that should be left to an individual. Deep moral matters many have with it, but in the United States, we don't impose our private moral views on others. Roe killed the country having that debate and left it to fester and divide rather than get settled.
Soon. I think by the end of the decade, this will play out, Abortion will be legal, and the debate over making the Dobbs decision a landmark case for the rights of voters to set laws, not people in robes who think they know what is best.
"The Vote was 7-2 with a total of nine, not the score of 435 or 100 or 37 states. It was a group of people on the court who felt they knew best rather than letting Democracy decide." Oh, but they DID! By overturning Dobbs the court kicked the can back to the states where it SHOULD have been in the first place before the "Black Robes" decreed it to be a "right"!
Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought that Dobbs said that the federal government was washing its hands of the abortion question and was remanding it to each individual state. What it didn’t say was that they are legal or illegal, or that SCOTUS knows what’s best for people. It only said that it’s not a Constitutional question, i.e., there’s no Constitutional right to them.
The Constitution explicitly states that we have a government of enumerated, i.e., specified powers. If an issue is not specified, the federal government isn’t supposed to be involved. Roe violated that notion by inventing abortion as a listed right; Dobbs merely corrected that.
There’s also no Constitutional right to owning a Ferrari, dining on caviar and champagne, living in brick houses, or preferring soap operas to what passes for the news. The Constitution is silent about these choices. That doesn’t make them illegal.
I am in agreement with you. And when you leave it to the states, people through direct democracy or through elected representatives get to vote. I didn't want to get into enumerated powers as I don't want to bore people first thing in the morning.
So true. The pro-choice side was always living in fear of End of Roe Apocalypse. But turns out Roe was keeping everything suspended and the issue being unsettled. Conservatives here are upset that women are all voting for abortion right in droves right now. But in the long run, in 10-20 years when this issue is finally settled at state level, the Ds won't be able to hold women's vote hostage with their carrot and stick approach for the last 50 f'king years. For that, I'm truly truly glad.
She'll spin it because because so many of the Dem party leaders are Jewish, so they're not like traditional anti-Semites. Yet their policies continue to get Jews killed. What else would you call Biden's restoration of aid to Gaza - as they exulted in reversing Trump's ending it - which aid went directly to Hamas? And then there's the fact that the Squad - and its stooges - are actually anti-Semites who thirst for the destruction of Israel. Bari is the traditional Democrat, for whom membership in the party is a rite of passage or some odd birthright. So it will, indeed, be interesting to hear her spin. Especially as the censorship and coverups she professes to detest are all Democrat initiatives.
TFP, you are biased for the Democrats. And they are the party of the demise of the Jews. As an independent voter, I ask you to consider the difference between a candidate that does not agree with your lifestyle and a party that doesn’t think Israel and Jews should exist. To me, it’s a no-brainer, but if you think abortion rights are the real problem in America, well…
I don’t think it’s possible for every writer to mask their opinion 100% of the time. I believe innocent life protection from womb to tomb, but I really want to understand why others believe differently. I want free and open discussion here, especially on these most difficult issues. That’s what TFP is doing.
The writers may have a bias, but they’re not shutting me down or attacking me with ad hominem. This us the only way.
This must be a different sort of place where we reject ad hominem and demand honest, thoughtful representation of the ourselves and others, whether or not we agree.
Because people who vote for abortion rights do not see fetuses as full human life. I'm not sure they all think that way about late-term. That one is really a drum-up issue to rally the base for both sides. But the national consensus and also in Europe is somewhere between the first trimester to early second trimester. Most people don't see fetuses at that stage the same as a fully born human. I know this is hard to hear for people who are prolife, but it is what it is. There's a conflict of moral perspectives here that cannot be reconciled.
I agree that we need more free and open discussion! Personally, I do not believe we should ban abortion because of the variety of scenarios where I do think it necessary. For example, rape, incest, the life of the mother, and fetal abnormalities.
Unfortunately, we live in a world where abortion is taken far too lightly, it is absolutely a serious and morally complex decision. However, I think we have to reconcile ourselves to the horrible truth that life is often brutal and cruel and sometimes the death of an innocent is preferable to a life of misery.
Like who defines what is a miserable enough existence that life isn’t valuable anymore. It seems too subjective and fraught with peril, especially for those who can’t speak for themselves.
When will people realize that there is no abortion “issue”: The vast majority of Americans believe in a woman’s right to control her body. End of story. Since this is a matter of personal morality, politicians should stick to their beliefs and not change them to gain votes. If you don’t believe in abortion don’t have one.
I have a really hard time when people start frothing at the mouth over the abortion "issue". For one, it's interesting that people used to rail at Republican evangelicals for being a "single-issue" voter (i.e., they're Republican because that's the pro-life side), when now, dems are voting democratic because that's STILL the single issue, it just switched sides. This ignores so much nuance in individuals and in party politics, it drives me a little bonkers. Second, this is dealing with life, liberty, and human rights, both for mother and child, so it's a big, big, big, (big, big, big) deal.
There STILL doesn't seem to be a consensus on what defines life and autonomy. You could argue that a fetus is solely reliant on the mother's body and therefore isn't autonomous, but that just smacks of "ableism", if I use a term that's more lefty. It's also pretty "ageist" to say that a fetus has rights at 15 or 22 weeks but not 6. Why? Why 15? Why 6? These numbers have NO MEANING. If I'm wrong, please enlighten me. If you say that abortions should be legal up until the age of viability, what does that even mean? Does that mean that rural communities with less advanced NICU technologies can have abortions later than people who live in the city? What happens when technology breakthroughs happen and that age goes way, way down? If you want to talk about rape, incest, etc, then I'm up for that, too, because that small percentage, while it doesn't address the bulk of abortions occurring in America, represents real people, too. While rape, incest, and all forms of sexual assault are never permissible, if a child is a product of rape, should they be punished? I really don't know what the answer is here, but I don't think it's as black and white as people like to believe. Abortion doesn't erase the trauma of the assault, and it could honestly just heap more shame and guilt on the victim(s). Just an additional note for people who like to use this line of reasoning: Be careful when you say this. You don't know who in your audience is a product of rape. I personally know at least 2 people who are products of rape, and I highly doubt they agree with your line of reasoning. Don't use these people (or medically necessary abortions) as a scapegoat for the masses who are getting abortions out of convenience.
There's no point in debating policy if we don't have all the facts. One fact that remains is that no one can give a satisfying answer on when a life is considered a life except the two extremes. Either life begins at conception/implantation, or life begins when a fetus takes its first breath. If life begins at conception, then abortion at any time cutoff is killing someone. If life begins at birth, then abortion should be legal up to birth.
There's a lot more I could say here, but I'd need a long form podcast show to get it all out. If you disagree, I'm happy to discuss this more. I just think all of our policy issues start and end with THIS disagreement. If you made it this far, thanks for reading.
We should just refer to our elections as abortions tbh. I call it Abortion Day instead of Election Day.
Really very excited that we are doing communism and bankrupting the country just so that 3 women per year don’t have to drive to Illinois to get an abortion. You people are such frivolous morons.
So true. But honestly, it’s republicans fault for STILL not getting the messaging right…on abortion and most other topics. I’m losing hope in republicans keeping the house and winning the senate. And as much as people love Trump, to the point of idolizing him, he’s ruining republicans chances of taking over the White House. He sits back on his throne while the others duke it out, acting like he’s the winner already while doing no campaigning! I voted for him twice and I’m praying I won’t have to vote for him a third time.
Get it together, Republicans voters! Choose someone else and let’s move out of the crappy bickering about Trump. There were a few people on the stage last night that are capable of doing what he can do. He’s in it for himself and I can’t believe people still don’t get it. Finally, we need a more moderate president. These extreme policy makers have caused division to the highest degree. Obama caused Trump which caused Biden. Is anyone else sick of this?
Trump's POLICIES were great for all Americans. It's his character you don't like. At least he had it out there, for all to see. Not like Obama -- great glibness, rotten Marxist policies.
Well, true...and I will vote for Trump’s police’s again if I must. His character bothers me greatly. But then, so does Biden’s. Weary. I am so weary of everyone. Reagan made me cringe a bit too, but good grief! Look at what he accomplished after the sweet but incompetent Jimmy??! I was young then. Young enough to note how much my life circumstances improved beginning in 1981. And the man came from California!!
I liked Bush Sr. too.
I’m not saying his policies weren’t good, but he’s not the right guy for now. Things are very different. He’s older, you can see in his eyes that he’s more tired, and his mind is on one thing, which is himself…getting back at those who did him wrong as well as his legal battles. That’s not good enough for me.
Ditto. We need a statesman/woman. Not a boorish braggart. I voted for him in the past two elections but if it is between these two I’ll vote for him again. Anyone else besides Cackalot / lying, crazy uncle Joe. I never liked Trump though some of his policies were helpful to us and he did strive to put Americans first. Our government should be serving our needs first and foremost. I do care about ppl beyond our borders but we need to play the long game. We and I mean all humans are closer to world war and that should concern everyone. I’m pretty certain that the air strikes we made yesterday were to assure the citizenry that Biden can be tough but it’s been clear from the beginning that he isn’t the man pulling the levers behind the curtain. I think ppl have gone off the rails in the past decade and our ability to come together gets worse every year.
The whole abortion issue has been so overblown. It should always have been up to the states. Even RGB confessed that Roe didn’t honestly bear proper legal scrutiny. I used to be a serious pro choice screech but came to some revelation that changed my mind. I think a total ban is ridiculous but stuff like partial birth abortion is clearly murder. Termination of pregnancy to save the life of the mother has always been upheld as well as pregnancy resulting from incest or rape. I don’t understand the inability of leftist screeches that can’t consider a compromise.
Women better wake up. If we diminish the reverence for life too much then pregnancy itself can be discounted for consideration. Too many women are championing the invasion of womens sports to mediocre trans athletes. We are leading the charge to our own destruction. Well, as usual I have exceeded the reasonable limit for yapping so I’ll shut up now and hope for the best.
Yap away! You articulated in 3 paragraphs exactly what I feel! Thanks, I don't have to type a comment now you did it for me! Honestly, I can't agree more with you, especially about the women in this country who are one issue voters, specifically, abortion.
I think it was a good yap! Yes, leave abortion lines to the states. Further, drawing a line at say, 15 weeks (or wherever a state says), is not an "abortion ban" but an "abortion allowance".
And, when the WSJ publishes articles on scientific work being done to make a "male" egg so that people have "more options" and when no one seems to agree that "male" and "female" mean anything in biology (unless you are working to make a "male" egg or a live womb transplant into a man maybe) then you know that real pregnancy itself can be discounted for consideration.
In addition to unfairness in sports the Republicans might talk about parents rights regarding GI and the Frankenstein school and medical communities.
"Legislation Protecting Minors From Medical Transition Could Have Unintended Consequences:
Society Must Also Become Aware of the Truth about Transition!"
https://pitt.substack.com/p/legislation-protecting-minors-from
And:
"John Money: The Pro-Pedophile Pervert Who Invented “Gender”"
https://reduxx.info/john-money-the-pervert-who-invented-gender/
I'm for DeSantis at this juncture. Look how well FL is run.
Me too I had high hopes when he first announced his campaign but the media smeared him so badly and unjustly and then Trump attacked him like some rabid dog that his support just disintegrated.
I hope he can find a way to climb back up on the dog heap if not this time then in the future. I also really like Tulsi Gabbard. She’s a straight shooter and intelligent lady but tough enough to spar with the liars. My dream ticket would be them both. Her party turned on her at the behest of HRC aka the wicked witch. I hate that woman and I try not to be a hater but she makes that hard.
Well we all better be praying for the future if not only our country but a world spinning out of control. When a misguided child can become the face of geopolitical manipulation we might be past the point of no return. I think her name is Greta Thornberg but not sure.
God bless you and keep you Loving Mother.
I think the entire US citizenry will benefit if he can root out those who have bet it all on destroying him. His personal vengeance is just another consequence. What the career bureaucrats in the executive branch have done is a coup. They refuse to be accountable to their boss. Pure and simple. And their Congressional
lapdog laps it up. It is a true Constitutional crisis and the Republic hangs in the balance. The only people I see with the skill to address it are Trump or Pompeo.
That is my concern, that Trump's second term will not be about making America great again, but just about Trump getting revenge on his tormentors.
His tormentors are not good for the American citizen. If you have doubts contemplate the lengths they went to to assure the election of JB. Then contemplate the lengths they have gone to to destroy Trump since 2020 and ask yourself why. I want them brought to heel before the Republic is no more. If doing so gives Trump personal satisfaction, so be it.
I agree with you, Lynne. But we should also remember the lengths those same leftists went to, beginning in 2015 and continuing thereafter, to keep (1) Hillary from being charged with crimes (James Comey dismissed as "careless" and non-criminal her willful destruction of more than 30,000 subpoenaed emails plus the hardware and software she'd used to transmit them), (2) Trump from being nominated, and then (3) Trump from being able to fulfill his Article II duties by fabricating the Clinton Collusion Concoction to subvert his Presidency. By the time of their "attempts to destroy Trump" in 2020, they'd been at it for at least five years -- and all in the name of "preserving our democracy."
"He’s older, you can see in his eyes that he’s more tired"
There were at least 10,000 raucous folks at his rally last night that would disagree with you.
Good. And policies are everything. I liked Kennedy, too, but I was not interested in his sex life activities.
JFK was a poor little rich boy and his hobby was politics.
Policies this time come with A LOT of baggage. Things are too critical right now for that mess to be front and center.
He was a professional activist with a serious case of narcicism. His only qualification for president was a one term senate stint and I don’t think he had some stellar legislation advances to his credit either. All that aside he was a better leader than Joe. I almost can’t believe we are duking it out over these two again!
Does anyone ever run for POTUS that isn’t a narcissist?
Maybe Eisenhower? Otherwise it’s all narcissists all the time.
I think a narcissistic personality is a requirement for anyone going into politics.
🪒🛎️🔨
Republicans “messaging” problem is that all messaging gets filtered through the PR arm of the Democratic Party (also known as “mainstream media” and “big tech.”
Polls show a vast majority of people support parental rights in education and not indoctrinating children into the gender religion. However, when a popular bill does just that the whole world calls it the “Don’t Say Gay” bill to this day.
Look even at the GOP debates. Not a single question about domestic issues the public cares about. All questions are asked from the left and designed to poke every soft spot with the most controversial framing.
You can’t really “out message” that in any meaningful way.
Most important comment right here!!!!!!!! Not even the Free Press can report without liberal bias
True about the debates, even the ones run by Fox.
Great observation and very well articulated.
Thank you for your astute analysis.
You bring up good points. Maybe they should do a little more emotional campaigning that get to peoples feelings…or lying. Dems have been great at both.
The deep state’s ugly face. They haven’t been fair to Republicans since the first half of the last century. They are tied to the evil creeping of socialism. Many are sleeping at the wheel and others will do ANYTHING to maintain power.
Just listened to Megan Kelly’s podcast episode from yesterday. She went off about the messaging of republicans and how the party is in danger of losing in 2024, and I 100% agreed with her. She was on fire. It’s well worth the time listening.
The only way republicans lose is if they don't get their mail in ballot strategy in line. In Pennsylvania, the dems had 400,000 votes in the bank before the polls opened.
Yes, we need to get our shit together.
Why does that make a difference? I’m not questioning you but rather that idea. I’ve never understood that. All votes should supposedly be counted, so what difference does it make when? I always enjoy voting on “Election Day”, but I need to rethink…just not sure why.
How many of those 400,000 "voters" do you think even read the ballot names, or actually signed them? When in Rome, do as the Romans do. And before anyone accuses me of encouraging voter fraud, democrats have assured us there is no such thing.
In Chicago the mailmen/women delivering to 2 or 3 story apartment buildings walk-ups are often too lazy to open each individual mailbox and sort through whose mail is whose.
Instead they throw all the mail on the floor and let the tennants find their own. Now imagine the millions of ballots out there for anyone to fill out, return, or stuff ballot boxes with.
When Colorado began to mail ballots to all registered voters, the parties paid people to go through the dumpsters at apartment complexes to recover ballots thrown away. I don't think they destroyed those ballots.
The film 2000 Mules showed people in Georgia stuffing bunches of ballots into collection boxes. When the state attorney general's office investigated they were able to identify three people from the film. When questioned, they said they were just delivering ballots for family members, which is legal. There is no way to prove they were lying, once the ballots are in the box and mixed with all the others. So the law has no teeth.
Most European countries don’t allow any mail in voting due to the ease in which it can be fraudulent. They also don’t have voting systems that are tied to external systems as it’s nearly impossible to ensure absolute integrity and security otherwise.
So why are we so foolish about it?
It makes a difference because it is so much easier to get a ballot someone isn't going to use, fill it out and mail it in, rather than going to the polls and pretending to be that person in order to vote for them.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/04/nyregion/bridgeport-connecticut-mayor-election.html
That is like abortion, the question is where is the line in the sand. I am good with properly authorized mail-in ballots for legitimate reasons. I am not okay with improperly vetted mail-in ballots. And I am not okay with random drop boxes for mail-in ballots. I am.not okay with harvesters helping people fill out the ballots and mailing or dropping off the ballots for others. See for example
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/04/nyregion/bridgeport-connecticut-mayor-election.html
Thanks for the tip. I’ll listen cause I liked her. We don’t get Fox News anymore due to changes in our service but she left anyway. And yeah, the GOP is flailing when it should be a cakewalk. 🫠
She does a great podcast. Today will probably be all about the debate!
Trump has gone around the bend. He's nuts.
I think you would be around the bend too if what had been do e to him was done to you. I do not use the term.persecuted lightly but IMO it is persecution. And it begs the question why?
It is because the left hates him.
thats exactly what we need in a President
CNN is reporting that the Bad Orange Man is getting over 20% support from black voters; contrast that with single digit support for Milquetoast Mitt and $&L McCain....it seems like there are significant portions of the PRO-crime democRATs assumed constituencies that are realizing that it's results that matter, not personality. Especially after Joetato's slur that if you don't KNOW who to vote for, "you ain't black".
Plus everybody who has ever thought they got a raw deal in court is sympathizing.
Good point, whether criminal (low level pot busts, speed "traps") or civil (false accusations/perjury - divorce court anyone?) I agree, there's a lot of people who see the disparity in the legal system on full display.
I'm not sick of it. Trump was the best president of my lifetime. Get serious for one second. It's the "but muh mean tweets" people who are the reason we're in the mess we are.
Lol.....always the Democrats fault.....out of all the available GOP candidates....people were forced to vote for Trump.
Now, how exactly did Obama "cause" Donald "Birther" Trump?
Well technically it was Obama’s election denier wife’s penis that caused Trump.
Do we have evidence that Michelle Obama denied anu election and/or that she is actually a man?
No one can do what Trump has done. Not one of them has the grit or stubbornness. Trump is holding rallies continuously. I am so thankful to finally have a fighter for America and Americans. TRUMP 2024
Linda, 💯
I will tell you one thing. America has been turned into Hamas surrogates. I don’t see any difference between them and the leftist mob and media other than they aren’t kill us yet. It may not be long. All the people that died fighting for this country had made no difference. I am losing any hope that this nation will rise up and face the peril we are facing. There are too many brainwashed idiots to fight at this point of no return. The communist leftist have poisoned our nation. The progressives have wreck our country. If anyone can see any hope, tell me how. I’m with Elon, let’s get off this planet.
It’s a joke, really, isn’t? This one issue has completely exposed vacuous nature of progressive thinking. I believe the truth is that they are tools for Obama’s fundamental transformation of America to a “neomarxism.” He is just arrogant enough to believe he can do it better than Marx, Mao and all the others.
I’m not the smartest tool in the box but I saw what a disaster Obummer was. I believe that’s where all our problems started.
I too am losing faith but I don't think it is a messaging problem. You can't have a message about an ever shifting issue. And even something as straightforward as abortion is multi-faceted by whoever runs the Democrats. Is it anti-woman to be concerned about a fetus? Sometimes. Is it a denial of healthcare? Yes according to them. Is it oppression of women to have concerns for women? According to Dem marketing strategy yes. Is it only a matter of the pregnant woman's preference? According to said marketing strategy, yes. With the caveat unless of course it is a pregnant man.There are so many things that are valid responses to all of this. But to engage is pointless I think because it is like trying to reason with the pro Arabs we now refer to as Palestinians. They do not want a solution. Rather they want those who do not cave to their demands obliterated.
Maybe that’s the idea. Could it be the truth is something else? Perhaps the algorithms are controlling a preferred narrative to demoralize Republicans.
Here is a link to one of Taibbi's articles today. Stunning stuff.
https://open.substack.com/pub/taibbi/p/big-brother-is-flagging-you?r=u46vr&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
If you don't read Matt Taibbi you should look at some of it. We are like draught horses with blinkers.
Yup. Maybe we’ll get lucky and one will be raptured (or both). I was hoping Tulsi Gabbard would give it another go. I’m a registered Republican but I’d gladly vote for her regardless of her party affiliation.
I like Pompeo. I like Gabbard too but I do not think she is yet experienced enough to lead the ticket.
Yes! I am sick of this! Great comment. Agee 100%!
Tell me what you think of Sasha Stone’s piece on this. Is this what you mean?
https://open.substack.com/pub/sashastone/p/the-democrats-win-on-abortion-but?r=1yhvat&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
Relevant article regarding republicans losing a lot: "Propaganda Works"
https://hotair.com/david-strom/2023/11/08/propaganda-works-n590935
Yes, me! Well said!
It's amazing how brainwashing and propaganda have made Americans the stupidest people on the planet.
Americans have :
been Indoctrinated
been Propagandized
become "Victims"
become Lazy
become distracted
become hypocritical
Lost all common sense and ability to REASON.
And in Combination of all of these things, Americans have become STUPID !
So to this, I say MASA !
MAKE
AMERICANS
SMART
AGAIN
It will never happen. Most American can't tell you who we fought against or why we fought our war of independence. We are a nation of dolts and I am not talking just about Dem/Socs, like the inarticulate moron who claims she teaches at Idiot U. the school of the not so bright.
Yup. Those smart phones induce stupidity. And you’re a clever girl,
so we’ll said!
If only...
Details?
Yes, there are details. Generalized statements are still permitted.
Such as? Maybe just one or two?
666
Okay so for example Jacob Blake (D) was a rapist with a knife getting into a car full of kids attempting to flee from officers he had just physically assaulted while drunk and high. Those would be details.
666
Details on HOW to make America smart again? I don't have any- I'm too stupid.
If it's not too late
Like some strange zombie cult. Madness.
Whoa there j j. Speak for yourself.
I think our modern lifestyles have not helped people improve anywhere. We still have some serious winners in the sciences, we have millions of really great ppl. It’s just that the jerks are the loudest. Really talented ppl tend to be a bit more mellow/humble.
There are incredible ppl in every nation and I hope ppl everywhere can feel some pride in their country.
Yep.
Consider this: Reproductive health is central to women’s healthcare from the time they begin menstruation to menopause. It’s more than abortion care. It’s access to contraceptives, it’s managed pregnancy and miscarriage care, and it is connected to emotional and mental health for women, too. For 50% of the electorate it is important to have bodily autonomy and freedom to make decisions without govt interference. Driving to Illinois is not simple or affordable for most people who could otherwise get support within a few miles from home to manage their reproductive health. Minimizing the importance of what this issue means for women is dismissive and quite frankly blind.
I appreciate your perspective. The truth is that we women have been used and abused by this industry, and it is an industry, for more than 60 years.
It started with the lie that women can have sex without consequences. It was never true and it’s not true now. Chemical contraception and abortion in all stages have truly only made men’s lives free if reproductive consequences, but the same is demonstrably not true for women. Furthermore, it’s made pharmaceutical companies and abortion providers very, very wealthy.
I say this as a woman who’s been around for awhile. I’ve seen women truly suffer from the very real medical, mental and emotional consequences of abortion and chemical contraception.
Betty Friedan is a very interesting woman to read about. She was a leading feminist in my era, but fell out of favor when she began to see the path her own advocacy was taking. It wasn’t a path that has brought greater contentment and happiness to women, quite the contrary. And yet we still see women selling the same lie.
But as women, can we separate our own actions and really look carefully at what is truly the path which will bring women toward greater contentment? What can women contribute using our own unique gifts for the betterment of society as a whole? Has abortion and chemical contraception contributed to the destruction of family life in the world?
I believe what is driving the abortion debate is the fact that most women have had or know of someone who’s had at least one abortion. We don’t want to feel badly about ourselves or make others feel badly so we will just continue to lie to each other. We’ll continue to vote so nobody has to feel badly about their abortion. We’ll justify it as good healthcare when it’s anything but for ourselves much less our babies. We’ll rail against women’s care centers because they don’t provide abortions- when they actually provide more legitimate health services to women than Planned Parenthood.
In essence, we’ve become complicit in our own demise.
The same is true for Covid vaccines, cigarettes , marijuana, street drugs, alcohol etc etc. Who likes admitting they might have been wrong or mislead?
If I could love this post, I would. Thank you!
Great comment.
I was having a casual conversation with my mother one evening and she said unequivocally that abortion is murder. That sent me into a rage that I couldn’t shake for days. In an effort to better understand my reaction I had to analyze the anger which is ALWAYS a fear based response. I didn’t want to think that I would murder a baby but eventually I was able to confront my delusions and make peace with it. It cost me years of self esteem issues, gave me a whopping infection that threatened my ability to conceive years later and yeah, no free rides in life. Gotta own it before you can let it go.
I don’t think most people understand why they get so angry. If you react that way to anything you have a fear behind it. Every time and it’s always tied to losing something you have or not getting something you want.
You’re right on every count.
And BTW, abortion ends in death every time. Maybe not the mother but life begins with rigor from conception. To say otherwise is simply scientifically incorrect and denial.
Virtual hugs. And my admiration for having the courage not only to examine your emotional.reaction but also to speak up here.
Maureen, I deeply respect your ability to admit this. You must be an amazing woman. Did you find healing?
Granny 62, I would've loved for you to be on the Debate Stage last night when this topic came up.
Perfectly expressed!
Words of wisdom Granny thank you for a brilliant post!
I will never understand the disconnect from these people. In the same block you have an abortion clinic, and down the road from the clinic you have an animal shelter that when it gets overcrowded has to euthanize animal's. What entity do they protest?
About Betty Friedan-- it was actually Larry Money who pushed her to add abortion to her list of women’s rights. He convinced her that her agenda wouldn’t go through without it. At one of the first NOW meetings, the group split on the abortion issue and the women against abortion walked out.
Brilliant comment. And so very rational.
You make it sound like women all have the same opinion on this issue, yet years and years of polling show that not to be true: women are split pro-life vs pro-choice at about the same rate as the overall public. Look at pictures from the annual pro-life march in DC and you will see many many young women. What’s more interesting to me is that those polls suggest the public consensus position on abortion is roughly equivalent to the EU average (legal until 12-15 weeks, sensible regulations, restricted after that point with the usual exceptions) and hasn’t changed much in decades, yet in the post Dobbs environment that potential consensus is nowhere to be found in policy, which is de facto total bans in red states and on demand until birth in blue states. Republicans that try to push that consensus view get creamed as much as those pushing for a total ban. I don’t really understand what’s going on.
"Reproductive health care" is a euphemism for abortion, and everyone knows it. No one is restricting access to contraception (free market conservatives have argued for years to make some birth control pills available over the counter). There have been scare stories about miscarriage care, but not enough info to judge what’s actually happening (nor do I trust NPR to tell me).
I will admit that the ‘driving to Illinois’ portion of this argument will be more persuasive when the maniacal central government that you are erecting based on this frivolous niche issue makes it so that you can’t afford a car or gas anymore.
Come to think of it, there’s gotta be 20 million women in rural areas, at minimum, where the nearest abortion clinic is 300+ miles away. What about a fleet of mobile clinic abortion vans? Since ‘not having to drive that far’ is a Human Right we should probably drop a couple billion dollars on Federal Government Abortionmobiles.
This country is so f**ked.
Only if the Abortionmobiles are powered by electricity, wind, solar, or fairy dust. Anything but fossil fuels.
Good point. We have gone from safe, legal and rare to available on demand on every block.
It would be like an American Aktion T4. I wish I could say it's inconceivable.
"For 50% of the electorate it is important to have bodily autonomy and freedom to make decisions without govt interference."
This! Somehow so many conservatives who always say they want government to bug off don't get this when it comes to this issue. Majority of women will never need or get abortions. But the idea that government can decide what happens to their own bodies elicits a visceral reaction. All the people who can't even stand a government imposed vaccine somehow suddenly want women to all allow the government to decide on the biggest decision regarding their whole body. I don't understand why they can't see that. They never address this part. As long as they never address this, they can keep harping on about the unborn but they'll never win over the women vote.
We cannot see that because you are wrong. We are not stupid. We believe your right to yourself ends where another life begins. It is so very simple and yet it is you who refuse to see the truth. Stop pretending abortion is a last desperate resort for a few women. It has become an inexcusable form of contraception...except of course contraception means preventing life, not ending it. It is you who are blind as well as wrong.
Firstly, I at least did not say you're stupid. Secondly, what you got here is two conflicting sets of moral values. You believe you're right and the other side believe they're in the right to the same degree. They can't convince you anymore with their moral arguments than you can convince them with your moral arguments. Question for the GOP is, where to go from here? Are they going to be a single issue moral defending organization? In which case why not just become a nonprofit advocacy organization? Or do they want to win elections and govern?
You said you cannot see how we woman who are prolife cannot align that moral position with our political choice for less government etc. My response is based on that & I concluded you must think we are stupid. Blind=stupid in this case. I apologize if I offended you. My morals do inform my politics. That is why I would greatly prefer a President I can respect on all levels. I respected Jimmy Carter personally but totally reject his politics. In reverse, I have no respect for Donald Trump’s personal life but I fully support his policies…except I do not want him to run again. Republicans are in a horrible situation, again. On that, I think we can agree.
QX did not say anything about "we women" just that until there is recognition that there are varying POV the Republican party cannot "win over the woman vote". Personally I think that is unrealistic anyway but I see the point. But I think the larger point is that there really is no one right answer here. You are correct that abortion is being used like contraception by some. Which is beyond harmful In many, many ways. But there are likewise women who are faced with concerns that they have considered and made an informed decision to terminate a pregnancy. Who are you or I or QX to question that?
I'm not offended. I just want to be clear that I don't think people who are pro-life are stupid. If anything, I understand where they come from much more than the average prochoice voter. I'm also not saying that the prolifers are contradicting themselves when choosing moral stand over politics. To clarify, what I meant was that they are not seeing how for women voters who are not prolife and don't hold the same moral position, to them this is a government intrusion on personal rights issue at the very fundamental level. It's hard for me to understand how they don't see this in the view of their opponents, not themselves of course.
Amen. Time to be a big girl and suck it up.
is that a joke?
Those who align with prolife are speaking for the unborn.
How about you?
How about taking responsibility for having casual sex?
How about making your abortion decision before 15 weeks, when babies can feel the pain of their lives ending?
You can keep saying these but these arguments aren't convincing or winning over the voters
I don't disagree. The Republican Party needs leadership and a common message, neither of which they have now.
They should unify behind the 15 week compromise and change the subject.
With apologies to Shakespeare, brevity is both the soul of wit, and debate
They did just that in Virginia, and they lost.
It's because people don't trust the GOP on the issue. Look what happened in Florida: DeSantis signed the so-called "compromise" 15 week limit, then immediately after he got re-elected, he quietly signed a 6 week ban. You best believe people paid attention to that bait and switch, just as with the bait and switch about Dobbs simply "sending the issue back to the states", when immediately you had Republicans talking about federal bans.
you assume that all abortions are the results of "casual sex" since you are not a fetus you cannot know what they feel. only what you are told. but I agree 15-16 weeks is a good cut off date
“Since you are not a fetus you cannot know what they feel”—
You should probably think about this when you facilitate dismembering a fetus in a womb during an abortion procedure.
since i have sat with women many times i can tell you that is not what happens. and with the morning after pill even less.. but still if you are not a fetus you cannot know what they feel you can only imagine
It's not "their own bodies." It's another person's body: the baby's. The whole point of abortion is to end the baby's life.
Everybody understands this basic point. Hence the need for euphemisms like "reproductive rights."
Abortion is a human rights issue. Someone has to speak up for the children who can't speak for themselves. If "harping on about the unborn" loses votes, then so be it.
The issue is not about the life of the woman but the life SHE created. I don’t get the leftist mentality that declares that it takes a village to raise a child and they don’t “belong” to you as a parent but when it comes to in vitro you’re all my body, my choice.
After 12 weeks it’s a baby honey. You can delude yourself and keep the lie going but facts are facts. Maybe you shoulda considered the ramifications before you indulged.
Wait, what? Take responsibility for your actions and choices? Every choice has a consequence, for good or bad.
to you it is a "baby honey". maybe not to others
Becusse why? Becusse they don’t want it to be a baby? What’s a fetus? What’s an embryo?
a fetus is a fetus and an embryo is an embryo
This has long puzzled me too. How can the party of small, limited government and personal responsibility insist on controlling such a private matter? OTOH how can the party of all government, all the time for even the most trivial matter be hands off on the wholesale slaughter of fetuses? It was actually my wake-up call that there is something rotten in Denmark.
There’s no contradiction. There are two lives at issue with abortion, and one if them is utterly helpless to express an opinion.
That is true. But my comment was meant to illustrate that neither party lives out its stereotype where abortion is concerned.
actually in Denmark abortion up to 12 weeks ( yes I get your bard reference). wholesale slaughter? what. I ran an abortion clinic for years. there was no "wholesale slaughter". just women who were desperate and needed services..of courser most here would call them whores for having "casual sex". just so not true
I know about Denmark. It was a Shakespeare reference. I am not you enemy on abortion as I see both sides of the argument. I wish you, and millions of others, did. Wholesale slaughter is one end of the spectrum. Not justified under any circumstance, period, end of discussion, is the other. IMO both are wrong. As for JUST desperate women in need of services. Sure.
regardless of what your mind thinks. they were indeed desperate
hence my reference to the bard.. i got it
Absolutely right, thank you for posting. Freedom across the board.
That’s not liberty, that’s license.
Oh please. Every woman in this country has free access to various kinds of contraceptives. Stop pretending! You sound so pious about government interference, but see no problem with their interference elsewhere. The issue is a simple and moral one--not political. And yes, men have full access to contraceptives too. This issue sickens me. Women hiding behind tired slogans about our rights. Please. Every woman & every man has a moral choice to make. And do NOT bring up rape please. Of course it is horrible and wrong and an attack every woman fears and any woman so attacked should have free access to “the morning after” pill. We all know as well that women raising children alone has become the norm. Men get a free pass and it is disgusting. But please stop claiming a higher moral ground just because you are a woman. The vast majority of abortions right now are a form of contraception. And to pretend that is not so is just plain wrong.
Oh please, if abortion is the most important issue in your life I feel sorry for you. I don’t get how the right to end a life you willfully started keeps you up at night.
Access to contraceptives is NOT tied to the issue of abortion. Most republicans support legal abortion in the first trimester. After that it’s just unacceptably selfish and a crime of the soul unless there is a medical necessity for the life of the mother.
Have you ever had one? Would you encourage a person to have one? Aren’t you glad your mother chose life? I can answer yes to two of these questions but only have some regrets about the one.
Tracy, yes and let me add to your statement. No one likes to be TOLD I can’t do something, especially adult women who, up until 45 years ago, had to have permission from a husband to get a damn credit card. People have short memories.
Weak argument. You were once told you couldn't vote. Those days are long gone.
Abortions are not banned. 15 weeks should be acceptable.
Pro life advocates are speaking for the people who cannot speak for themselves.
Please show me your proof. I am 68 and have been married for 45 years and I can assure you I came into my marriage with my own credit cards and at no time did I need my husband’s permission to get another one! What a stupid thing to say! I wish my mother were still here. She would tell you the same and she was married in 1952. Get my father’s permission indeed! Every woman my age knew to continue to keep at least one credit card in our own name only, for a wide variety of reasons.
In 1974, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) prohibited discrimination against credit applicants based on gender, among other factors. For the first time, women could own a credit card in their own name. - Did I miss something?
Yep. I think you did. ECOA may indeed have helped some women and men. I would not know. Prohibiting discrimination has rarely prevented discrimination…this I know because I moved south in 1973. I had no trouble getting a credit card and neither did my mother. I am not claiming that everyone was so lucky (??) but I do not find your argument convincing. Outrage over women’s rights is such a tired argument in my opinion. And I find it particularly galling in this age when defining what is a woman appears to be beyond the intellectual abilities of many in leadership positions. We now have bigger fish to fry. And in my opinion, moral positions will always inform political positions. Of course compromise is necessary politically. But separating our full moral stance from politics is disastrous, as we are now seeing.
Thank you sister!
It is blind to not see why Obama didn’t codify Roe during his entire tenure when he heavily campaigned on doing it Day 1. I’m sure you can recall his many excuses when he was pressed for action. Democrats have the perennial fish on.
no kidding. this is what the moralists here just dont get.. this ONE issue will drag us into wars and graft and corruption and yes death of humans children and adults already here on earth. the Dems are riding high on the ONE issue. I used to be a single issue voter ( pro choice). now I am still pro choice but understand that abortion is the touchdown that will win the game for the Dems. ONE issue.. while the economy and our privacy and our freedoms are ebbing away. ONE ISSUE
GIDDY over Dobbs. Strange we never found out who leaked it, right?
Puh-leeze. An entity that offered Reproductive Health sans abortion would go belly up before the ink on the signage dried.
I’m sorry but this isn’t true. There are hundreds of women’s care clinics offering a huge range of reproductive health services, just not including chemical contraceptives or abortion.
Are any of them not affiliated with -- and supported by -- religious entities?
There are 20 Federally Qualified Health Care Centers to every 1 Planned Parenthood. They offer contraceptives, prenatal care, mammograms, STD testing, and a whole host of other health care services on a sliding scale. These are not religiously affiliated-- run by government-- and offer women and others of lower income a VASTLY better healthcare alternative to abortion clinics.
On the one hand, amazed. On the other hand, supported by the deepest of pockets. Nice, but not a very solid refutation, is it?
so what if they are? And I am an agnostic, but if you do the deed, sometimes you have to pay a price.
“...bodily autonomy and freedom to make decisions without govt interference...”
THAT should have been the basis for a “constitutional right” to abortion from the start! Roe’s “right to privacy” never made any sense from a legal perspective, and seems more prone to creating bad laws. The concept of bodily autonomy is a far firmer basis, related to foundational legal principles like habeas corpus.
Abortion restriction laws do not impact access to contraceptives, miscarriage care, or pregnancy care. That’s a lie that the pro-abortion lobbyists tell you so that you are scared into voting for abortion.
Bodily autonomy is important, but it does not justify abortion. We limit bodily autonomy for all sorts of reasons. Most people do not support late-term abortion, which is often done for elective reasons not for any medical emergency. If we accept the bodily autonomy argument, then to be consistent logically, you must accept abortion on demand for all 9 months of pregnancy. And this could even justify partial-birth abortion. Are you prepared to support this?
Most honest people say no, which means that they DO accept limits to bodily autonomy.
Except those poor dears want, nay demand, government support to facilitate the convenience of reproductive health care you so elegantly articulate. Then demand family leave when they deign to birth a child and subsidized child care. It makes one wonder how on earth civilization evolved to the 20th century without it.
Perhaps. An alternative could be that GOP men should just stop trying to regulate women's bodies so they can go back to winning elections.
The only real way to fix this is for people to stop lying.
It isn’t a woman’s body. It is a second human body that grows inside the woman’s body. Babies are not delivered by storks.
Restricting this termination of a nascent human life to 15 weeks is a reasonable compromise, but first you have to stop lying.
That aside, since there are 78,000 ways to easily avoid getting pregnant, if getting pregnant is going to be a problem for you, abortion is the most petty and frivolous issue to base your vote on. It’s like voting for Democrats because you prefer their position on dealing with people who are harmed by lightning strikes.
Step off Kevin. It’s a woman’s body with another human inside and always will be. Do not even attempt to mansplain.
Your reply actually confirmed Kevin’s point.
From a woman: the life growing inside of me deserved every right that I possess. There. From a woman: there are a million and one ways to avoid pregnancy. Basing your voting choice on a ‘woman’s right to choose” ie, a woman’s right to kill the life growing inside her--is just stupid. Use your moral outrage elsewhere. Gah.
The right to choose isn't about the moral obligation a woman has to the life growing inside her. Every woman understands at some level the moral obligation. It is profound. Still. We must preserve the choice. These are two different things.
I disagree. Profoundly. However, I do sincerely appreciate your cordial reply. I wrote in a rage and that was inexcusable. Thank you for tolerating my stupidity. Every woman has a right to choose to use contraceptives. Our government makes sure such things are available everywhere to both sexes. The choice to preserve life is different. People in Canada are now free to choose mercy killings of the elderly and poor and hopeless via suicide or euthanasia. Soon, the mentally ill and drug and alcohol addicted will be added to their growing choices to kill. MAID is one of the most evil ideas based on choice to enter our world and it is just across our border. Beware. It is indeed a slippery slope.
Yeah those are two different things and one of those things conflicts 100% with the other.
We must preserve the choice to kill our own child? Why?
Did you know that men are allowed to become gynecologists?
"It isn't a woman's body."
_______________________________
What is it then Kevin? Is your medieval perception that a woman's body is of no consequence over protecting the life inside it? Would you just put the woman in a coma until the baby is full-term? Whether you like it or not, you do not have control over this situation. You simply do not.
15 weeks, my friend. Get your abortion within 15 weeks.
Another mansplain. 15 weeks is still a choice.
Then choose to have your abortion within 15 weeks and move on.
Clear enough mansplaining, or shall I draw you a picture?
“It” is a unique human being at the very earliest stage of development. It has its own unique DNA and possibly different blood type. A woman’s immune system has to be repressed during pregnancy because her body naturally recognizes the fetus as a DIFFERENT BODY than its own. Scientifically, “it” as in a zygote, embryo, fetus is a uniques and individually different body from the woman’s body.
What about bodily autonomy for the child?
I really don't know how people stop lying and say "It isn't a woman's body" will win over votes. If anything, it'll scare even more women voters into voting against Republicans.
The other point which you've made many times about why people don't use contraceptions more is much more valid and both sides don't like talking about it. It really should be brought out into the open.
“A state’s antiabortion attitudes, which likely contribute to the enactment of restrictive abortion laws, are a major factor in inducing greater use of highly effective contraceptive methods.” Restrictive abortion laws, antiabortion attitudes, and women’s contraceptive use. Social Science Research, Vol 41, Issue 1, January 2012
“Fewer abortion providers increase the likelihood of women using the pill.” Utilization of oral contraception: The impact of direct and indirect restrictions on access to abortion. Social Science Journal, Vol 51, Issue 1, March 2014.
“Our findings reveal that restrictions on abortion funding have a significant and positive impact on a woman’s decision to use the pill.” The Role of Restrictive Abortion Legislation in Explaining Variation in Oral Contraceptive Use. Clinics in Mother and Child Health, 2015, 12:4.
“Women in states characterized by high abortion hostility (i.e., states with four or more types of restrictive policies in place) were more likely to use highly effective methods than were women in states with less hostility.” State Abortion Context and U.S. Women’s Contraceptive Choices, 1995-2010. Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health, Vol 47, Issue 2, June 2015
Seems like low contraceptive use is tied to abortion availability. No need to be strict on contraceptive if abortion is an option.
Oh, well said indeed! Wishing you could write an entire article here. You nailed this issue! Thank you!
I'd say 12 weeks, but no need to split hairs. The problem is that none of these laws properly protect women from terrible situations.
For example, the 6 week Florida law does not allow a woman to induce labor for a fatal fetal abnormality starting in the third trimester. This scenario is technically considered an abortion. Why do politicians want to force women to non-viable pregnancies to term? The risks to the mother greatly increase as the pregnancy progresses.
When it comes to the states, women are choosing fetal viability as the line over 6 week bans implemented by men.
All of the information about the problems this is causing is coming from hospitals and doctors who receive basically all of their income from the federal government and as such are some of the biggest donors to the Democrat party.
Spot on!
You don’t need an abortion for a fatal fetal abnormality in the third trimester. Do everything you can to care for mom and baby, and then deliver baby when needed and provide perinatal palliative hospice care. Preliminary studies on palliative hospice care show better outcomes of mental health from grief for parents.
I would agree with you. However, this is the crux of the issue that most people don't understand. The term abortion simply means ending a pregnancy. Democrats corrupted the term "abortion" to include medically necessary procedures for either mom or baby that prematurely ends the pregnancy while the baby is still alive. Medically speaking, what you described is an abortion...and is generally prohibited in most states with 6 week abortion bans.
No.
Abortion technically is the “ending of a pregancy” by active killing of the fetus. This can be done by starving the embryo of nutrients, suffocating the embryo, (this is essentially what a chemical abortion does) or dismemberment of the fetus (a D&C or suction abortion.) Pro-abortionists have changed the definition of abortion to obscure what it really does. Medical procedures that treat things like ectopic pregnancies are completely different medical procedures and even coded differently in hospitals and clinics. (See https://secularprolife.org/2022/12/do-pro-life-laws-endanger-womens-lives/.)
By definition, a producer is an abortion only if it results in a dead baby. Any procedure that tries to save the life of the mother by separating the mom and baby (either child is able to live or die) is fundamentally different than an abortion. Doctors know this, it’s been done all the time before all the hysteria after Dobbs decision, and I repeat, no 6-week abortion ban and no later week abortion ban prevents any of these life-saving procedures. Pro-abortion lobbyists call them “abortions” to confuse people. But they are not. It is vastly different both intention and medical procedurally to separate a mom and child in a medical emergency and fail to save the child, than to actively kill the child to save the mother.
It’s not just “GOP” men who are pro life, millions of decent women are. You do not speak for all women when you say this.
And I speak as someone who believes abortion should be legal, available, but RARE. With over 60 million babies aborted since Roe v Wade in the US alone, it is NOT rare. It’s now a form of contraception.
Millions of us still believe in the sanctity of life, our humanity, we have a soul. We do not believe abortion any time even at the point of birth, which is tantamount to murder, is a society we want to live in or one that will survive.
If winning elections is more important than the sanctity of life, there is no hope. I’d prefer to lose every election in good conscience than lose my soul. Ohio will reap the wind.
Sorta gave the game away by saying it’s “GOP men”. Too bad she didn’t say “GOP straight white men who are physically fit and successful”.
😂😂
When you see 60-year-old women screaming in the streets about abortions, that’s your first clue that this is about a psychological derangement based on a particular personal resentment and not actually about abortions.
Ooh, shots fired!!
On target too.
Such a decent human post thank you JAE!
It doesn’t matter if you’re pro-life or pro-choice. Most women are both. We must always have the choice.
You do! What you're ignoring is the choice that causes That!
More lying and deceptive slithering linguistic ploys. What a surprise.
That is not what the terms ‘pro-choice’ and ‘pro-life’ mean. You cannot be both.
It is not a “must” that you “always” have the “choice”. Ask Europe.
The best compromise is for women to stop sleeping with men that don't support women after impregnating them, and for men to stop sleeping with women that would consider killing a healthy fetus after 16 weeks.
Since you continue to mansplain, I will womansplain. Europe has nothing to do with a woman's body. We always have a choice. Always. Choice is embedded in the universe. Only humans take it away. I would like to believe that I wouldn't abort a fetus, but I don't know that I wouldn't either. But, I would never allow you or any other to take that choice away.
They have women in Europe and abortion is restricted and it’s fine.
Well I hope you’re smart enough to avoid any such conundrum. It’s not rocket science but after 12 weeks that ball of cells has a beating heart and can feel, hear and is hard wired to live. Just like you are.
“We must always have choice.”
What about the choice to sexually abuse a child?
What about the choice to own a slave? What about the choice to kill my neighbor because I want to take his car? What about the choice of Hamas to kill women and children for “freedom”?
Must we have all these choices?
Also, have you ever considered why it is that women bear children and not men?
“We must always have the choice...”
To do what?
Say it out loud: “we must always have the choice to kill our own child in the womb.”
If I were a candidate being asked for my position, I'd look the questioner in the eye and say, "the question you should be asking is, should there be a time limit on a woman's right to an abortion or should she be able to dispose of a baby up until the instant it takes its first breath? The answer to that isn't mine to give, it's a burden that every voter must bear, and I pray that before they answer it, each of them takes a long, hard look in the mirror”.
Yes, the incessant Dem ads in VA were all about the GOP supposedly wanting to ban abortion in all cases. The GOP ads didn't even mention abortion, much less point out that the Dem party line is for legal abortion up until the last second (or a bit after) for any reason, as all of their purported limits invariably have an exception for "health" which is a loophole big enough to sail a carrier through. That could have been an effective answer but instead the GOP let their opponents define them, with unsurprising results.
And yet it saddens me that so many will vote for unrestricted abortion, basically on demand vs some level of what I would define as morality. Even sexually progressive European countries have placed limits on the abortion industry. But we have this Ll or nothing mindset.
We, meaning the vast majority of Americans, aren't choosing the all or nothing prospect. The establishment is forcing us to choose between the lesser of two evils to keep themselves in power. It's a demented game.
no one votes for "unrestricted" abortion as these are limits in all legal abortions. determined in some cases by the medical team of doctors trained in this and the woman and hopefully her partner. there is no "abortion on demand". it is just the kind of hyperbole that is used to whip up votes for either side depending
Don’t be naive. There is absolutely abortion on demand. The most given reason for seeking an abortion is financial concerns, not health issues.
https://secularprolife.org/2022/11/abortionist-admits-faking-health-reasons-for-elective-6-month-abortion/
The abortionist messed up and killed a woman and in the investigation admits that she checked “mental health reasons” for giving a 6-month abortion even though she agreed that she didn’t even check if the woman actually had any health or mental health issues. This happens ALL the time.
https://sarahterzo.substack.com/p/report-shows-high-number-of-repeat-abortions-in-minnesota-c0f3a816f029?r=1k678&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
This article shows how data from records that some women in Minnesota have had up to 10 abortions. There is no way a woman is having 10 abortions for anything other than because she wants to (probably using it as a form of birth control.) this is just Minnesota, but I’m confident this happens all over.
Wake up. Women get abortions for no good reasons-- which is essentially on demand-- all of the time.
And having sex without consequences?
Cute. Ignorant but oh so clever.
Snarky meets snarky. Hope you have a great day.
Last time I looked Nicki Haley is still a GOP woman. Vote for her.
Or we can just rename the GOP the Prolife Party, since they seem to care more about this issue than anything else, to the point of losing all elections and power.
100%. this is their hill to die on
Sorry Kevin. You're sounding like the Democrats here when they blamed women for not voting for Hillary. You keep blaming women voters but women don't work for politicians or the government. It's the other way around. When women's votes on this issue is so loud and consistent, then it is the elected officials's job to serve the constituency. Not for the constituency to shut up and serve the politicians.
And why blame women instead of Republicans wanting to push laws so restrictive and ban abortions altogether? The principle and morality reason doesn't stand when the subject is winning or losing elections because those who support the right also believe their position is one of principle and morality by their standard. So you're left with either women give, or the candidates give. Why only blame women and not blame the GOP for pushing these bans and extreme restrictions that even some conservatives don't want? They could've won soundly for two Novembers now but insist on not listening to the voters and get clobbered.
Whichever way anyone feels about abortion, the right to decide for themselves is what women voters are saying they want and it's not negotiable. In a democracy, why shouldn't the elected politicians serve the very people they're running to represent when it's so obviously clear that's what the majority wants?
To you the issue is frivolous but to them the matter is personal as these laws directly interferes with their right to make choices about their own lives.
False. I’m not blaming women. I’m blaming the ones who base their vote on abortion, along with the men who do so, because that’s a preposterous thing to do and they need to grow up.
But these are local elections, not a vote for Biden and Communism.
I am very relieved to hear that they won’t do this exact same thing in federal elections. Thanks.
You're welcome!
I’m going to save the email notification for this one and hopefully I will remember to return to this thread to tell you “You were wrong, obviously.” in about 12 months when you are proven wrong.
That will be a great day actually because I’m rooting for Democrats to sweep in this particular one so that they can make things so much worse that we will then be able to cleanse the party from society.
QX 100%
Kevin, clearly it’s not “frivolous” if it’s the reason we keep losing. To your point, we are careening towards a future that may very well see a bankrupt communist America. I think it’s time the Republican Party gets its priorities straight and realize if we want to keep America free we are going to have to give up on the abortion issue, it’s just not worth it.
The situation it creates where Joe Biden grows a short mustache is not frivolous, obviously. But that’s not the thing I’m calling frivolous.
Imagine if I could avoid paying taxes by taking a pill and wearing rubber gloves at the bank, and I was in the street holding a sign screaming about taxes. That would make me an insane person.
Fabulous Analogy!
Ha, I happen to agree with you KD so please restrict your “you people” to “some of you people.”
No matter what your views are on a terribly divisive issue, what does it say about the Democrat party when its rallying cry is “we are the party of unlimited access to killing the unborn”?! How soulless, but the descendants of Margaret Sanger carry on, ghouls that they are.
When people protect their rights by voting for them they are "frivolous morons"? Sounds like taken directly from the playbook of tyrants and dictators.
That's what democracy is all about. The people are deciding and no bigoted, superstitious sweet little Jesus freaks are deciding for them. On this day we witnessed a victory of democracy over theocracy and tyranny! And You better respect the will of the people instead of mocking it!
What's Your problem with democracy anyway?
The US is like Albania (or one of those especially basket case former Soviet satellites) where you can’t buy a grapefruit or an avocado for under $100 but by golly you can get an abortion.
How are we doing Communism?
It gets worse. Check this out:
https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DOC-398244A1.pdf
While this is a blunt way of making the point I am equally disgusted with single issue voting. Two things: 1) people are telling us abortion is the reason and it may be simply the way they phrase questions to the voters after the polls 2) most voters are in favor of choice but not to 9 months gestation. There is a compromise. Abortion will not be 'solved' by prohibiting it entirely. That's a losing stance. The conservatives have to fight this one in hearts and minds not with legislation to ban anything.
Thank you Kevin. Exactly how I feel. I doing understand my fellow voters.
The right to life movement has hijacked the Republican Party. It is sickening as there are far greater issues facing this country — open borders, China’s imperialist march across the world, inflation, Iran’s funding of terrorism, fentanyl crisis. My list could go on.
If a woman makes the difficult decision to have an abortion, it is not my affair. We fought for the right to vote; think we are brilliant enough to know what to do with our uterus. One issue voters will be the demise of this republic.
But, on the other hand, the Dem's complete obsession with the ability to kill babies at any point in the pregnancy makes me crazy! I think they are the ones with intractable, sickening views.
True. However late term abortions of a healthy pregnancy is extremely rare and I have never heard of this happening anywhere. First trimester abortions are not rare. The GOP is stupid if they think women will accept a 6 week abortion ban to stop a hypothetical late term abortion.
https://secularprolife.org/laterabortion/
This shows a bunch of research studies about late-term abortions, and various quotes from abortionists that do late-term abortions.
Yes, they are rarer than abortions < 15 weeks, but they do happen.
Polling actually shows that most Americans support a 15 week ban, so you have to wonder why Dems and pro-aborts push unlimited abortion so strongly.
Late-term abortions (or later abortions) are really NOT hypothetical. And data shows that most are NOT done for medical emergencies. (In any case, during a medical emergency, after 20 weeks, a C-section is much faster and safer than an abortion anyway, so there is NO good reason that any later abortion ever needs to happen. Which then makes you wonder why so many pro-abortion folks push it— like do some of these doctors just like killing babies??)
your term "abortionist" says it all I think the words you are looking for are medical professionals. otherwise those procedures are illegal and dangerous
You are just playing semantics. A medical professional who performs an abortion is an abortionist. Majority of Ob/GYNs do not perform abortions. Those that do (unless they work in a hospital for women’s health), tend to mostly do abortions and do not offer comprehensive pregnancy care to women.
Pro-abortion lobbyists are even pushing for abortions to be done by people who do not have a medical degree. So clearly, the terminology isn’t really the issue here.
There is a doctor in Philly doing hard time for precisely that. Wake up.
He's in jail, and the Ohio amendment is 22 weeks so not the same situation at all. This has nothing to do with the awful Women's Heath Protection Act.
I am not familiar with the WPHA. Haven't read the bill. Don't know what it provides, other than a Google search suggests it seeks to expand whatever existed under Roe and Casey. Politically that is likely never going to go anywhere.
Because I believe there are two "lives" involved in a pregnancy, I think both sides of the debate need to recognize that reality. Is there a point where the certainty of a successful human live birth is so high such that an abortion should not occur? Of course. However, I have wrestled with this for decades. Have whipsawed back and forth on how to handle. But, I will never be pregnant so my specific autonomous rights are not involved. I say this as the father of 3 great offspring. End of the day, I'd let a woman decide though I'd want some restrictions after about 25-28 weeks. Certainly not what some folks are doing, however rare, when there is a clearly human baby being aborted.
And Ohio votes to enshrine abortion in their state constitution with the added "and you cannot change or alter this". WHAT????
The left's position on late term was a reaction to the right's relentless push to limit abortions after Roe v Wade. Everything is an organic chain of action and reaction. Plus the issue has been hijacked by the far extremes on both sides so whenever one side wins something, the other side will move even farther go the extreme to one up the opposition. Reality is most women are not insane to want late term abortion at all barring extreme circumstances, whether the law allows it or not. Who wants to undergo a major procedure like that for fun?
If late term abortions are a warped 'reaction' to a reasonable compromise of 15 weeks, then you folks don't know the first thing about governing.
You're misunderstanding what I said. Whether intentionally or a honest misunderstanding IDK. I didn't say the 15 weeks pushed them to the reaction of late term. This happened way back during the Plessy case. 15 weeks was essentially Roe v Wade. But the pro-life faction wouldn't have that, so they started chipping at it through courtrooms and litigation strategy. Then they lost big with Plessy which expanded abortion right to viability. If Roe v Wade was left alone, we would be at 15 weeks, and now some in the GOP is getting to where we all started. The whole thing just came a full circle.
No, it has not come full circle. SCOTUS removed it from the federal stage. It is now a State issue and is rightly being debated in each state jurisdiction. Pro-life voters will hold their stance or cave to the impatience of the pro-choice people who can’t wait for everyone to debate it at the state level. Both sides are trying to legislate the issue. The voters will decide in each State what there limits or allowances will be. We will have to accept those results and each side can go back and try again. It will never be resolved completely.
I’m just curious and I can’t assume from your moniker, but are you a woman?
does it matter?
To someone who believes in abortion rights but wants to protect our country among other extremely important issues, for which the Democrats are failures, the GOP needs to change! Get this off the platform and get back to governing.
What is abortion?
It ends the life (kills) a unique human being at its earliest stage of development.
No one should have that right.
Really doesn’t matter what sex/gender you are. No one should have that right.
I agree with you. I hope to see a GOP rise out of the ashes that respect that different parts of the country will feel differently on this and allow good candidates to run on other issues and win. The GOP in the Northeast and West Coast is dead as they keep putting up people who are moral scolds rather than pragmatic winners. Democracy has a way of ending debates and creating new candidates.
Ironically, the birth rate of legal citizens of this country is going down while we're allowing illegals in with their children-all to vote D.
If you think women are "brilliant enough to know what to do with their uterus," visit Family Court.
Please use the right terms. They are not illegals. They are undocumented Democrats.
Yes, our adopted son was one of five born addicted to meth. He will never outgrow his mother’s abuse. I have been to family court and know its horrors.
One issue voters on both sides of the issue.
Really? You know this how?
I think this got lost in the comments…
Hear, hear.
One thing that really puzzles me: why were voters so eager to give up parental rights as evidenced by the stunning losses of those who ran for school boards on this issue? In Loudon County, VA (where a two girls in two different schools were raped in the girls restroom by a male claiming to be transgender) only two of nine candidates won on this issue. In rural Spotsville County, VA, these candidates lost, giving up the majority.
Have we gone so far that people trying desperately to protect against government overreach in parental authority cannot even win?
If these were legitimately run elections, this us depressing, indeed.
Not sure that's really accurate. Of the 9 member Loudoun school board, 7 didn't even bother to seek re-election and the 2 who did, lost. I'd say they all paid a political price. The awful, awful Soros district attorney who got herself in the middle of it also appears to have lost her election.
Spotsylvania is a good example of how things can go too far in the other direction. That Board was a mess, with an overly aggressive attack on any book with sexual content. It's one thing to go after prurient graphic novels, but high schoolers reading The Canterbury Tales shouldn't raise any eyebrows. Plus the Chair of that Board (who lost) is under indictment for fraudulently altering a contract to increase the Superintendent's salary without consulting the rest of the Board.
I can tell you that in my Virginia county we handed the last of the Covid-era diehard kid-maskers an ignominious defeat.
Thanks! As always, there’s a lot more to the story. Here is the source I read: https://www.theepochtimes.com/article/top-10-takeaways-from-tuesdays-election-and-what-it-means-for-2024-post-5525789?utm_source=Morningbrief&src_src=Morningbrief&utm_campaign=mb-2023-11-09&src_cmp=mb-2023-11-09&utm_medium=email&est=GrmHwdLAyWFwhLyXaAaltrtl9f2o%2FicF6q%2F%2BI3C03aEVwzmD07xTZgqi1pTD40hh
Maybe someday we'll have methods to prevent unwanted conception. That would be nice.
Also abstinence works 100% of the time.
I can think of one! And it's existed as long as men and women have existed!
Highly recommend NAPRO. Nothing like going au naturale and getting in touch with your own body to prevent unplanned pregnancy!
My comment above was meant as irony, of course. Nowadays 99% of pregnancies can be prevented by contraception, but lots of people don't bother and make all sorts of excuses for their irresponsible behavior.
I saw the same thing in my CT town. A slate of Dems and even a write in won the school board election - so they could continue to push the DEI equity issue in the schools, along with trans madness - over two Republicans that they managed to paint as extreme. And worse the RINO Republicans in the town went along with the Dems. The candidates were not extreme - they simply stood for principles that a decade ago had near unanimous approval.
And by issue polling still do.
I am honestly at a loss as to how any sane person could even entertain voting for Democrats. First, their party is led by a senile imbecile who is demonstrably corrupt and viciously divisive, not to mention incompetent. Second, the Democrats all robotically vote as a block, so they are complicit with Biden and his stooges. Third, they have opened our border, leading even Democrat mayors to wail at the consequences. Without a border we can't have a country. Fourth, the cost of everything has gone up; this did not happen by magic, it was Dem policies and spending. Fifth their policies are destroying our energy industry and jeopardizing our electric grid. I could go on but you get the picture. And yet they win elections. Sure the media lies for them and carries their water but that can't be all it is. This is madness. Maybe a national divorce is the only answer.
Sanity is not required to vote. In some cities neither is citizenship or a pulse
Its not that hard to figure out how people vote for Democrats. Lets start with few baselines:
1. - Uniformed/uneducated minorities tend to vote heavily Democrat.
2. - Educated white liberals (laptop class) that suffer from documentary effect predominately vote Democrat.
3. - Women. Women are 30% more likely to vote Democrat then Republican/Independent. (Gallup).
There are other data points but those are the leaders.
Yes and that provides two very inviting target groups, depending on how one defines "minorities."
"Educated white liberals," however, are hopeless.
People aren’t sane. We invent realities that don’t cause cognitive dissonance. The press gives narratives to support these hallucinations. Trump is very valuable in that sense. Orange Man Bad, so you can ignore these other things and Vote Dem, which you have always done and want to do. Changing parties is very painful psychologically. People avoid pain.
My philosophy rings true every election: "People are stupid, and consistently vote for people and issues that are against their self interests because it FEELS good"!
Hard to believe but sometimes the simplest answer is the answer.
It’s election fraud.
Two words: Culture Wars.
With the granddaddy of them all being abortion. Overall public opinion hasn't really moved much over the past 50 years. The extremists will continue to shout either "Abortions for all, any time, any where", while the other side shouts "Never!" with the majority sitting somewhere in the middle. Is it really any surprise that this is crystal meth to politicians who have no discernable grasp, let alone stand, on the real issues of which you only partially enumerated? It is the most sublime of misdirection.
We also need to differentiate between small government, libertarian conservatives vs. social conservatives. Much hay is being made about the hypocrisy of the Right simultaneously crowing about government overreach and promoting more local or individual liberty instead, while at the same time engaging in shared fever dreams of a total Federal ban on abortion. The culture wars are being fought by the SoCons, not the libertarians. What the SoCons and the GOP party leadership seem utterly incapable of grasping is that the SoCon wing has been steadily loosing power for the past 20 - 25 years. This is not the 1980's. Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell no longer set policy. If the disaster of the 2022 midterms wasn't enough to wake them up to reality then I'm afraid nothing will. Certainly not Tuesday night.
I live on the border with KY. Andy Beshear is fairly well liked plus his dad was also governor of KY not so long ago. That’s why he won reelection. Otherwise KY is pretty red. Next governor will be a R, I’m sure.
Beshear won because Cameron and the R’s ran an awful campaign. Beshear was The Boy Dictator during Covid. He closed churches, wrecked small businesses. Day after the primary in May there should have been ads showing the KY State Police writing down license plate numbers of people who went to church on Easter Sunday 2020 at Beshear’s direction. Instead Cameron did nothing and Beshear immediately began attacking him over the abortion issue. R’s won every other constitutional office going away. Cameron thought Trump’s endorsement would be all he needed, he underestimated the Trump hate in Louisville & Lexington. Sad part is there was a R that could have won. Not sure I’m that optimistic about a different outcome in 2027.
It's not abortion -- directly! It's the baggage -- which you list -- that comes with it! And until someone figures out how to reach the single-issue voter, we're screwed. Could the unpleasantness on the middle east -- or anything else -- provide a wedge? Far too soon to tell.
All it took was your first sentence to give it a like…but good supporting arguments to back up your opinion!
Was that a gentle hint to be more concise?
No, I’m with you! I’m baffled at how people can vote Democrat as well. And your points are exactly why. Republicans have a real messaging problem. And Trump seriously won’t help no matter what the polls say. I’m so over him.
Bruce, it's really not a puzzle, and voters are not all stupid. All the GOP needs to do to win is drop the abortion issue. Or at least stop pushing insane bans and restrictions. And stop making it an election issue until they can make a better case for restrictions. Right now, they make no convincing case except "morality". But that isn't convincing to people disagree with them on this. All the issues you raise are pressing. But when it comes to a woman potentially dealing with her own immediate body and her own life, all these issues are a far distance. The border literally feels like a foreign country comparing to their own wombs. National gas prices and grocery prices don't mean squat to a woman when it comes to her immediate life. Even whoever is in the White House is a distant issue in comparison. Until people running elections get this, they'll keep losing.
It is becoming harder and harder to get young women to choose not to abort because 1. they were raised by parents who didn't give consequences for bad choices and 2. they were raised by parents to be narcissists. Nothing matters except themselves. Who could possibly convince them that self-sacrifice is the height of love? Adoption, not abortion. There are tens of thousands of couples waiting...
Mildly sophist -- if Republicans don't raise the issue, it'll be raised for them by their opponents. But thank you for playing.
Are you actually saying Republicans aren't smart enough to come up with an answer if the Dems raise the issue for them? If they're that incompetent that they can't have a good answer when the opposition is baiting them, then they deserve to lose because what happens when Xi JinPing or Putin decides to bait them?
Please. Give your side more credit. In every loss they incurred this week, it was due precisely to the GOP pushing the issue.
Chris Christie and Nikki Haley both gave answers on this last night when baited that independents, moderates and even Ds find acceptable. Maybe the dumb ones you want to support can take a lesson?
“All the GOP needs to do to win is drop the abortion issue”
And do what, adopt abortion on demand as their platform? In New York you can LEGALLY get an abortion right up until the baby takes its first breath and it makes no difference how New Yorkers vote so your theory needs a bit more “womansplainin”. How about republicans adopt ALL of the democratic platform policies – open borders, government censorship, codifying a federal injustice department, increasing the $31 trillion debt… The pathetic joke is that dems still wouldn’t vote for republicans. If you’re gonna lose, at least lose with your principles intact because the time is coming when that’s all you’ll have left.
I really don't know how NY or CA are relevant here. We're talking about losing local and state elections where GOP should have won in November last year and this year. You're being really obtuse to jump from me saying drop the abortion issue until they can make a more convincing case, to the GOP adopting Dem policies. Is everything this obtuse and black and white with you? If so I really don't know what to say.
Keep anti-abortion on your platform them, and make the same arguments that are completely ineffective to persuade voters. Personally I think they can regroup and pursue some better arguments that are relevant to today that can put some restrictions on abortions. But everyone who are prolife seem to care about about their own virtue signaling and expressing their personal moral outrage than convincing voters. Keep losing then. It seems you're all willing to die on this hill.
"Personally I think they can regroup and pursue some better arguments that are relevant to today that can put some restrictions on abortions."
Like what? Is 15 weeks long enough? Virginia Governor Youngkin worked his ass off promoting that and republicans still LOST. NY and California may be lost causes for republicans but states like PA, Michigan, Nevada and Arizona are where the next presidential election will be decided and if you bothered to check, access to abortion in any of them is hardly restrictive. Nevertheless, dem strategists will claim otherwise and their obtuse constituents will shriek accordingly.
In one sense, you and I agree, Republican messaging needs to be improved so voter turnout next year isn’t as pathetic as it was Tuesday night. Democrats have no such problem. Clearly, for them, the ability to shred a baby up until birth is a clarion call.
How about I answer you sincerely instead of us bickering?
I5 weeks is a good benchmark and quite universal but I don't think persuasion would come from this. The issue is trust. The two parties have been fighting to the bitter end on this for so long, pro-choice voters and liberals do not trust the GOP at all even if they say 15 weeks. Especially not when there are some other GOP politicians harping about bans in other states. There's deep mistrust and they side-eye any suggestions to compromise even if 15 weeks is arguably reasonable and most voters have a consensus on this.
If conservatives want to curtail abortions, they have to take a different approach entirely and start having a more honest, non-biased and non-judgmental discussion about this issue, which either side can but the Ds won't because they're winning. Nikki Haley is really right on this one.
Let me give you an example: most people didn't used to know what a fetus look like in any stage of development. They have some vague sense that the fetus will form to viability some weeks before pregnancies, but until recently, we didn't even have ultrasound. Now an ultrasound (the old kind) might look lovely to new parents, but to most people it's just a blob. You can't tell the difference between it or the stuff they showed us when Malaysia Airline lost MH375. But with digital advancement, how a fetus appear has improved a thousand fold. I was literally spooked last year when a friend showed me what her niece's unborn child looked like in digital image. You can actually see the face. I don't think most people or young women have ever seen that before. If people can see what a fetus looks like in late stage, it would be much much tougher for them to be ok with late term abortion.
The next thing people can discuss is viability. That also changed over time. Historically a baby must be born and can die with the mother in childbirth. But viability has become earlier and earlier. It's definitely a social discussion to be had to flesh this out. An honest discussion about this may convince people that abortions should not be done beyond 5-6 months barring health and medical reasons.
Add to that is the Republicans need to be more sincere addressing health and medical reasons. They say the exception is there but they really haven't been that sincere in fleshing out what that means, and how doctors can be sure they won't get criminally sued. It may be that a compromise has to be given to trust the doctors, instead of suspecting doctors will all want to perform abortions for convenience. Here's another case of deep mistrust here standing in the way.
And they can do some kind of campaign drive to encourage use of contraceptives like how there used to be campaigns against drunk driving and smoking, both succeeded against all odds. But conservatives don't want to do that because they don't actually approve of sex before marriage or casual sex or something, so they don't really care to push contraceptives either. There is also some level of sexism too. There is a degree of vindictiveness by some conservatives on this. It's not uncommon to see some anonymous posters all over the internet calling women sluts and they should keep their legs closed, with no mention ever about how men can also stop abortions now by not having unprotected sex unless they want to have children with that woman. All this won't help persuade voters. If they really want fewer abortions, then something's gotta give because they can't stop people from having sex the way they want. They'll need to stop openly judging women and also promote contraceptives.
Another thing is they can honestly point out how much society has changed since the 50s, 70s, or 80s. Back then a woman's reputation and life will in fact be totally destroyed if they are pregnant but unwed. There is also no stigma for women to ask men to use protection, or use protections themselves. There are many options now for women who want to avoid getting pregnant. Further, they can actually take a pro-woman stand and reframe the conversation to young women that they don't have to give in to the pressure of "sex positivity" which is something they are facing and being shamed for if they don't subscribe to it today. There's already a low level backlash by some GenZ women on this. Look up Louise Perry. Instead of waving the finger at women, they can actually take a different approach and talk about how this liberal "sex positivity" idea is severely harming women. It's not even wrong. It hasn't proved to be empowering, but exploitative. There are even far left women who find this harmful. They can offer the throwback idea that sex is something intimate for two people in love. It would sound a whole lot more reasonable than sex is only morally right between married couples.
You may ask why is it the GOP's obligation to do all these grunt work. The answer is they're losing elections. The solution left is to change hearts and minds, not law. So they can either figure it out, or go home.
Thank for your sincere response. I’m not sure what cohort you’re basing it on but it’s clear to me that there is NOTHING that republicans can do or say that will change the voting habits of the single, young women driving recent election results. The sooner republicans accept that and focus on issues that persuadable voters care about, the better they’ll do.
Are you a man or a woman? Not being a smart ass, just wondering about perspective. Because Republicans don't have a problem with the male vote but we have a big problem with the female vote.
The problem with the issue of abortion is we are once again being run by the extremes at the state level.
The pro abortion wing ( and that seems fair since the push is zero restrictions) has trumped the “its murder wing” ( lets ban it at 6 weeks or less) for the average voter.
The average voter fears the “right” on this issue far more than the left. It is far to restrictive and while voters might abhor the idea of a 35 week abortion intuitively voters know that they dont happen.
Its the reverse of gun control. The voters knows the goal of the gun control and anti abortion advocates is to ban them so they instinctivly reject restrictions as slippery slopes.
As with both issues most voters will never use a gun nor require an abortion but they dont want the option removed.
The unintended consequence is we are amending constitutions by a majority vote which is terrible governance. The Ohio gov tried to point this out but failed. Had he pushed and passed a law allowing abortion to 20 weeks BEFORE the election instead of promising to work it out after he would have had credibility.
The GOP has to get abortion off the ballot which means they have to give up the fight. They should.
Technology as in “Pharma abortion drugs” have changed the entire landscape ( like it or not). The percentage of abortions done this way must be enormous. Late term abortions are primarily truly health induced. One can morally be appalled but the fact remains abortions are never going away.
The right wanted it returned to voters. Voters are deciding.
The problem with that “give up the fight” from my perspective is to essentially give up on protecting the very most vulnerable of society. I see it as a descent into a world where people are expendable essentially because someone has determined they have no value. Are they too small? Too old? Too frail? Too sick? Are they the wrong sex? Wrong color? Too dumb? Too ugly?
Is it really unrealistic in this day and age, after all we’ve seen these past three years, that we could easily end up in a place where governments decide whose life has value and whose doesn’t? Who lives and who dies?
That’s a prospect that frightens me, frankly.
Granny62– I completely agree!
This comment (and others) about “giving up the fight” show that these people really don’t view the fetus as a human being. Because debating about a human life that is 10 weeks old versus 40 weeks old is equivalent (morally) to debating between the value of a human life that is 10 years old and 40 years old. So clearly, these people DONT see the unborn child as a HUMAN BEING.
The slippery slope you hint at is already happening. Unborn children diagnosed with possible Down Syndrome are aborted (I.e. killed) 67% of the time.
So tell me, what is the punishment or penalty if one is aborted? Not trolling its a serious question,
If it is illegal do you charge the parents, the doctors? What do you charge them with?
Most of the current state abortion laws have a civil lawsuit brought against a doctor with a $10,000 fine plus paying for legal fees. Sometimes the hospital or clinic is also charged a fee, and sometimes the doctor/abortionist could lose their medical license.
The woman is never charged. Most pro-lifers see the woman as a second victim. There are many statistics that show a majority of women feel pressured or coerced into abortions by their partners, friends, or family.
However, if a woman does something like take a bunch of drugs in order to induce a miscarriage and the baby dies— then she can be charged, because that’s fetal endangerment and those laws are already well-established.
But that’s the thing that makes abortion so insane. It’s against the law to knowingly put a fetus in danger (say with drugs, or a person who hits a pregnant women can be charged with fetal endangerment) and yet, if a doctor fatally dismembers a fetus in abortion, then it’s somehow legal? No, abortion laws should be brought in line with fetal endangerment laws, because it’s still a human being that’s being killed. The only different legally should be who is charged, and in an abortion, the doctor/nurse/clinic should be held accountable.
I believe the medical professionals are the ones who are complicit. No matter what the procedure, a patient must be given the truth about possible consequences. Abortion has very real long term negative consequences to the woman. She also deserves to know precisely what is happening with abortion- it is ending a unique human life.
Perhaps beginning with a legal requirement to inform would be a good start, even without changing the law as it exists now.
Did you know that when a woman sees their child in an ultrasound as a part of informed consent in abortion protocol, the majority of the time she will change her mind?
You are making the social moral argument , not a legislative one, The bans dont say so them an ultrasound and let them decide; they say you cant have one.
OK, they you are agreeing abortion is Ok, and not murder as long as everyone gives consent. My guess is you will get little disagreement from the average voter.
You essentially said, I wont charge them with anything. That was my point
What I am saying is that so much if this “abortion-on-demand” water has gone over the dam that perhaps an incremental approach to punishment of healthcare providers would be prudent.
I am not giving up on the idea that we should protect the vulnerable. You cannot legislate morality. If abortion is murder then pass a law treating it that way. But no one really wants that. Not even pro lifers inspite of their rhetoric. So who really is giving up the fight?
Instead abortion can be available but we as a society can abhor it, do all we can to make it something no one wants nor should they celebrate. That is the fight, not legislatively but morally.
But the reality is a woman is in one tough situation sometimes and she should have options. Thats all.
Laws are all about morality. We have laws against killing grown humans, how is that not legislating morality?
The only reason abortion law is not passed as a law like murder is because “people don’t want it that way” and people make the laws. But that doesn’t mean it’s right or good. (How many bad laws has this country had in the past?) And people don’t want this abortion law because they have all been duped by the pro-abortion lobby from the 1970s that lied to Americans about the nature of abortion, lied about how many women died from illegal abortions (they said 10,000 when it was more like 200), and continues to lie to women that their life would be better if they kill their own child for “freedom.”
Killing your own child should never be an option. There are other much better options to help women in a tough situation. Killing shouldn’t be one of them.
We agree that laws are about morality and we have a law against murder and we charge people with it.
The problem with the abortion discussion is that individuals who want to ban abortion use the argument that it is a human life but will not pass laws saying that. They pass laws that ban it after a certain time period and specifically preclude the mother from being charged with anything. What message does that send about your morality argument?
I am not some pro choice zealot by any means, I am saying that the legislative effort by the "abortion is taking a human life" crowd is both hypocritical and ineffective to advance what they contend is such a clear cut moral issue. They say one thing but legislate as if its less than that. They lose the moral high ground ( and would never get a law passed in any event. )
The other problem I see is the people "Celebrating" these laws with no restrictions and partial birth abortions! I read a ridiculous self proclaimed "Trans" saying they couldn't wit to be the fist to get impregnated..... to have a public abortion.... how SICK is that ???
The Glee on their faces as they march is stunning and despicable to me.
Having read the thread: All y'all are ignoring that which caused the pregnancy. Tools exist to prove the identity of he who was the cause. Make him financially responsible. Wild idea, huh?
Agree completely. Women have deserted the Republicans in droves. We Republicans have to be smarter. Abortion is not a hill to die on. Plus as a guy in his 70s, I believe - and have always believed - that a woman must have some right over her own body. Men would not stand for such a denial. Does a balance have to be achieved between that and the murder of a perfectly viable fetus? Of course. But that is a political debate. And those just saying "no" are not helping the cause. And, yes, those who support both abortion and the vaccine mandates are idiotic hypocrites. Sauce for the goose.....
Yes, to everything you said. I live in OH and voted for the abortion amendment. Why? Because the 6 week heartbeat bill is just dumb. If Rs want to move forward on the conservative agenda in other areas, they need to shut up about abortion. Let women do what they need to do. In the end, the woman is the one who has to live with her decision.
Aren’t you terrified of the consequences to parental authority?
Well, sh*t! If you didn't like the law - change the legislation .... don't flippin' Amend My Constitution for your selfishness! Did you realize that it also gives children access to abortions and "gender affirming care" WITHOUT parental permissions? Thanks a FN bunch for your ignorant vote.
Where are you and others getting the gender affirming care piece from? What exact language gives you that impression?
A yes/no question: Did you read -- for comprehension -- that for which you voted?
Yes!
"The average voter fears the “right” on this issue far more than the left. It is far to restrictive and while voters might abhor the idea of a 35 week abortion intuitively voters know that they dont happen." I think this is false. They don't happen every day perhaps but they happen.
I would hazard to guess that a voluntary 35 week abortion does not happen . Voluntary as in i don’t want the kid abort it?
1% of abortions occur after 21 weeks. This would be 3.5 months later.
“We have to know the difference between good and evil,” Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under Trump, said. That’s the only way, she added, that we can “go back to the soul of America.”
——————————————————
Nothing sets off my Vague Manipulative Horseshit Alarm™️ more than “soul of America”.
That said, this isn’t about knowing “the difference between good and evil”, Nikki. Almost everyone knows that. This is about knowing whether or not it is a smart idea to have the same parasitic dipshits, who have lost 17 consecutive wars, lead a bankrupt country into 3 more wars, all at the same time.
That is obviously not a smart idea.
"That said, this isn’t about knowing “the difference between good and evil”, Nikki. Almost everyone knows that." Boy! You really whiffed on THAT one, Kevin Durant?! As Americans march for the Hamas Death Cult, and approve of killing babies at the time of birth or AFTER birth in the ovens in the south of Israel, do you REALLY think most people know the difference between good and evil? I sure don't!
No most of those people know it is evil and are themselves evil. There’s really only a small percentage of insane people who just don’t know right from wrong.
Love the TradeMark!
Seriously, almost everyone knows that? But you think its fine to be friends with someone that is an unabashed anti-Semite? Because when they are not denigrating people based on intractable characteristic, and likely wishing for the death of 10 million people worldwide, they are a nice person. Do you think perhaps you are too eager to pat yourself on the back there? And, you know, get your own shit in order, before presuming to condescendingly lecture others on it?
‘Hardcore antisemite’ was probably an overstatement or at least unclear. I shall clarify. She’s not ripping down posters. She’s not genocidal and doesn’t support Hamas or have a Palestinian flag. She’s nowhere near Rashida Tlaib. But she has many of the standard cliched antisemitic beliefs.
I’m also friends with Democrats who support a two-state solution, which is basically a genocidal antisemitic view and it is 1,000x more dangerous to Jews than my Muslim friend’s weird offensive beliefs. But a majority of left-wing Israelis, who are themselves Jewish, also support a two-state solution.
I have a bunch of friends who believe a couple of dumb things that are going to get lots of people killed because most of the people in the country have dumb beliefs that are going to get a bunch of people killed. My Muslim friend’s antisemitism is offensive but not dangerous.
I will continue lecturing everyone condescendingly because I am literally always proven right.
Relative to the elections, the lovely Mrs. Guy, who is not highly conservative, had this comments-
“I can’t believe that a bunch of women would let this country go to hell on the off chance that they might want to scrape some cells out of their uterus.”
One issue voters will kill this country and, in doing so, the world.
On the flip side, aren't prolife conservatives also one-issue voters? They are complicit in making this a one issue election.
Agreed. But I think there are more moderate D's who vote exclusively for pro-abortion candidates than moderate R's who exclusively vote pro-life. For some reason wanting to abort a baby up to birth is classified as mainstream, which it is not. I think the left wants to avoid the obvious fact that most citizens are ok with some type of limit to abortion. I know the right has a vocal anti-abortion component but I don't think it is as large as the left's pro-abortion component. Nor does it control the agenda as much as the left's. It's important but not dominant. I see most R's as wanting to find an acceptable limit. I see the left as not wanting to engage in that discussion because it is the only issue they have left now which to run.
Do you get it now, GOP? The red wave that turned into a red drip. The losses Tuesday in red states. You continue following the same doomed strategies that will assure you lose the big prize again in 2024.
All because of you are so out of step with the majority of the electorate on abortion. Stay the fuck out of everyone’s bedrooms and doctors offices and you’d be surprised at how many more votes you could pick up.
When you sacrifice lives and your moral compass for votes, you're no better than your opponents. Furthermore, Democrats are 100% against compromise.
They want to control the message: "Vote for us because they will take away your right to choose, sending single woman to back alley, medievil, dangerous practices."
Dems: Except stay in doctors’ offices when it comes to being forced to inject zero-liability, novel vaccines that don’t stop transmission. Make sure people who don’t comply are fired, cast out of society and colleges, and subjected to vile ridicule by such intellectual giants as Jimmy Kimmel and Howard Stern. This is what passes for liberalism these days. As pathetic or more than any holy rollers. Fauci is my church! I bow down!
Vivak gave an unbelievably true statement at the debate. Look for it on TikTok or Youtube. He's 100% right and I don't even support him. The GOP are a party of losers and if they don't wake up they will lose again in 2024.
Honestly, I thought Vivek was the only one who was saying everything on our minds the press won't cover. The moderators sucked. The press and goons they interviewed were all like oh this was the best debate and substantive blah blah blah. But all the questions were freakin inane and treading old grounds. As a result, we heard nothing new from anyone except Vivek. Nikki Haley didn't tell us anything we don't already know. Given those questions, all she did was repeat the answers she already gave in the last two debates. And I don't know why people say DeSantis polled higher after this. Every time he started speaking, my ears tuned out and all I could focus on is how much he looks like a pug bobblehead. Why does he keep scowling when he starts to speak? And what's with all the head bobbing? Even the two Indian-Americans on stage wasn't doing that. He didn't project presidential to me. He just looked evermore provincial. He loses me more the more I see him. Tim Scott was totally forgettable. Chris Christie had some very interesting thoughtful things to say, which makes me think he wouldn't be bad in some kind of cabinet position but maybe he should best serve by becoming a university professor. He can help educate the next generation and do more good there.
But Vivek. I love that right off the bat he called out the RNC for choosing these awful moderators. He was absolutely right Tucker Carlson should've been there instead. And I'm not at all a Tucker fan.These liberal moderators never ask any questions the conservative primary voters want to ask if it doesn't fit their agenda. They keep saying oh woe ratings are low because Trump wouldn't show up. How much do they want to bet the ratings would shoot up if Tucker was the moderator? I'm not sure Joe Rogan is the right person as he's not a press person, but hell yes, Rogan would've brought in his millions of viewers. Bring on Megyn Kelly too and THAT would've been a primary debate people would watch even if Trump is no show. But that RNC chairwoman wants to bury these candidates as she's a Trump appointee. Which begs the question, why are we even wasting time on these debates then?
Multiple times Vivek started talking about things that are under a media blackout. He may not be ready for the presidency, but he was the only one who said anything pressing on the primary voters' minds. Except for the two digs at Haley. They both sounded rehearsed and if he can't do it well off the cuff, he should stop that. Those digs don't hurt her but him as they sounded rehearse and thus phony.
If we, as a country, choose to keep voting Democrat because they promise to let mothers kill their children, then we deserve everything we get.
Where is the REAL debate on abortion itself? It always centers on individual "choice", not the bloody deaths of nascent human life.
Exactly.
In Praise of the Dobbs decision, this is what Democracy looks like. What made Roe such an abomination was that there is no right to an Abortion in the United States. Let me define a right as two-thirds of the House and Senate along with three-fifths of the States. That never happened with Abortion. The Vote was 7-2 with a total of nine, not the score of 435 or 100 or 37 states. It was a group of people on the court who felt they knew best rather than letting Democracy decide.
Now it is. The country, for the most part, is Pro-choice, and these state amendments will settle the issue. As a student of History, especially American History, issues get debated, and once one side wins, the issue gets resolved. Soon, we will start having pro-choice Republicans who should use the old Clinton line of safe, legal, and rare to speak about Abortion. It's a personal issue that should be left to an individual. Deep moral matters many have with it, but in the United States, we don't impose our private moral views on others. Roe killed the country having that debate and left it to fester and divide rather than get settled.
Soon. I think by the end of the decade, this will play out, Abortion will be legal, and the debate over making the Dobbs decision a landmark case for the rights of voters to set laws, not people in robes who think they know what is best.
"The Vote was 7-2 with a total of nine, not the score of 435 or 100 or 37 states. It was a group of people on the court who felt they knew best rather than letting Democracy decide." Oh, but they DID! By overturning Dobbs the court kicked the can back to the states where it SHOULD have been in the first place before the "Black Robes" decreed it to be a "right"!
Robert , my comment was about the Roe decision not the Dobbs decision. I am complete agreement with your point.
Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought that Dobbs said that the federal government was washing its hands of the abortion question and was remanding it to each individual state. What it didn’t say was that they are legal or illegal, or that SCOTUS knows what’s best for people. It only said that it’s not a Constitutional question, i.e., there’s no Constitutional right to them.
The Constitution explicitly states that we have a government of enumerated, i.e., specified powers. If an issue is not specified, the federal government isn’t supposed to be involved. Roe violated that notion by inventing abortion as a listed right; Dobbs merely corrected that.
There’s also no Constitutional right to owning a Ferrari, dining on caviar and champagne, living in brick houses, or preferring soap operas to what passes for the news. The Constitution is silent about these choices. That doesn’t make them illegal.
I am in agreement with you. And when you leave it to the states, people through direct democracy or through elected representatives get to vote. I didn't want to get into enumerated powers as I don't want to bore people first thing in the morning.
I usually wait until around 10 to start boring people. Then I hit the ground running.
;-)
So true. The pro-choice side was always living in fear of End of Roe Apocalypse. But turns out Roe was keeping everything suspended and the issue being unsettled. Conservatives here are upset that women are all voting for abortion right in droves right now. But in the long run, in 10-20 years when this issue is finally settled at state level, the Ds won't be able to hold women's vote hostage with their carrot and stick approach for the last 50 f'king years. For that, I'm truly truly glad.
Let people keep voting for the anti-semite party. I want to see how Bari spins it.
She'll spin it because because so many of the Dem party leaders are Jewish, so they're not like traditional anti-Semites. Yet their policies continue to get Jews killed. What else would you call Biden's restoration of aid to Gaza - as they exulted in reversing Trump's ending it - which aid went directly to Hamas? And then there's the fact that the Squad - and its stooges - are actually anti-Semites who thirst for the destruction of Israel. Bari is the traditional Democrat, for whom membership in the party is a rite of passage or some odd birthright. So it will, indeed, be interesting to hear her spin. Especially as the censorship and coverups she professes to detest are all Democrat initiatives.
Yes I agree Bruce. Well Said.
TFP, you are biased for the Democrats. And they are the party of the demise of the Jews. As an independent voter, I ask you to consider the difference between a candidate that does not agree with your lifestyle and a party that doesn’t think Israel and Jews should exist. To me, it’s a no-brainer, but if you think abortion rights are the real problem in America, well…
I don’t think it’s possible for every writer to mask their opinion 100% of the time. I believe innocent life protection from womb to tomb, but I really want to understand why others believe differently. I want free and open discussion here, especially on these most difficult issues. That’s what TFP is doing.
The writers may have a bias, but they’re not shutting me down or attacking me with ad hominem. This us the only way.
This must be a different sort of place where we reject ad hominem and demand honest, thoughtful representation of the ourselves and others, whether or not we agree.
Because people who vote for abortion rights do not see fetuses as full human life. I'm not sure they all think that way about late-term. That one is really a drum-up issue to rally the base for both sides. But the national consensus and also in Europe is somewhere between the first trimester to early second trimester. Most people don't see fetuses at that stage the same as a fully born human. I know this is hard to hear for people who are prolife, but it is what it is. There's a conflict of moral perspectives here that cannot be reconciled.
I agree that we need more free and open discussion! Personally, I do not believe we should ban abortion because of the variety of scenarios where I do think it necessary. For example, rape, incest, the life of the mother, and fetal abnormalities.
Unfortunately, we live in a world where abortion is taken far too lightly, it is absolutely a serious and morally complex decision. However, I think we have to reconcile ourselves to the horrible truth that life is often brutal and cruel and sometimes the death of an innocent is preferable to a life of misery.
But who decides that?
Sorry, I’m not quite sure what you are asking and I want to address your question accurately. What do you mean by “that”?
Like who defines what is a miserable enough existence that life isn’t valuable anymore. It seems too subjective and fraught with peril, especially for those who can’t speak for themselves.
I’m sorry- I meant which innocents?
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When will people realize that there is no abortion “issue”: The vast majority of Americans believe in a woman’s right to control her body. End of story. Since this is a matter of personal morality, politicians should stick to their beliefs and not change them to gain votes. If you don’t believe in abortion don’t have one.
I have a really hard time when people start frothing at the mouth over the abortion "issue". For one, it's interesting that people used to rail at Republican evangelicals for being a "single-issue" voter (i.e., they're Republican because that's the pro-life side), when now, dems are voting democratic because that's STILL the single issue, it just switched sides. This ignores so much nuance in individuals and in party politics, it drives me a little bonkers. Second, this is dealing with life, liberty, and human rights, both for mother and child, so it's a big, big, big, (big, big, big) deal.
There STILL doesn't seem to be a consensus on what defines life and autonomy. You could argue that a fetus is solely reliant on the mother's body and therefore isn't autonomous, but that just smacks of "ableism", if I use a term that's more lefty. It's also pretty "ageist" to say that a fetus has rights at 15 or 22 weeks but not 6. Why? Why 15? Why 6? These numbers have NO MEANING. If I'm wrong, please enlighten me. If you say that abortions should be legal up until the age of viability, what does that even mean? Does that mean that rural communities with less advanced NICU technologies can have abortions later than people who live in the city? What happens when technology breakthroughs happen and that age goes way, way down? If you want to talk about rape, incest, etc, then I'm up for that, too, because that small percentage, while it doesn't address the bulk of abortions occurring in America, represents real people, too. While rape, incest, and all forms of sexual assault are never permissible, if a child is a product of rape, should they be punished? I really don't know what the answer is here, but I don't think it's as black and white as people like to believe. Abortion doesn't erase the trauma of the assault, and it could honestly just heap more shame and guilt on the victim(s). Just an additional note for people who like to use this line of reasoning: Be careful when you say this. You don't know who in your audience is a product of rape. I personally know at least 2 people who are products of rape, and I highly doubt they agree with your line of reasoning. Don't use these people (or medically necessary abortions) as a scapegoat for the masses who are getting abortions out of convenience.
There's no point in debating policy if we don't have all the facts. One fact that remains is that no one can give a satisfying answer on when a life is considered a life except the two extremes. Either life begins at conception/implantation, or life begins when a fetus takes its first breath. If life begins at conception, then abortion at any time cutoff is killing someone. If life begins at birth, then abortion should be legal up to birth.
There's a lot more I could say here, but I'd need a long form podcast show to get it all out. If you disagree, I'm happy to discuss this more. I just think all of our policy issues start and end with THIS disagreement. If you made it this far, thanks for reading.
Excellent post.
You cannot fix Stupid.
Now we love death more than life. Where have I heard that before?