The Rodeo

Oh how I wish your vote counted

Thanks for that Christine.

This response from Obama (as spoken in opposition to the bill) gives the impression that he only considers a child to be one that has been in the womb for nine months.

There was some suggestion that we might be able to craft something that might meet constitutional muster with respect to caring for fetuses or children who were delivered in this fashion. Unfortunately, this bill goes a little bit further, and so … this is probably not going to survive constitutional scrutiny. Number one, whenever we define a pre-viable fetus as a person that is protected by the equal protection clause or other elements in the Constitution, what we’re really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a — a child, a nine-month-old — child that was delivered to term. That determination, then, essentially, if it was accepted by a court, would forbid abortions to take place. I mean, it — it would essentially bar abortions, because the equal protection clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an antiabortion statute.

Either way, it offends me greatly, and he comes off as an extremely slimy person.

So I agree that the particular issue you point out is disturbing, and the article is certainly dramatic. From reading Obama’s statement, it reads to me like he considered it carefully and determined that the consequences of the change would be much farther reaching than was originally intended. That is a good thing. People should read and interpret legislation properly, not just rubber stamp it because it has a fancy name like “The PATRIOT Act”. Now the statement reads cold, because it is cold. It’s a logically constructed argument about something that you feel strongly about.

Even though we don’t agree on the general topic of abortion I certainly agree that the scenario described in the article is horrific.

On the question of “viable foetus”, surely it should mean “foetus that there is a chance of nursing to health”.

Now I didn’t mean to post this comment as an apologist for this, and I’ve rambled on too long already. So I’ll stop.

Hi Andy,
thanks for your response.

I’m not sure who I would vote for - McCain is the only other nominee at the moment, but there are no independents (I’m aware of) yet. And I am not of the opinion that you have to vote for one of the two main parties (same goes in Australia - I voted Independent for one of the last elections).

Pro-life isn’t my only issue when voting, but someone pushing for legalising (more) abortion gets my nay-vote, and then I decide amongst those remaining.

What annoyed me most was this portion of Obama’s statement:

I mean, it — it would essentially bar abortions, because the equal protection clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an antiabortion statute.

It seems he won’t consider it because he has decided that limiting abortions is a deal-breaker for him and therefore there is no way he would consider the bill, whether it is morally right or not, because it might draw the line determining what a child is closer to conception than it already stands.