Abortion rights are a good reason to vote Democratic, because abortion rights are important to more than half the population. It's not the only issue, but it's up there in importance as a symbol of freedom and keeping government out of our bedrooms.
Abortion rights are a good reason to vote Democratic, because abortion rights are important to more than half the population. It's not the only issue, but it's up there in importance as a symbol of freedom and keeping government out of our bedrooms.
ItтАЩs smart politics. GOP stepped on their weenies with their draconian, liberty-hating abortion restrictions, and Dems are driving a truck through it to the win column. Economy and border are broadly more important, sure, but hot button issues win elections.
High prices for housing, staples, and gasoline, to name three, come largely from two things: a supply chain *still* screwed up by Covid, the global shutdown, and logistics system still not operating efficiently worldwide; and supply-and-demand. It happened on Biden's watch because Biden inherited almost all the the fallout from Covid. If Trump wins next year, he will inherit the economic problems, and prices will remain high until demand and supply chain issues work themselves out. Presidents politically get the blame and the credit for what happens on their watch, but our economy is so massive no president can do much to alter it.
The border mess is a collective failure of Congresses and both parties beginning with Ronald Reagan. None of them did anything to fix legal immigration, and I blame them all for that. We cannot have open borders and be a sovereign nation, they are mutually exclusive.
Also on the border, most of the illegals do not swim the Rio Grande or walk across the "open border," an open border that doesn't exist in reality--we are arresting and deporting more illegals now than we did under previous administrations. So the big beautiful Trump wall would not have solved the problems while costing trillions to erect.
Most illegals and contraband like fentanyl come in through the international trucking system, because millions of semis cross our southern border every year and most of them get only a cursory examination, if any. That was the case under Trump, it remains the case under Biden. If we quit allowing Mexico to ship products into our country, much illegal people and goods would stop. So would billions of dollars of agricultural and other imports this country demands. Gotta choose, one or the other. Or hire enough Border Patrol to hand-search every truck, and that's ... unlikely.
Did Biden pump too many billions of dollars into the economy during Covid? Probably. But what was the alternative, let people starve? People were out of work for two years. Landlords were out of rent money for two years. Businesses had no traffic for two years. The federal subsidies kept people and businesses afloat, and I am willing to suffer the inflationary aftereffects for a while to allow them to have lived through the shutdowns that made the real unemployment rate a zillion percent.
The shutdown ITSELF is a separate issue, because shutting down our entire system is what caused the chain of events that led to the mass unemployment and need for the bailout. Sure, we can blame Biden in retrospect for doing it, but only in retrospect--that first year of Covid, nobody knew what the hell was the right approach. Since most of the world did the same thing, I'd argue that if Trump had won the election, he'd have shut us down, too, given what we knew at the time.
The second year of shutdown was ridiculous, and for that I blame Biden fully. At the time I called for opening the country back up after the first year was over, and if we had, it might have mitigated some of the aftershock. But, governing is imperfect.
Now that we have solved the problems of the world via social media, I bid you a warm good night.
Shane, that is what abortion is. I know you are pro abortion until the 9th month. We've had this discussion. That doesn't mean that abortion isn't a horrific way of discarding something (a fetus/baby).
The states have control of abortion law now and it varies from state to state as it always would have had SCOTUS not stuck their nose where it didn't belong Even RBG said so.
We have millions of illegals and I don't doubt another catastrophic event is in the making. We can't afford groceries and young people can't afford mortgage rates which means fewer owning homes. These are huge issues that the Dems are solely responsible for.
Thanks for the politeness of your reply, md. Since I respect your writing ability, even if I don't agree with your conclusions, I will give you a serious reply.
I'm not "pro-abortion." I'd prefer every woman choose to keep every fetus until it becomes a child, and love and care for that child for the betterment of our society. But the key word is "choose," and to that end I champion every woman's right to make that decision for herself. I do not want politicians to bully her into that choice early because it lets a DeSantis or a Noem or an Abbott win another term as governor.
I prefer no laws governing abortions, because women are more than capable of figuring it out for themselves. Without laws, they would choose early abortions, because they overwhelmingly do now. But politicians are hell-bent to legislate abortion whether or not they should, and so they pass laws when they don't need.
I'm not unreasonable. I'd be willing to make abortions freely available until the end of the second trimester--24 weeks--and then none unless for medical emergencies to fetus or woman, or for ghastly fetal deformities. But too many politicians insist on no abortions, six weeks, or twelve weeks, and that's way too restrictive on women's rights for my taste.
So if it's going to be six weeks or no laws, I favor no laws and women making their own choices. I trust them to do that. I don't consider fetuses "preborn children," so it's easy for me to champion this. You consider fetuses children, so it's easy for you to champion your view. We simply will not agree on that part of the equation.
I believe SCOTUS ruled correctly in that states, not the feds, have the right to regulate. But too many states took that opportunity to jam abortion bans down their residents' throats, and it infuriates me that half our population is treated with such disdain. The Texas bounty hunter abortion ban? Ohio changing referendum rules once, twice, thrice midstream? Talk about cynical, disgusting political theater. Voters don't like it, and now Republican abortion-banners are losing their jobs over it. Good. They went too far.
Your reply is so thoughtful and practical. I posted my practical view as a female physician and mother of three. I hope you read it and send me your critique.
Disa, thanks so much for this. I appreciate it. Abortion is not just morality, not just religion, not just politics, not black-and-white. Allowing women to make that choice for themselves, while simultaneously making it easier to say "yes" to carrying to term rather than aborting, is the ideal for a free society. Bounty-hunter abortion bans are the LAST thing a free society should do.
I appreciate your civil arguments, but I decline to be included in "half the population" that supposedly is being treated with disdain. There are many women opposed to abortion.
Yes, there are. But you should be able to make that decision for yourself, not have it shoved down your throat by government dictate.
Women should never have been subjected to such political theater as the Texas bounty hunter scheme. You deal with life's complexities every day and are perfectly capable of deciding the abortion issue for yourselves instead of having a man--face it, most of the politicians deciding these things for you are men--tell you what's best. I find it insulting for women, their doctors, and their friends to be chased down by bounty hunters because Abbott wants another term as governor.
My comment was in direct response to the comment that abortion bans show disdain to half the population. I'm assuming "half the population" refers to women. I don't feel that abortion restrictions show disdain to me as a woman.
Oops, missed this! I do believe they show disdain in that they assume women don't know how to make this decision without Big Daddy's help. Women do.
That said, there are degrees. A policy that simply says, "Abortion restrictions begin at 24 weeks because the consensus is that mother's right is dominant until then, and child's right dominates after that," is a lot less insulting then, "Cause you won't keep your legs together, bimbo, have the baby or we'll let bounty hunters ruin your life."
The former is better because it acknowledges the rights of both parties, not only the fetus's.
To your last sentence, the discussion is important now if you see that inflation and illegal immigration affects every single person while abortion most definitely (thankfully) does not. Even though you don't consider yourself 'pro abortion' you've made it a very important / top tier voting issue, or so it seems, and there really is no differentiation between "it's your choice" and "for abortion". There is a lot of word displacement and replacement going on in our culture now.
The state in which I live has abortion law going back to the 1800s so laws were on the books in many states long before SCOTUS was involved in the '70s and in '22. Undoing abortion law altogether was impossible. What's happened with abortion (just like what's happening with trans now) is the billions of dollars that are made from it and pushed into it. And it could care less about it's consequences. Just look up Goznell. As a man (and I mean no offense), you'll just never know that feeling of having a baby grow in your body and the gift of that opportunity. And again, no offense, but I don't think you can understand the damage to the emotional and physical health of a woman who has an abortion and all too often it's not just one abortion. I worked with a woman who had three abortions (paid for by our boss) and then birthed a child. All of the pregnancies were with different men. The child she had was born with Down's Syndrome...likely genetic on the father's side but who really knows. She may not be the typical woman, but for reals, women are using abortion as contraception. Aren't we a more sophisticated society than that? Are we back to sacrificing our children at the altar? I know you don't support that that kind of abortion, but it's all part of the equation.
Lastly, babies can survive at 24 weeks. They feel pain at 20 weeks. You and I will always disagree on this issue. As Bari says, "Jews, who understand that being made in the image of God bestows inviolate sanctity on every human life...." How would God only make a human in his image after they are born because the mother chose life for him or her?
"To your last sentence, the discussion is important now if you see that inflation and illegal immigration affects every single person while abortion most definitely (thankfully) does not."
This? Absolutely. A culture-deep conversation about Inflation, the larger economy, and immigration are critical to have now, and for everyday citizens to insist on piercing the "nah, nah, everything's fine" bullshittery that passes for assurances from our legislators. All is not well, so we must either force change through the system or receive documented, believable evidence as to why "fine" is correct. We cannot continue to ignore these issues and continue as a society. To be a sovereign nation is to not have illegal immigration, period. And if we're one more crisis away from Great Depression III, we need to know that in time to stave it off.
What does hearten me, though, in all seriousness, is this conversation and others I've had on this forum. Normal Americans can still have deep conversations about difficult and mult-viewpoint issues without turning into Twitter-like shout machines. Your take on abortion manages to make me take pause on my own views, and while I might not change my mind, I'm open to more possibilities to do so than I would ever be from other forums.
No offense taken. Women are the only half of humanity who can experience the intensely personal side of the babymaking equation; men can't. My arguments can only be about legality and freedom because men cannot get pregnant.
Thank you in return for this lovely comment, md, I really do appreciate it, and you. As I watch the murder cults wreak their hell on Earth in Israel, I continue to be impressed by the respect and support we Jewish people receive from our non-Jewish friends around the world. You are a mensch, one of the highest compliments of Yiddish I can pay.
ThatтАЩs why the Republican Party needs to change- fast. Just recognize that itтАЩs important to women and be reasonable! ItтАЩs 2023, and people still think women should be pushed into back alleys to do what theyтАЩve been doing forever: ending unwanted pregnancies!? ItтАЩs downright archaic. And self destructive for the Republican Party, which needs to win so our country can go back to being meritocratic and democratic.
Abortion rights are a good reason to vote Democratic, because abortion rights are important to more than half the population. It's not the only issue, but it's up there in importance as a symbol of freedom and keeping government out of our bedrooms.
Abortion rights is no longer a Federal issue, so voting for federal dems is moot to that.
It IS a federal issue, not just state. U.S. Republicans are threatening a federal abortion ban. Democrats are needed to block that.
And the democrats have convinced the electorate that abortion is more important than the economy and an open border.
I donтАЩt like it because I believe that my two issues affect more people.
But here we are.
ItтАЩs smart politics. GOP stepped on their weenies with their draconian, liberty-hating abortion restrictions, and Dems are driving a truck through it to the win column. Economy and border are broadly more important, sure, but hot button issues win elections.
This will settle in another year when each state has spoken...and we'll still have sanctuary cities, unaffordable housing and staples.
High prices for housing, staples, and gasoline, to name three, come largely from two things: a supply chain *still* screwed up by Covid, the global shutdown, and logistics system still not operating efficiently worldwide; and supply-and-demand. It happened on Biden's watch because Biden inherited almost all the the fallout from Covid. If Trump wins next year, he will inherit the economic problems, and prices will remain high until demand and supply chain issues work themselves out. Presidents politically get the blame and the credit for what happens on their watch, but our economy is so massive no president can do much to alter it.
The border mess is a collective failure of Congresses and both parties beginning with Ronald Reagan. None of them did anything to fix legal immigration, and I blame them all for that. We cannot have open borders and be a sovereign nation, they are mutually exclusive.
Also on the border, most of the illegals do not swim the Rio Grande or walk across the "open border," an open border that doesn't exist in reality--we are arresting and deporting more illegals now than we did under previous administrations. So the big beautiful Trump wall would not have solved the problems while costing trillions to erect.
Most illegals and contraband like fentanyl come in through the international trucking system, because millions of semis cross our southern border every year and most of them get only a cursory examination, if any. That was the case under Trump, it remains the case under Biden. If we quit allowing Mexico to ship products into our country, much illegal people and goods would stop. So would billions of dollars of agricultural and other imports this country demands. Gotta choose, one or the other. Or hire enough Border Patrol to hand-search every truck, and that's ... unlikely.
Did Biden pump too many billions of dollars into the economy during Covid? Probably. But what was the alternative, let people starve? People were out of work for two years. Landlords were out of rent money for two years. Businesses had no traffic for two years. The federal subsidies kept people and businesses afloat, and I am willing to suffer the inflationary aftereffects for a while to allow them to have lived through the shutdowns that made the real unemployment rate a zillion percent.
The shutdown ITSELF is a separate issue, because shutting down our entire system is what caused the chain of events that led to the mass unemployment and need for the bailout. Sure, we can blame Biden in retrospect for doing it, but only in retrospect--that first year of Covid, nobody knew what the hell was the right approach. Since most of the world did the same thing, I'd argue that if Trump had won the election, he'd have shut us down, too, given what we knew at the time.
The second year of shutdown was ridiculous, and for that I blame Biden fully. At the time I called for opening the country back up after the first year was over, and if we had, it might have mitigated some of the aftershock. But, governing is imperfect.
Now that we have solved the problems of the world via social media, I bid you a warm good night.
I am insulted by the claim that my primary interest in life is the right to dismember my baby in utero. WTAF?
As if adult women havenтАЩt known how to prevent pregnancy for a very long time.
Why are you telling me this? I didnтАЩt suggest you dismember anything.
Shane, that is what abortion is. I know you are pro abortion until the 9th month. We've had this discussion. That doesn't mean that abortion isn't a horrific way of discarding something (a fetus/baby).
The states have control of abortion law now and it varies from state to state as it always would have had SCOTUS not stuck their nose where it didn't belong Even RBG said so.
We have millions of illegals and I don't doubt another catastrophic event is in the making. We can't afford groceries and young people can't afford mortgage rates which means fewer owning homes. These are huge issues that the Dems are solely responsible for.
Thanks for the politeness of your reply, md. Since I respect your writing ability, even if I don't agree with your conclusions, I will give you a serious reply.
I'm not "pro-abortion." I'd prefer every woman choose to keep every fetus until it becomes a child, and love and care for that child for the betterment of our society. But the key word is "choose," and to that end I champion every woman's right to make that decision for herself. I do not want politicians to bully her into that choice early because it lets a DeSantis or a Noem or an Abbott win another term as governor.
I prefer no laws governing abortions, because women are more than capable of figuring it out for themselves. Without laws, they would choose early abortions, because they overwhelmingly do now. But politicians are hell-bent to legislate abortion whether or not they should, and so they pass laws when they don't need.
I'm not unreasonable. I'd be willing to make abortions freely available until the end of the second trimester--24 weeks--and then none unless for medical emergencies to fetus or woman, or for ghastly fetal deformities. But too many politicians insist on no abortions, six weeks, or twelve weeks, and that's way too restrictive on women's rights for my taste.
So if it's going to be six weeks or no laws, I favor no laws and women making their own choices. I trust them to do that. I don't consider fetuses "preborn children," so it's easy for me to champion this. You consider fetuses children, so it's easy for you to champion your view. We simply will not agree on that part of the equation.
I believe SCOTUS ruled correctly in that states, not the feds, have the right to regulate. But too many states took that opportunity to jam abortion bans down their residents' throats, and it infuriates me that half our population is treated with such disdain. The Texas bounty hunter abortion ban? Ohio changing referendum rules once, twice, thrice midstream? Talk about cynical, disgusting political theater. Voters don't like it, and now Republican abortion-banners are losing their jobs over it. Good. They went too far.
Illegals and the rest of it is another post.
Your reply is so thoughtful and practical. I posted my practical view as a female physician and mother of three. I hope you read it and send me your critique.
Disa, thanks so much for this. I appreciate it. Abortion is not just morality, not just religion, not just politics, not black-and-white. Allowing women to make that choice for themselves, while simultaneously making it easier to say "yes" to carrying to term rather than aborting, is the ideal for a free society. Bounty-hunter abortion bans are the LAST thing a free society should do.
I appreciate your civil arguments, but I decline to be included in "half the population" that supposedly is being treated with disdain. There are many women opposed to abortion.
"There are many women opposed to abortion."
Yes, there are. But you should be able to make that decision for yourself, not have it shoved down your throat by government dictate.
Women should never have been subjected to such political theater as the Texas bounty hunter scheme. You deal with life's complexities every day and are perfectly capable of deciding the abortion issue for yourselves instead of having a man--face it, most of the politicians deciding these things for you are men--tell you what's best. I find it insulting for women, their doctors, and their friends to be chased down by bounty hunters because Abbott wants another term as governor.
My comment was in direct response to the comment that abortion bans show disdain to half the population. I'm assuming "half the population" refers to women. I don't feel that abortion restrictions show disdain to me as a woman.
Oops, missed this! I do believe they show disdain in that they assume women don't know how to make this decision without Big Daddy's help. Women do.
That said, there are degrees. A policy that simply says, "Abortion restrictions begin at 24 weeks because the consensus is that mother's right is dominant until then, and child's right dominates after that," is a lot less insulting then, "Cause you won't keep your legs together, bimbo, have the baby or we'll let bounty hunters ruin your life."
The former is better because it acknowledges the rights of both parties, not only the fetus's.
The latter is Ken Paxton's Texas.
To your last sentence, the discussion is important now if you see that inflation and illegal immigration affects every single person while abortion most definitely (thankfully) does not. Even though you don't consider yourself 'pro abortion' you've made it a very important / top tier voting issue, or so it seems, and there really is no differentiation between "it's your choice" and "for abortion". There is a lot of word displacement and replacement going on in our culture now.
The state in which I live has abortion law going back to the 1800s so laws were on the books in many states long before SCOTUS was involved in the '70s and in '22. Undoing abortion law altogether was impossible. What's happened with abortion (just like what's happening with trans now) is the billions of dollars that are made from it and pushed into it. And it could care less about it's consequences. Just look up Goznell. As a man (and I mean no offense), you'll just never know that feeling of having a baby grow in your body and the gift of that opportunity. And again, no offense, but I don't think you can understand the damage to the emotional and physical health of a woman who has an abortion and all too often it's not just one abortion. I worked with a woman who had three abortions (paid for by our boss) and then birthed a child. All of the pregnancies were with different men. The child she had was born with Down's Syndrome...likely genetic on the father's side but who really knows. She may not be the typical woman, but for reals, women are using abortion as contraception. Aren't we a more sophisticated society than that? Are we back to sacrificing our children at the altar? I know you don't support that that kind of abortion, but it's all part of the equation.
Lastly, babies can survive at 24 weeks. They feel pain at 20 weeks. You and I will always disagree on this issue. As Bari says, "Jews, who understand that being made in the image of God bestows inviolate sanctity on every human life...." How would God only make a human in his image after they are born because the mother chose life for him or her?
"To your last sentence, the discussion is important now if you see that inflation and illegal immigration affects every single person while abortion most definitely (thankfully) does not."
This? Absolutely. A culture-deep conversation about Inflation, the larger economy, and immigration are critical to have now, and for everyday citizens to insist on piercing the "nah, nah, everything's fine" bullshittery that passes for assurances from our legislators. All is not well, so we must either force change through the system or receive documented, believable evidence as to why "fine" is correct. We cannot continue to ignore these issues and continue as a society. To be a sovereign nation is to not have illegal immigration, period. And if we're one more crisis away from Great Depression III, we need to know that in time to stave it off.
What does hearten me, though, in all seriousness, is this conversation and others I've had on this forum. Normal Americans can still have deep conversations about difficult and mult-viewpoint issues without turning into Twitter-like shout machines. Your take on abortion manages to make me take pause on my own views, and while I might not change my mind, I'm open to more possibilities to do so than I would ever be from other forums.
No offense taken. Women are the only half of humanity who can experience the intensely personal side of the babymaking equation; men can't. My arguments can only be about legality and freedom because men cannot get pregnant.
Thanks so much Shane for a cogent, respectful dialogue.
And continued prayers for all of my Jewish friends and those I will never know. God will not abandon His chosen people.
Thank you in return for this lovely comment, md, I really do appreciate it, and you. As I watch the murder cults wreak their hell on Earth in Israel, I continue to be impressed by the respect and support we Jewish people receive from our non-Jewish friends around the world. You are a mensch, one of the highest compliments of Yiddish I can pay.
Oh my gosh....I'm honored! Thanks Shane! Made my day/month/year.
You're entirely welcome, md, the honor is mine.
ThatтАЩs why the Republican Party needs to change- fast. Just recognize that itтАЩs important to women and be reasonable! ItтАЩs 2023, and people still think women should be pushed into back alleys to do what theyтАЩve been doing forever: ending unwanted pregnancies!? ItтАЩs downright archaic. And self destructive for the Republican Party, which needs to win so our country can go back to being meritocratic and democratic.