Abortion Restrictionists Go Bold

No more baseball fight-style standoffs in the abortion wars. Plus: so-called constitutional crises, Bernie's credit paternalism, and GoT redux on the Reason Podcast.

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Abortion Restrictionists Go Bold

The political/culture wars are once again at full throttle as Georgia becomes the latest in a series of states to enact serious abortion restrictions, in this case a ban on the procedure when a fetal heartbeat can be detected. Is the longstanding legal/cultural consensus (or political standoff) about abortion—that it should be legally available during the first trimester—giving way to a more extreme agenda by polarized advocates on each side? That's the thorny question underlying this week's Editors' Roundtable edition of the Reason Podcast, featuring Katherine Mangu-Ward, Nick Gillespie, Peter Suderman and Matt Welch.

Other items up for discussion include our latest "constitutional crisis," the most recent installment of that television show, and also this tweet:

In The Divine Comedy, Dante reserved a special place in the Seventh Circle of Hell for people who charged usurious interest rates. Today we don't need the hellfire, but we do need a national usury law that caps interest rates on credit cards and consumer loans at 15 percent. pic.twitter.com/i4vnZOwFB2

— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) May 13, 2019

Subscribe, rate, and review our podcast at iTunes.

Audio production by Ian Keyser.

Relevant links from the show:

"'Heartbeat Bills' Banning Almost All Abortions Are Back," by Elizabeth Nolan Brown

"Let Midwives and Nurse Practitioners Provide First-Trimester Abortions, Says Federal Court," by Elizabeth Nolan Brown

"The Abortion Divide Shows a Fight Growing Ever More Bitter," by Glenn Garvin

"'Record Low Are 'Pro-choice,' Yet 75 Percent Support Abortion Rights," by Nick Gillespie

"Abortion & Libertarianism: Nick Gillespie, Ronald Bailey, Mollie Hemingway, and Katherine Mangu-Ward," by Nick Gillespie and Joshua Swain

"Debate: Libertarians Should Support Abortion Rights," by Tibor Machan and Karl Pflock

"Wishing for a Constitutional Crisis," by Keith Whittington

"The Real Constitutional Crisis Is Congress' Unwillingness to Do Its Job," by Matt Welch

"Forget Robert Mueller. Trump's Attacks On Syria Are a Reminder We're Already in a Constitutional Crisis," by Peter Suderman

"Firing the FBI Director Is Not a 'Constitutional Crisis,'" by Jacob Sullum

"Bernie Sanders' New Plan Will Make It Tougher for Poor People To Get Credit Cards," by Peter Suderman

"Three Cheers for Usury," by Katherine Mangu-Ward

"Payday of Reckoning," by Katherine Mangu-Ward

"In Defense of Payday Loans," by Nick Gillespie and Jim Epstein

"On Game of Thrones, Absolute Power Corrupts Daenerys Targaryen Absolutely," by Robby Soave

What are we consuming this week?

Matt Welch

• NBA Conference Semi-Finals
• The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)

Katherine Mangu-Ward

• "Was Shakespeare a Woman?"
• The Power by Naomi Alderman

Nick Gillespie

• Game of Thrones
• Veep

Peter Suderman

• Game of Thrones
• My Father Left Me Ireland: An American Son's Search for Home by Michael B. Dougherty

---

Comments

[Red Rocks White Privilege]

Considering Blue States either passed or promoted bills that supported abortion all the way up to and including the time when the baby was taking the Magic Trip Down the Birth Canal (and afterwards, when they "make it comfortable"), it's not really a surprise to see Red States limiting it to their own arbitrary point.

Just remember, the vast majority of Americans want at least *some* restriction on the practice, including those who consider themselves pro-abortion. And as long as hospitals are making efforts to keep preemies alive in NICUs long before their actual due date, it's going to stay that way.

[Last of the Shitlords]

The ‘heartbeat bill’ is more reasonable than legalizing post birth baritone, which is flat out infanticide.

[Juice]

The baby comes out singing "Nobody knows the trouble I seen..."

[Ray McKigney]

LOL.

[Rat on a train]

Through the 75th trimester!

[Chipper Morning Wood]

That's not a valid argument in support of these laws.

[Nardz]

And that's not a valid objection to them

[Kevin Smith]

If you can't produce valid support for a law then that is, by default, a valid objection. We should not be banning things just for the sake of banning them, or to make certain groups of people "feel good"

[Nardz]

It's a question of homicide, and at what point it crosses the line from permitted to illegal.
Your general point is true, but your use of it here is idiotic

[ace_m82]

"Is the longstanding legal/cultural consensus (or political standoff) about abortion—that it should be legally available during the first trimester—giving way to a more extreme agenda by polarized advocates on each side?"

I'll steal the comment from someone a few weeks ago who said something along the lines of no, one side ALWAYS said it was murder, though the other said it should be legal, safe, and rare, and now says it should be legal, safe, and common.

"Consensus" =/= moral or ethical. It means majority, and it likely doesn't even mean that in the case of the above quote.

[Brandybuck]

Legal, safe, and rare is such a rarity [sic] nowadays. I used to think Rush Limbaugh was an idiot for calling abortion a feminist sacrament, but in truth way too many feminists act like it actually is a sacrament.

Regardless of which side you're on, if you're treating abortion as a means of birth control, you're doing it wrong. Only only should abortion be legal, safe, and rare, the further along the fetal development the MORE rare it should be!

p.s. And fuck all those feminists who are playing footsie with infanticide!

[Last of the Shitlords]

I know someone that has had thirteen abortions, and doesn’t see anything wrong with that. No extenuating circumstances, just careless about fucking and didn’t want more kids.

She didn’t appreciate it when I said she was a monster.

[loveconstitution1789]

Thirteen!?! Holy crap!

If she killed that many people outside the womb, she would be considered a mass murderer.

[ace_m82]

Or a politician.

[Eric]

Seems to me that killing even one “baby” would make a woman a monster. Of course I don’t think a clump of cells is a baby either.

[Nardz]

You're a clump of cells too, eric.

[Eric]

You know what I mean.

[Nardz]

Do I?
Maybe you should explain it to me.
What is a clump of cells?
What is a person?
What separates one from the other?

[TJJ2000]

Self-sustainable at the cellular level.

[ace_m82]

Many premature babies aren't.

[TJJ2000]

Which is exactly the scenario used by Roe v Wade. The most premature (test-tube) baby (entirely technology supported growth) to ever even survive was 21-weeks; pegged exactly as such by the Supreme Court. 80% premature at 27-weeks are severely retarded.

[Fancylad]

How many cells until it's no longer a clump.

[Azathoth!!]

How many cells until it’s no longer a clump.

Maybe when it's got differentiated organs inside it? 'Clumps' of cells doing specific jobs?

A functioning heart is an easy example of a clump of cells differentiated from the rest.

Say--it'd be a good indicator.

[TJJ2000]

The real question - Which individuals "clump of cells" are public domain (up for public debate). I'm not sure you should have the right to argue about how I trim my fingernails.

[ace_m82]

A living full human has rights (not is "public domain", which is the opposite of rights).

A hand has no rights. The owner of it does, and likely wants it back.

[Vernon Depner]

Doesn’t it take two people to be careless about fucking?

[Last of the Shitlords]

Yep. She tended to bang losers.

[damikesc]

Planned Parenthood whines about the attacks on reproductive health.

To paraphrase Brit Hume, Planned Parenthood does a lot of things...reproduction isn't one of them.

[Michael Ejercito]

Gloria Steinem once said that if men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament.

She might have been on to something.

I suspect those who believe men could get pregnant also consider abortion to be a sacrament.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

If conservatives wish to ensure that there is a Democratic majority on the Supreme Court in a few years, they should work harder to criminalize abortion -- and not just in the can't-keep-up states.

[Last of the Shitlords]

Most people aren’t soulless creatures like you and don’t want infants murdered.

[Juice]

the can’t-keep-up states

Illinois or New Jersey?

[Fancylad]

Only leftists like Kirkland and Tony could possibly think that allowing the slaughter of their political opponents children is an acceptable political strategy.

[Last of the Shitlords]

I despise progtards, but would never kill their children. Who are guilty of nothing.

[Azathoth!!]

I think it's hilarious that Artie and Tony think that it's conservatives kids being aborted.

[Tony]

You're the only ones treating this as a political-demographic issue. You people are insane.

[Brandybuck]

Notice in the picture above how many approving women are looking on. One myth of the abortion debate, even among libertarians, is that pro-life stances are coming from males and a "patriarchy". Not true. It's women who are overwhelmingly driving the pro-life movement. It may be a women's issue, but women are deeply divided over it.

I'm not going to state my stance here, I'm a coward and fear getting burned at the stake. But I know enough to know that there are far more women wanting to overturn RvW than there are men. Sorry KMW, but it's true. Many may dominate in the legislature and courts, but it's women driving this issue on both sides.

Some women put a higher priority on non-interference in their personal sexual choices, but at least as many other women put a higher priority on the sanctity of life.

I'm not going to say that personhood starts with conception, but neither am I going to say that personhood only starts after the baby fully exits the birth canal. The truth is a fuzzy line somewhere in between, and picking one arbitrary point over another (end of first trimester vs first heartbeat vs whatever) is just as good as another.

[loveconstitution1789]

Women tend to be behind much of the Nanny-State nonsense.

1. Much of the run-away Domestic Violence laws and subsequent abuses of power
2. Refusing to abide by historical precedent that accused are innocent until proven guilty.
3. Social programs to "save/help people"
....

I believe it to be why the Nanny-State has grown so fast over the past 30 years. Women on the Left and Right want their agendas pushed.

[TJJ2000]

+1000

[MiloMinderbinder]

It's 2019. Abortion is no longer about women's bodies. Men can get pregnant too.

[Brandybuck]

Yeah, but they're really women who were born women and merely "identify" as men. Because government schools taught them that gender was merely an ephemeral choice.

[Azathoth!!]

The correct term is 'people with uteruses'. Uteri?

There are more than two genders.

[Last of the Shitlords]

Wasn’t that a Springsteen song? ‘57 genders and nothing’s on’.

[JFree]

Notice in the picture above how many approving women are looking on.

I don't disagree that much of the argument is driven by women (who in the R tent just seem ok with letting the stupider men do the speaking for them). But I've got a lot of experience inside the R tent and I know those types of folks very well. And if, instead of them looking at a gov signing a bill, they were looking at their own pregnant teenage daughter; those faces would look very different.

[loveconstitution1789]

Social Conservatives have been learning from Lefty's strategy.

Pass laws that might be struck down but by the time they wind their way through the courts, some of the laws might just stick.

[Fist of Etiquette]

What's the timestamp where we get past all the abortion stuff and talk about the cheapness of human life for a lady on the climb?

[Dillinger]

soon as everyone runs out of money to donate.

[Brandybuck]

The later is just a reflection on the first. We just have to talk about poor women getting abortions before we get to the ladies on the climb getting abortions.

[Dillinger]

won't somebody please think of the unborn children?

[TJJ2000]

As soon as you think of my "unearned" income. lol..

[esteve7]

So if 6 weeks is too soon, then where is the line? The idea that it isn't a human until it magically goes through the birth canal at 9 months is absurd.

I was born 3 months premature. Was I a baby or not? Where is the line? The notion that something is subjectively a human depending on the feelings of the mother at a given time is insane. There has to be an objective standard, and it's not when it is an inch away from being outside the birth canal.

[EscherEnigma]

There has to be an objective standard [...]

Why? Because you want one?

Too bad. For all of human history there hasn't been one. And when folks do think about it, they inevitably come up with different ideas. The long-standing one was "breath of life", with "quickening" becoming popular a few centuries back. The whole "fetal heartbeat" is as arbitrary as those were.

So yeah... while you may want an objective standard, there's no reason to think there must me one, just waiting to be discovered.

For that matter, even if there is an actually objective standard waiting to be discovered, what makes you think we're anywhere close to it? As a hypothetical, consider the possibility of a soul, and specifically ensoulment. If such a thing were true, then that would probably do fine as an "objective standard" ... assuming it could actually be measured. Which is to say, even if there is a hypothetical objective standard, that doesn't mean we're close to finding and using it.

[Dillinger]

>>>what makes you think we’re anywhere close to it?

why i err on side of caution.

[chemjeff radical individualist]

I think that is the smartest take, really.

[Mickey Rat]

Because the law is a yes/no proposition and if you do not have a objective standard you will have a subjective, nonsensical standard.

[Brandybuck]

There is not objective standard, but there can be a firm legal standard. IF there's not, if it's just what progressives want at the moment, then you are in territory where babies, born babies, babies outside of the womb, are shoved down garbage disposals because they are inconvenient to the mother's weekend plans.

The legal limit should be between the extreme points of conception and birth. And NOT near either extreme either. A heatrbeat might not be the right point, but it's just as good as another. The first trimester might not be the right point, but it's just as good as another.

For me it's somewhere after embryo development (arms, legs, heartbeat) and before viability (with or without medical intervention). Which leaves somewhere between the end of the first trimester and start of the third. I lean towards the earlier.

Also note that I'm a libertarian. I do NOT want to go around arresting mothers for having abortions one day too late. A law is a harsh thing and I want any new law to err on the side of caution.

So yeah, no such thing as an objective standard. But we can have a legal standard. It may be arbitrary, but it can still be reasonable. If only people would be reasonable in talking about the issue.

[Eric]

I think most we’ll-meaning people could agree on the third trimester as the line. After that line it has to be on a case by case basis (ie. brain dead infant, protect the life of the mother, etc)

[chemjeff radical individualist]

But that would make too much sense and will never fly in this political climate.

The moment you say "abortion should generally be restricted, except in particularly difficult cases where doctors have exercised considerable professional judgment", you will have Team Red screaming "they are killing babies!!!!"

And the moment you say "abortion should generally be permitted, except in particular cases where certain individuals wish to make particularly unwise choices", you will have Team Blue screaming "they are enslaving women!!!!"

There is no room for reasoned argument or nuance. Because any nuance is the camel's nose under the tent for screaming hysterics and demagoguery.

The pro-life crowd really need to think hard about whether they truly intend for every single procreative act to result in birth, even if the act is nonconsensual, and even if the child is horribly deformed, and way beyond in a Down's Syndrome type of way - babies who are born with like 10% of a brain and will only live a few hours after birth, that sort of thing. Is it really the moral thing to do to ban all abortions even for these very very hard cases?

And the pro-choice crowd really need to think hard about the depravity of certain women, and men who manipulate women, to make some rather shameful choices. They have doubtless not really internalized Gosnell's Clinic of Horrors. Even if a health 8-month-old fetus isn't a full human being, it still has some proportion of rights that a human being does have, and using the power of the state to protect human rights isn't tyranny and isn't slavery.

But we can't have this discussion because demagoguery rules the day on this issue.

[Mickey Rat]

When the pro-life side is willing to take compromise position they are accused of not being serious about their principles. It is the pro abortion rights side that cannot accept any middle ground.

[Eric]

A compromised position like 6 weeks? Most women don’t know they’re pregnant at that point unless they’re keeping tabs. It’s a de-facto abortion ban.

[Last of the Shitlords]

I have a friend who is an NNP. Babies are frequently viable to a little before twenty weeks with modern incubator technology if the baby is otherwise healthy. Which is long before the third trimester.

So why should those babies not be protected?

[damikesc]

"A compromised position like 6 weeks? Most women don’t know they’re pregnant at that point unless they’re keeping tabs. It’s a de-facto abortion ban."

Funny, women I know are aware of a late period on the first day of it being late.

[JFree]

There are only four doctors (were 5 - one was killed) in the US who perform third trimester abortions. 40 states do restrict them. Those sorts of abortions are all case-by-case basis and by third trimester the women have usually made the decision to have a baby. And then there is some diagnosis of what will be a fatal condition.

Watch the documentary After Tiller (Tiller was the one murdered). Obviously no one does actually watch to find out about 3rd trimester stuff (21,760 views). Easier to watch mass media and write pols and make speeches in order to get govt in the middle of that decision.

I'll be damned if I can see where govt can stick itself in the middle and make a better decision.

[Last of the Shitlords]

You can’t see it? Two words: Kermit Gosnell.

[JFree]

Sure. You want to make abortion illegal so it will be safe. That'll work. Because you're not just interested in public self-congratulatory piety - or pithy two word explanations of nothing that prove how stupid/manipulated you are.

You do realize that that guy was in PA (the first state to restrict post-Roe - which became the Casey decision) - doing the abortions that were made illegal there post-Casey (teens who can't get parental consent, poor who can't afford waiting period while traveling long-distance, immigrants who didn't want their name given to the state). That's obviously just a complete coincidence - that the conservative justices on the SC created a market for illegal unsafe abortions.

[damikesc]

The states WON'T even investigate abortion mills.

Do you realize that during the fucking police entry into his clinic, where they found cat shit everywhere and women "recovering" on recliners with old, bloody towels on them --- PA STILL let him complete an abortion.

The cops were in the "clinic". Saw how gross everything was. And the state STILL wouldn't stop him nor even try to close his clinic for another month.

Pro-abortion folks give no shits about health.

[JFree]

Pro-abortion folks give no shits about health

He was not allowed to join the 'association' of abortion providers in PA - BECAUSE of those conditions. So he was NOT getting referrals for regular legal abortions. His only patients were those who were getting ILLEGAL abortions. It is BECAUSE those were illegal, that those in that situation had no choice and no ability to complain. Same reason that employers of illegals and landlords of illegals also offer crappy unsafe illegal conditions.

You 'libertarian' R's really don't understand complexity do you? I can at least understand why the fundies don't understand nuance/complexity. But you 'libertarians' who remain in that R tent and feel the need to make excuses for the Elmer Gantrys are really quite inexcusable yourselves.

[Azathoth!!]

He was not giving illegal abortions.

That is a lie.

Unreferred does not mean 'illegal'--if it did than nearly all the abortions performed by Planned Parenthood would be illegal.

Because most patients are not referred by their doctors.

[JFree]

The hell he wasn't. He was convicted of 21 counts of illegal late-term abortion and 211 counts of violating the 24-hour wait. If he had actually been keeping the records he was required to under law, I'm sure they would have found a few hundred teens who didn't get parental consent - and charged/convicted him of those too.

And by 'referrals' I mean the network of referrals that was used before google (and maybe even now). Those don't come from the doctor - esp not men (90% of OBGYN's were men in 1970; 40% are now). Those are every woman's first 'choice' of provider. Only when that network can't do something (usually because it's illegal) do women go to the 'last resort'.

[Azathoth!!]

He was convicted AFTER a huge amount of pro-life screeching.

AFTER the pro-choice community tried, endlessly, to deny it.

[damikesc]

"The hell he wasn’t. He was convicted of 21 counts of illegal late-term abortion"

He admitted in the raid that 10-20% of his abortions were illegal. He also manipulated ultrasounds to get a younger age for the fetus --- and he STILL got the law wrong and STILL aborted them late (he thought they were legal at 24.5 weeks...they were illegal at 24.0 weeks specifically). His own falsified records have him committing THOUSANDS of illegal abortions.

He did the REALLY late ones on Sunday with only his wife and took the records home and destroyed them. We have no idea exactly how many illegal ones he performed. It was a large, large number.

He violated the 24 hr wait basically every single time he did an abortion and did so for years.

[damikesc]

"He was not allowed to join the ‘association’ of abortion providers in PA – BECAUSE of those conditions. "

Know who never got notified of the problems?

ANY state agency. Nobody was notified.

The association didn't do anything to resolve the problem. They just let him go and kill and injure women and children.

"His only patients were those who were getting ILLEGAL abortions. "

There was literally zero chance he could pass a single health inspection --- if one was ever done. Again, one of the people in charge of the department of home-based health, who oversaw abortion, allowed him to continue doing an abortion in the middle of a police raid after having seen the horrendous conditions inside.

"Same reason that employers of illegals and landlords of illegals also offer crappy unsafe illegal conditions."

Except you will bend over backwards to protect people who are doing this.

[JFree]

Know who never got notified of the problems? ANY state agency. Nobody was notified.

Well that's what fucking happens when your 'clientele' are doing something illegal. Yeesh. Ain't too many by-the-hour motels that get anonymous calls to inspect for roaches or dirty sheets. How many sidewalk dealers get busted by their clients because they don't meet USP formulary regs?

And don't confuse me for an open borders advocate at all - tho I do despise E-Verify. I actually do think the right way to go after illegals is via landlords - since landlords are gonna call the state in a heartbeat to deport if they want to evict. Goose and gander and all.

[damikesc]

"Well that’s what fucking happens when your ‘clientele’ are doing something illegal. "

That abortion NETWORK didn't notify anybody. Their investigator, who told him no, didn't mention any concerns to any state agency.

See, most CREDIBLE medical associations wouldn't allow obviously criminal shit to go on because it makes them ALL look bad. Abortion? Not so much.

"Ain’t too many by-the-hour motels that get anonymous calls to inspect for roaches or dirty sheets. How many sidewalk dealers get busted by their clients because they don’t meet USP formulary regs?"

He fucking chained his emergency doors. When a patient DIED --- the doors were chained. MONTHS later...still chained. Because the state is far more worried about protecting abortion than it is in protecting women. And the abortion industry is no better.

[Last of the Shitlords]

Yes, we must clearly legalize murder to stop murders. Makes total sense.

[Last of the Shitlords]

Reminds of the manifesto that shitstain Joseph Duncan who murdered most of a family and then kidnapped the two remaining young children for his use in satisfying his unholy urges, of which Pedo Jeffy and PB support. They were a preteen brother and sister. After he tired of the boy, he brutally tortured him, making the sister watch, until he finally finished him off. He was spotted with the girl soon thereafter at a diner before he got round to murdering her too.

During his decade plus incarceration since then, as they haven’t gotten around to executing the piece of shit, he has managed to smuggle his ranting s out of prison to be published on the Internet. Where he explains that we’re he left alone to satisfy his unholy appetites that he wouldn’t have gotten angry and had to murder all those people.

That’s the kind of argument the pro infanticide crowd espouses.

[LiborCon]

So, the Right is passing unconstitutional abortion laws in the hope that they’ll get to the Supreme Court, which, they assume, will restrict or abolish abortion rights.

While the Left is passing unconstitutional gun laws in the hope that won’t get to the Supreme Court, because it will likely overturn them and strengthen gun rights.

[Ray McKigney]

These states are definitely looking to set up a test case for the new "conservative" majority on the Supreme Court. What I could see happening (though I really don't think it's very likely) is a majority of the Court holding that abortion is not a Constitutionally protected right. That would throw it back to the states, with some states remaining pro-abortion and some states adopting new restrictions and possibly outlawing it altogether. Such an outcome would be fine by me.

[NJ2AZ]

I think the conservatives hopefully for a favorable SCOTUS ruling are overplaying their hands. Kagan/Sotomeyor/Ginsburg are in the bag. I don't see Roberts as being one to want to rock the boat either. That means only one of the remaining five has to side with that bloc and RvW is here to stay.

I can't be alone in thinking the odds of that happening are sufficiently higher than zero.

[Unicorn Abattoir]

"In The Divine Comedy, Dante reserved a special place in the Seventh Circle of Hell for people who charged usurious interest rates"

And the 9th circle was for betrayers. How faithful have you been to the Constitution, Bernie?

[Dillinger]

>>>usurious interest rates

fifteen's cool though. love, bernie.

[JFree]

So states that had slavery are looking to reinstitute it. wottafuckingsurprise

[Unicorn Abattoir]

Any enslavement will come from the hard left. Portland's more likely to have slavery than Birmingham is.

[chemjeff radical individualist]

How about - slavery is wrong whether it comes from Portland or from Birmingham?

[Last of the Shitlords]

So is child rape, even when perpetrated by some noble illegal.

[DesigNate]

Not that I agree with the Georgia law, but What The Fuck? Equating not being allowed to kill a fetus (that is a direct result of your own actions and choices) with chattel slavery, really?

[JFree]

'Involuntary servitude' is the phrase used in the 13th Amendment. And like it or not, forcing a woman to carry even to viability (much less to term) when she does not want to is involuntary servitude to that fetus (and to the state that mandates that).

Your very moralistic absolutist characterization of that condition - ('a direct result of their own actions and choices') is EXACTLY the legal basis for allowing involuntary servitude under the 13th Amendment. You see it as righteous PUNISHMENT - and in your preferred world she'd be branded with a scarlet HO cross her forehead.

You are not the sort who will offer to pay for even basic pre-natal care for a woman who can't otherwise afford it. You are not the sort who will offer to pay the costs of early delivery (that's $3000-$4000 per DAY in a NICU - or up to $500,000+ for a baby born at day of viability) - but you are perfectly willing to mandate coerced delivery. You certainly won't offer to pay if something turns out bad and the fetus is not going to be 'normal'. And you sure as hell oppose any aid for the 18 years of dependency post-birth. You ARE the sort who will insist instead that she be lectured by self-righteous hypocrites in order to be convinced that her involuntary servitude is 'for the greater good' if the kid can be born and given over to be raised by someone approved by those self-righteous hypocrites.

That GA law is not about protection of the fetus or life. Otherwise, there can be no exceptions for rape or incest - a fetus resulting from that is as innocent as one conceived in marriage or consent. The nanosecond that exception is made, then it IS ABOUT PUNISHMENT of the pregnant woman and those making a religious argument are admitting they are hypocrites. It's ok to kill some fetuses but not others.

[damikesc]

Shocking.

Pro lifers offer a compromise and it is used to attack them as not being serious.

[JFree]

It's not a 'compromise'. It is a LEGAL TACTIC to get what they want (a prohibition of abortion) while trying to avoid the transparently unconstitutional prohibition against involuntary servitude. If they didn't make that rape/incest exception, it would be thrown out by the existing SC incl the conservative justices without even needing to revisit Roe. Making that rape/incest exception is only a 'compromise' between the hard right and the completely loony apocalypse-is-nigh right. At least the loony tunes aren't hypocrites.

It's the same sort of tactic that was used in Brown v Board. There were actually 5 cases that were combined. 4 of them were Jim Crow states where separate also meant extremely unequal - where a SC ruling wouldn't have needed to revisit Plessy. Brown was about Topeka - where it was about a state law that allowed a muni to segregate but ONLY in elementary and ONLY if the schools were truly equal. That's the one that forced SC to revisit Plessy.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Another great meeting of Libertarians For Statist Womb Management and Libertarians For Big-Government Micromanagement Of Ladyparts Clinics!

Attendance was down -- mostly because so many members of Libertarians For Tariffs And Protectionism were too afraid to leave home today, and there is plenty of membership overlap -- but misogyny is always a huge motivator among the disaffected clingers.

[Fancylad]

You're such a bloodthirsty ghoul Kirkland. Now tell me how blacks aren't human and Asians have tails.

[Eddy]

I look forward to the time when progressives decide that abortion rights are "conservative" and that the prolife cause is "progressive." Just as they flipped the definitions on eugenics.

When our textbooks describe how progressives defeated the right-wing pro-abortion forces and established a right to life for the unborn, we will know that the prolife cause has won, and I won't strongly begrudge the progressives for joining the victory parade a little belatedly.

[wootendw]

The primary fact of life, philosophically speaking, is consciousness. A conscious mind does not merely exist. It KNOWS it exists - and has a will to continue existing and being conscious.

Some say it makes no difference if the fetus is conscious because the would-be mother has the right to expel the fetus from her body which is hers. The problem with this is that the fetus is not an invader. Normally, it is 'invited' into the womb by voluntary actions of the mother, including consentual intercourse. If you invite someone into your home, you cannot just kick them out for no reason in the event of a thunderstorm.

At what stage a developing fetus becomes conscious is difficult to ascertain. But there is nothing wrong with saying to a pregnant women that "sure, you have the right to abort your pregnancy; just do it before the fetus become conscious, otherwise you've committed yourself to carrying the baby to term and giving sustenance thereafter". Nine weeks ought to be the limit except to save the mother's life. Better to err on the side of life.

[Kevin Smith]

If you invite someone into your home, you cannot just kick them out for no reason in the event of a thunderstorm.

Actually you can. Since they are in your home on your invitation, and you retain your private property rights, you can rescind the invitation and ask them them to leave at any time for any reason. If they refuse then they are trespassing.

[TJJ2000]

+100; Well put! And I'd like to think an individuals functioning Body rights would be a little more (not less) respected than property rights. PERSONAL issues really shouldn't be socialized.

[damikesc]

A more appropriate analogy is if you let somebody inside your home, you cannot just decide to murder them if they do not leave during a storm, unless they are threatening to kill you.

[bragullu]

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[Azathoth!!]

The Seventh Circle of Hell contains the Violent.

The Violent Against Others, which is the river of boiling blood.

The Violent against Self, which is the Wood of the Suicides

The Violent Against God, which is the Flaming Sands.

There is no special place for usurers. Perhaps Bernie was thinking of Islam, which forbids the charging of interest and has created a series of fiscal lies that they believe fools Allah into thinking that Muslims do not charge interest.

They reside in the Eighth Circle, which is for those who commit Fraud.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

In The Divine Comedy, Dante reserved a special place in the Seventh Circle of Hell for people who charged usurious interest rates.

So Bernie goes after the Jews now?

[Last of the Shitlords]

Jooooooosssssss!!!!!!!!

[North49]

I know I'm getting to this late, but I just want to say, Nick is doing great at listening and letting the others speak and finish their point before responding, it makes for a much richer discussion. Thanks Nick! Your contributions are valued, and so is your restraint!