Why Democrats Can�t Talk Honestly About Abortion

[Mountain Man]

Drone strikes can and do kill pregnant women - and their unborn children with them.

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/23/drone-strike-al-qaida-targets-white-house

Earlier this month, a collaborative report from the Open Society Justice Initiative and researchers from the Yemeni nongovernmental organization Mwatana Organization for Human Rights documented nine US air strikes between May 2012 and April 2014 that caused civilian harm.

Based on interviews with victims and their relatives, eyewitnesses, doctors and hospital staff, the report cites a US drone strike that killed 12 people, including a pregnant woman and three children, as well as another incident in which the US struck a house containing 19 people, including women and children.

© Copyright Original Source

Now show me one single conservative on this forum who has ever said they're "fine" with this.

[Christianbookworm]

Innocents being killed in war is always a tragedy that should not happen. Duh! Who even would think that is an optimal outcome???

[Roy]

Now show me one single conservative on this forum who has ever said they're "fine" with this.

Why should I? That has nothing to do with your false claim that drone strikes weren't like "killing an innocent human life before it has even left the womb".

Grow some cojones and admit you were wrong, rather than trying to dodge responsibility for your falsehoods.

P.S. here.

[Mountain Man]

Why should I? That has nothing to do with your false claim that drone strikes weren't like "killing an innocent human life before it has even left the womb".

Grow some cojones and admit you were wrong, rather than trying to dodge responsibility for your falsehoods.

P.S. here.

Do I really need to point out to you that there is a significant difference between an accidental killing of an innocent in a combat situation, and a deliberate killing of an innocent in an abortion clinic?

And I'm not going chase this rabbit trail, but I think you've misunderstood Darth Executor. He didn't say he was fine with Innocents being targeted by the military but challenged the idea that civilians who contribute to their country's war efforts should be considered innocent. As I recall, nobody presented a good rebuttal.

[Roy]

Do I really need to point out to you that there is a significant difference between an accidental killing of an innocent in a combat situation, and a deliberate killing of an innocent in an abortion clinic?

No, you need to grow some cojones and stop avoiding responsibility for your falsehoods. Like, for example, when you pretend that drone strikes are "combat situations".

And I'm not going chase this rabbit trail, but I think you've misunderstood Darth Executor. He didn't say he was fine with Innocents being targeted by the military but challenged the idea that civilians who contribute to their country's war efforts should be considered innocent. As I recall, nobody presented a good rebuttal.

He said civilians could be targeted because they were "contributing to the war machine". How exactly do the unborn contribute to war efforts?

[carpedm9587]

You do realize, I'm sure, that when the woman is "dilating", we're only moments from an actual birth, right?

Yes

This is a FAR CRY from "abortions should be safe, legal and rare" and not beyond the first (or second) trimester, yes?

I dont see where this bill compromises "safe, legal, and rare." And I don't understand the latter boundary. It appears to me to be as arbitrary as "quickening" or "heartbeat" or "brain waves" or any other arbitrary boundary that has been put out there. If the mother's life is at risk - it is at risk. If the fetus is nonviable - it is nonviable. The bill as about extending the criteria for the abortion to include non-viability of the fetus.

And again - I am not in favor of abortion. I don't think abortions should happen even in the case of a rape. I think abortion is immoral with only a very few narrow exceptions (having to do with the status of the fetus and life of the mother). I just think the conversation should be an honest one - so I found it ironic that a thread with this title started with an article that misrepresents the truth.

Carpe -- this is BEYOND the "slippery slope" --- this is so incredibly draconian that I would never have thought the liberals would have pushed THIS far. The logical question is -- where does this stop?

So I'm not having the somewhat over-the-top reaction you are having, despite my position against abortion. This isn't a major shift, AFAICT. It's a relatively minor adjustment to an already in-place law. I think you need to take a deep breath, stop reading the hyper-partisan language of the anti-abortion/pro-life sources, and read the actual bill and look at what it does and does not say. You are reacting as if the new law let's people rip a healthy child from a healthy woman's womb and stab it with a knife in the delivery room.


ETA: I just saw the post about your wife and your accident. I hope she is healing well, and that your accident was not too serious.

[Mountain Man]

No, you need to grow some cojones and stop avoiding responsibility for your falsehoods. Like, for example, when you pretend that drone strikes are "combat situations".

What I said was that it was not analogous to abortion, and it's not.

(Of course you're going to nitpick as usual and say, "But you never said 'abortion', you said 'killing an innocent human life before it has even left the womb (or even minutes after, if some especially evil liberals have their way)'," but given the context of this thread and the post I was responding to, it will be obvious to any reasonable person that I was referring specifically to abortion. For record, I've never mistaken you for a reasonable person.)

He said civilians could be targeted because they were "contributing to the war machine". How exactly do the unborn contribute to war efforts?

And where did Darth Executor say he was OK with the killing of the unborn?

[carpedm9587]

OK, look at this....

"If a mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen. The infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that's what the mother and the family desired. And then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother. So I think this was really blown out of proportion,"

Let's break it down....

"If a mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen. The infant would be delivered.

Even Northam, a pediatrician, for cryin' out loud, is no longer referring to a "fetus", but an "infant". The infant would be delivered - so you have an actual baby there.

So let's begin by remembering that he had been asked about a specific situation: if the baby survived the 3rd trimester abortion and was born alive. And let's further remember that the bill stipulates that the attempted abortion can ONLY be performed if a) the fetus is non-viable or b) the woman's life/health are at risk. Let's continue on....

Let's continue...

The infant would be kept comfortable.

We'd have to assume the baby, at this point, is alive, yes? In order to "be kept comfortable".

Yes, we assume, based on the statement, that the infant (out of the womb) is living - which aligns with the question that was asked, which initiated this response. It is either healthy (so the abortion was attempted because the mother's life was at risk and no safe way to deliver the child existed - which the law requires ) or because the infant is "non-viable," which means it is at imminent risk of death.

Then he seems to ....

The infant would be resuscitated if that's what the mother and the family desired.

The "kept comfortable" infant... needs to be resuscitated... from what?

Remember - two reasons for the abortion: infant not viable - mother's life/health threatened. If the infant needs resuscitation, it is either not-viable, or it was harmed during the abortion. Someone has to make the assessment, "what will this infant's life be like if it lives?" If it is non-viable, the family may elect to not resuscitate - for the same reason someone with stage-four cancer elects not to get chemo or radiation treatment. Only here, the infant cannot make the decision - the parents must. The same is true if it was harmed during the abortion.

We're talking about a baby, no longer "my body", but "My body vs the baby's body". The infant is no longer "part of the body" of the woman.

Correct

And note, Northam refers to her as "the mother" and family.

And then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.

What would this discussion be about? What's to discuss?

Well, let's see. A baby was just born that was to be aborted. It was to be aborted because it's non-viable, or the mother's health was at risk. The baby has just been resuscitated (if needed). So the discussion could be about:

1) what short-term plans are (stay in hospital, continued medical intervention, etc.).
2) what long-term medical plan there is for the child (assuming it has been medically compromised or was aborted because it is non-viable).
3) what long term parenting plan there is for the child (because the parents cannot provide the care the child needs, or the mother's health is too compromised to be an effective mother, or any of the legion of reasons a mother/father has to decide to place their child for adoption)

In other words, there is a living infant there - possibly medically compromised - and a set of parents that had opted for abortion. Do they want to be parents? What's next?

You (and most of the right) is jumping on "they're discussing whether or not to kill the living infant." The law does not permit that in any state, and neither does this abortion law.

And I notice that everyone continues to avoid my question: does anyone here think 58% of the population of the United States, probably including many of your friends, neighbors, and even family, are functioning sociopaths?

That's the fourth time I've asked the question with no response - three in this thread. I find myself wondering why no one wants to respond.

[Mountain Man]

Senate Democrats Block Bill to Protect Babies Surviving Abortion

"I don't care what party you're from -- if you can't say that it's wrong to leave babies to die after birth, get the hell out of public office!"
-Senator Ben Sasse

[Roy]

No, you need to grow some cojones and stop avoiding responsibility for your falsehoods. Like, for example, when you pretend that drone strikes are "combat situations".

What I said was that it was not analogous to abortion, and it's not. :ahem

And where did Darth Executor say he was OK with the killing of the unborn?

"How is being a civillian inherently more worthy of protection than being a soldier? Wars aren't personal disputes between individual soldiers, they are massive disputes between groups of people, some performing different functions but all of them contributing to the war machine."

Pregnant women are included in both "civilian" and "groups of people", therefore not worthy of more protection that soldiers. He's OK with killing civilians, including pregnant women and hence their foetuses.

Do you have the cojones to admit this?
Do you have the cojones to admit that drone strikes are not "combat situations"?

I doubt it.

[carpedm9587]

Senate Democrats Block Bill to Protect Babies Surviving Abortion

"I don't care what party you're from -- if you can't say that it's wrong to leave babies to die after birth, get the hell out of public office!"
-Senator Ben Sasse

Such absolutes are good for the optics, but don't hold up under scrutiny. Yes, if you leave a healthy child to die after birth by not feeding it and not caring for it, you're a monster and the law will treat you as the murderer you are. But if a child is born with half it's heart protruding from it's chest, hydro-cephalic, and with severe deformities to its limbs, the situation is different. As painful as it may be, a parent has to ask "what kind of life will this child have if I intervene with all of the arsenal of the modern medical world?" Yes, the heart can be put back in and may keep beating. But with hydrocephalia, the child will have little or no cognitive function. With severe deformities it will have little ability to care for itself. It will live with little/no quality of life while draining resources that could keep other children in the family fed and housed and placing a massive drain on the medical community. Every situation has a cost/benefit. Sometimes, the humane thing to do is let nature take its course and let the child die naturally, with no intervention.

My neighbor recently had to make this decision. After weeks of trying to keep their baby alive, they realized the next step was to amputate both legs (they were becoming gangrenous) and even if that worked, the lack of blood to much of the body had severely damaged the brain, so the baby would "grow up" a limp of living human flesh in a bed with no responses and no detectable cognitive function. They ceased all medical intervention, and held their child until it passed. And they grieved.

So, with due deference to Mr. Sasse - he's wrong. Sometimes the compassionate thing to do is nothing - and to let an infant die. My heart goes out to every parent faced with this choice. It is my hope that it is a very rare thing.

Meanwhile, I support the blocking of the bill. We already have laws on the books protecting human life from random killing. I don't see the need to add yet another one.

[Mountain Man]

He's OK with killing civilians, including pregnant women and hence their foetuses.

He never said "pregnant women".

And I suppose we could have a discussion about what exactly constitutes a "combat situation", but that's beside the point, which is that, as far as I know, drone strikes, unlike abortions, are never ordered with the intent of killing innocent lives.

I suppose your posts do serve some purpose, which is proving the premise of this thread that liberals can't talk honestly about abortion, so you at least have that going for you.

[Mountain Man]

Such absolutes are good for the optics, but don't hold up under scrutiny. Yes, if you leave a healthy child to die after birth by not feeding it and not caring for it, you're a monster and the law will treat you as the murderer you are. But if a child is born with half it's heart protruding from it's chest, hydrocephalic, and with severe deformities to its limbs, the situation is different. As painful as it may be, a parent has to ask "what kind of life will this child have if I intervene with all of the arsenal of the modern medical world? Yes, the heart can be put back in and may keep beating. But with hydrocephalia, the child will have little or no cognitive function. With severe deformities it will have little ability to care for itself. It will live with little no quality - draining resources that could keep other children in the family fed and housed, and place a massive drain on the medical community. Every situation has a cost/benefit. Sometimes, the humane thing to do is let nature take its course and let the child die naturally, with no intervention.

My neighbor recently had to make this decision. After weeks of trying to keep their baby alive, they realized the next step was to amputate both legs (they were becoming gangrenous) and even if that worked, the lack of blood to much of the body had severely damaged the brain, so the baby would "grow up" a limp of living human flesh in a bed with no responses and no detectable cognitive function. They ceased all medical intervention, and held their child until it passed. And they grieved.

So with due deference to Mr. Sasse - he's wrong. Sometimes the compassionate thing to do is nothing - and to let an infant die. My heart goes out to every parent faced with this choice. It is my hope that it is a very rare thing.

And I support the blocking of the bill. We already have laws on the books protecting human life from random killing. I don't see the need to add yet another one.

We're not talking about babies born with extreme and life-threatening deformities but otherwise healthy babies who manage to survive the attempt to murder them through abortion.

[carpedm9587]

We're not talking about babies born with extreme and life-threatening deformities but otherwise healthy babies who manage to survive the attempt to murder them through abortion.

THAT is what the right wants to make this about - but the fact is no one on the left is talking about killing healthy babies outside the womb.

So I repeat - for the fourth time in this thread: does anyone here think 58% of the population of the United States, probably including many of your friends, neighbors, and even family, are functioning sociopaths?

[Cow Poke]

So I repeat - for the fourth time in this thread: does anyone here think 58% of the population of the United States, probably including many of your friends, neighbors, and even family, are functioning sociopaths?

Can you please provide a succinct and clear explanation for why you're asking this question?

thanks