Well you know what you could do if you wanted to know what the defense some of these doctors offered was? You could do a little research. It is incredibly easy in this age of internet information.

I could do it for you but I'd like to prove a point.

You can't imagine a reason, and don't believe there is a reason yet never bother to hear a reason from those that are alleged professionals. That makes me think that you really don't want there to be a reason. Guess what, I don't either. There are a lot of horrible things I'd rather not face but that doesn't mean they don't exist.

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...the government...is caving in...with their specious arguments couched in the...language of civil rights law, and that the churches ... likewise crumbling to...rhetoric which is nothing but heretical sophistry -- ~F Phelps
Platitudes like the one you offer are no different - and no less incorrect - than the jackass part-time Christian who says, "I'm going to heaven because I'm nice to people." It so misses the point.~Impugn

Dilettante,

If I was wrong and you still profess that it is the method which you find appalling and not the term of pregnancy/stage of fetus development, which method of abortion would you prefer?

In all cases in which the fetus is other than dead inside the womb, it is still alive prior to any abortion method.

You need to be honest with yourself, it is either abortion itself which you oppose or, as I stated, some stage of pregnancy at which you begin to view the fetus as a life to be protected.

If you can state unequivically that any specific abortion method should be banned outright because of what happens to the fetus, then you must state that all abortion methods should be banned. Otherwise you are hypocritical.

This is the problem with what the Supreme Court has just ruled. If the fetus is a life to be protected, the judgement, if it is honestly argued, should be to protect all life. In which case, the argument of abortion would be definitively answered.

This judgement intentionally skirts the issue.

__________________
...the government...is caving in...with their specious arguments couched in the...language of civil rights law, and that the churches ... likewise crumbling to...rhetoric which is nothing but heretical sophistry -- ~F Phelps
Platitudes like the one you offer are no different - and no less incorrect - than the jackass part-time Christian who says, "I'm going to heaven because I'm nice to people." It so misses the point.~Impugn

I would love it if you would do it for me; thus far I have apparently been incapable. I am openly and honestly looking for an explination from anyone who will give it to me.

JHC, in my opinion, all abortions are somewhat appalling, and the later the term and more disturbing it is.

HOWEVER, I must recognize that in some cases the appalling procedure is necessary for the woman's life/health. Because of that, I can't support a total abortion ban; endangering one life to save another makes no sense.

But in this case, we appear to have an apalling act that isn't necessary (that act being the active killing of the baby during an Intact D&E). So that act can be banned, and that particular example of barbarity ended even if others must be allowed to proceed because of their necessity.


The last sentence is certainly true, and I think most people on either side will acknowledge that. It skirts the issue because, so far, people can't agree on how to decide the issue. This law was meant to make progress on a small piece of it on which people can agree.

You still sound as if you're determined to push people to the extremes: either to demanding a ban on all abortions or to accepting any abortion, at any time, by any means.
Most people fall between those two extremes, as does this law.

If you want to know my personal feelings on the issue, then I would like to see a ban on all mid-to-late term abortions that were not in response to a severe and unusual threat to the health or life of the mother.
Thus, I think this method should be banned because "what happens to the fetus" is unnecessary. We must, at times, accept some horrors. But, by God, we do not have to accept pointless horrors.

The subject--broadly speaking--is the recent Supreme Court ruling on the constitutionality of the PBA Ban, any issue related to its reasoning and logic is well within the subject

You're also apparently fixated on the goal of killing babies (which is NEVER medically neccesary to do a late-term termination of a pregnancy) as opposed to terminating a pregnancy (which sometimes IS neccesary---although can be accomplished just as effectively for the life and health of the mother through full live delivery).


Ever heard of the terms slang or euphemism? There IS such a thing as "PBA", it is a term used specifically in reference to the procedure in question. That statment is about as stupid as saying their is no such thing a "reefer", that we are talking about "marijuana" in a discussion of drug legalization.


Actually there is NO law declaring "abortion" legal, each and every method of proceedure is subject to its own forms of regulation and restriction. In the case of THIS method of abortion, it is now ILLEGAL (in case you hadn't been paying attention). Going back to my earlier analogy of a drug discussion, that is about as stupid as defending pot smoking because "smoking is legal".

The AMA has ruled that PBA/ID&E is NEVER medically neccesary for the life or health of the mother. In EVER instance the delivery could be completed WITHOUT resulting in the death of the baby with NO adverse consequences to the mother.

The life/health needs of the mother are what requiring termination of the PREGNANCY, and in case you hadn't figured out by now based on the billions of people walking the Earth, it is NOT always neccesary to terminate the baby in order to end a pregnancy (in fact most births in this country are now induced--JUST as is the case in ID&E--the only difference being that in the ID&E the doctor, after inducing labor, then artificially forestalls delivery in order to kill the baby before it has fully emerged from the uterous.

Your problem is that you are utterly fixated on the notion that the medical purpose of the proceedure is to terminate the CHILD rather than the PREGNANCY. When the ACOG says it is sometimes the preferable method, it is comparing it ONLY to other options which result in the death of the baby, and specifically excluding all options for terminating the PREGNANCY, which (as is factored into the AMAs findings) includes live-birth.

That's because like most people, you are ignorant. The fact of the matter is, despite the contemporary tendency to use the word abortion as specifically referring to a termination of a pregnancy, which as you say purposefully kills the baby, is NOT supported by the ACTUAL definition of the word:

Notice the emphasis on termination/ending of the pregnancy rather than the baby. In practical terms, prior to "viability" they are one and the same, but not by definition.


How wrong you are, the court has finally taken a small step to standing fully erect on this issue. It is Roe v. Wade and all the subsequent decisions that have affirmed/expanded its central holdings which have been ideological back-bending, in order to uphold the PBA ban, or even to flat out overturn Roe would require mere deference to our Constitution, not hardly bending over backwards.

Hell, even O'Conner aknowledged in a case where she had the deciding vote that Roe was wrongly decided and had to invoke stare decisis to affirm it.

__________________
"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

The term is vague, inflammatory, and purely political in nature. It has no scientific or medical meaning and is purposely vague.
Unless you are trying to say that my claim of abortion being legal is false then I see no point here.

I can only repeat that according to the medical experts most familiar with abortion, this procedure is sometimes the best and safest choice.

I volunteer for an organization (HOPE project) which works to prevent unwanted pregnancy in teens. I also donate money to Mom's house and birthright. I suspect my work and my donations (modest thought they are) have prevented more abortions than this legislation. So maybe it's the congress and the court who is fixated on killing babies.

Abortion is (IMO) an evil thing. It needs to be reduced and, if possible, prevented. But it needs to be done by social, cultural, and religious activities which address the causes of unwanted pregnancy and the mindset which regards abortion as an acceptable birth control method. Not by legal tricks which interfere with a woman's legal rights and deny her the safest method of obtaining a legal medical procedure.

__________________
The most important political office is that of private citizen.
Louis D. Brandeis - First Jewish Supreme Court Justice

WRONG, they have said it COULD sometimes be the best and safest choice compared to other methods of ABORTION, specifically failing to include in that qualification NON-abortion options for terminating the pregnancy WITHOUT intentionally killing the baby; and even then they couldn't present a single instance where it was "neccesary"? Why that caveat? Because, as noted by the AMA late term ABORTIONS are NEVER medically neccesary given the perfectly safe alternative of live birth. Bottom line, there is NEVER a time where it is medically neccesary or safer to kill intentionally kill the baby even when ending the PREGNANCY is neccesary for the life or health of the mother.


Why is it "evil"? Do you equate it morally with murder? If so, why shouldn't the same laws against murder apply to abortion?

__________________
"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

Since abortion is exactly what we are taking about, that's all they needed to say.

__________________
The most important political office is that of private citizen.
Louis D. Brandeis - First Jewish Supreme Court Justice

Abortion is evil. It amazes me that you still ask this question, despite all the numerous threads on it.

Further, I do equate abortion with murder, and except for a few rare instances, the same laws that apply to murder should apply to abortion. It is a cruel and immoral act, and the sooner it is stopped the better.

I think Marcus' point is that what they said doesn't mean much if the context ruled out all sorts of other options.

In effect, they said "this may be the best and safest procedures...if you don't count any procedure that doesn't kill the child." It might technically be true, but it isn't very useful.
I could say that the "kindest and most compassionate treatment of a cold is remove the patient's nose while he's unconscious....if you don't count any treatment that allows the patient to keep his nose." Again, it's technically true, but by limiting the context I've made the statement fairly worthless.

You are wrong. The courts have NEVER held that there was an absolute right to abortion, even in Roe (in which they made up out of thin air any right at all) they acknowledged that there were competing interests (its how they managed to discover the relevance of Trimesters in the Constittuion). The issue at hand in this case is whether or not the law in question violated even the imaginary constitutional requirements to BALANCE those competing interests. Given that at the stage of pregnancy which a D&IE would be performed the option of live delivery without intentionally killing of the baby is always a medically acceptable alternative for terminating the PREGNANCY with absolutely no life or health consequences to the mother over and above those in any form of abortion, then that balance was clearly in favor of the life of the child. It is NEVER medically neccesary or even superior to intentionally kill the child in order to meet the life and health needs of the mother even if it IS medically neccesary to end the pregnancy early

Well, it doesn't amaze me that you got it completely wrong. I did not, nor would I ever question whether or not abortion is evil. What I DID do was to ask someone who had declared it evil, yet was arguing society had no business legislating against this evil, to articulate WHY they personally thought it was evil. The point being that as a society we readily proscribe any number of things deemed to be "evil", and in order to understand why a distinction would be made with abortion, it is essential to understand the reasoning behind their belief that it is "evil"

My personal view is that abortion is immoral and that it should always be proscribed except for instances of the life or long-term physical health of the mother requires the early termination of the pregnancy, but even then, it should be clear as a matter of law that the primary medical objective be the termination of the pregnancy and that any method of doing so without intentionally killing the child that is available be used.

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"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

All of this is interesting but it does not address the fact that the legislators and the court substituted their judgement for that of the doctors most familiar with the procedure and with abortion in general. As you have admitted, the issue is particular methods of abortion. So the medical opinions need only (and should only) address this method of abortion in relation to other methods of abortion.

__________________
The most important political office is that of private citizen.
Louis D. Brandeis - First Jewish Supreme Court Justice

WRONG, show me were any court has ever said as a matter of law that , there an inviolable right to abortion.

To the extent there has ever been a made up right, it has ALWAYS been balanced against society's interest in protecting the unborn. Go read Roe v. Wade since you are clearly ignorant of the law.

So, despite your obtuse denial of this basic fact, the legal standard to be applied by the court is to BALANCE the interests of the mother against those of the unborn (the court has ALWAYS recognized some level of interest on the part of the unborn). In this case, it is an incontraverted FACT that under NO circumstances is an ABORTION neccesary to accomplish the early termination of a late-term PREGNANCY. It is NEVER in the MEDICAL interest or benefit of the mother to terminate the child as opposed to the pregnancy. It is for that very reason that the ACOG specifically--and clearly with the intent of misleading the court--EXCLUDES from its consideration of the efficacy of ID&E the equally suitable option of live birth. The AMA however is not quite so disingenuous. The bottom line is that no medical group has ever stated that ID&E is ever medically neccesary or superior to the life or health interests of the mother over ALL other options for terminating the PREGNANCY.

That is your fundamental misunderstanding, the central issue is not particular methods of abortion, but the full range of options available for terminating a pregnancy. Now, prior to the point of viability (a point which technology is rapidly making earlier and earlier) ending the pregnancy is inevitably an abortion for all practical purposes (in that there is no way to end the pregnancy without also ending the life of the child). But at a certain point (and clearly well before the point in ID&E procedures) terminating the pregnancy does NOT neccesarily require the death of the child, at that point, the law is clear and the interest of the child becomes much more legally significant.

__________________
"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

I can't imagine why I would bother to do such a thing or why you seem to want me to.

I see no connection at all between the legisation we are talking about and all this hysteria about abortion being a "made up right". Not a single abortion will be prevented by this law.

__________________
The most important political office is that of private citizen.
Louis D. Brandeis - First Jewish Supreme Court Justice