Michael-
It’s pro-choice, not pro-abortion.

Yes Michael, please make that distinction. Hoeffel endorses the notion of women having the choice of whether or not to kill their unborn baby. He’s not endorsing killing per se, just having that option available.

The important thing is the choice.

Actually, about 65% of Democrats are pro-choice while 35% identify as pro-life. For the Republicans, there is a similar split. About 70% identify as pro-life while 30% call themselves pro-choice.
As for me, I’m where I think a majority of Americans are: I believe abortion is morally wrong, but I also think outright banning it is just not practical. Frankly, I feel deeply conflicted about it. So both extremes on this issue make me uncomfortable.
The face that Hoeffel seems to be so enthusiastic about abortion definitely makes me uncomfortable! While I may be essentially pro-choice, I definitely don’t like the Hoeffel/Michelman crowd on this issue. They are out of the mainstream.

Likely opponent Damian Dachowski? Are you nuts? Have you not learned of “The Matthews Effect?” Damian is the one candidate who has no shot whatsoever at the nomination. You’re not from around here, are you?

You think Dachowski, who’s district name-ID must be less that 15%, can enter three months before the primary and win? Schwartz is well-liked and well-known.

Stick to being sexist, Livingston, because you are obviously not very good at math.

Lisa-
That’s fine. Thanks for making the distinction.

BTW, if Bin Laden’s mother had wanted an abortion 50 years ago would that have been okay?

David, It would be as ok as if Jonas Salk’s, Albert Einstein’s or even Barack Obama’s mother chose that.

What a pedestrian argument.

The fact is that no one is pro abortion. No one wants to have an abortion. No one gets pregnant for the purpose of having an abortion.

However, most people want to live in a country where, if a woman becomes pregnant as the result of rape, incest, or a failure of birth control, or if the pregnacy risks her life or her health, the government does not require her to have a baby. We want that woman to have a choice.

Thus, pro choice.

Of course, those who believe that the government should enforce their personal or religious views on others (i.e., militant pro lifers) would prefer to disguise the reasoning of those who are pro choice by misleadingly calling them “pro abortion” or “baby killers”. The rational extreme of this deceptive name calling is those actual murderers who, in the name of righteousness, have shot, bombed and killed doctors, patients and workers at medical facilities who LEGALLY perform abortions.

Sounds to me frighteningly like Islamic fanatacism (i.e., it’s righteous to kill non-believers in the name of one’s religious beliefs). That is not the America that I know.

Lisa-
Just testing you. Actually, if any of the ones you mentioned had been aborted, we wouldn’t know. Similarly, there could have someone WORSE than Bin Laden who was aborted.
The point, however, is that any choice can lead to either good or bad outcomes.

So, if there is going to be a choice, isn’t it better that individual women make the choices for themselves, rather than it comes from a government and a particular religious point of view?

Lee-
Exactly.

David and Lee,

I can see that “choice” is important to both of you, except when it comes to the choice of being pro-life or pro-abortion. Then there is only one “choice,” isn’t there?

I’m not going to play your little semantic games anymore, because the truth of the matter is that the pro-choice movement is pro-abortion. That’s not to say that everyone who wants abortion to stay legal is promoting abortion over life, but an organization like Kate Michelman’s NARAL is a pro-abortion, not a “pro-choice,” organization.

NARAL was furious that John McCain chose Sarah Palin as his running mate. Why? It wasn’t because she was a strong, self made woman. No, if Kate Michelman’s NARAL was even remotely interested in feminism, they would have enthusiastically backed a self-made woman like Sarah Palin. What infuriated NARAL about Palin was not that she made a choice as to whether or not to bear baby Trig to full term, it’s that she made the wrong choice. A late-in-life, Down’s syndrome baby who could potentially stand in the way of his mother’s ambitions is the poster “clump of cells” for organizations like NARAL. Sarah Palin made the wrong “choice” and she was vilified for it with particular zeal by people like Kate Michelman. So please, let’s end the coyness over the word “choice,” especially as it applies to organizations like Michelman’s.

Like me, there are many other people out here who believe that Roe v. Wade was wrongly decided, that the so-called “right to privacy” was derived not from the Constitution, but conjured from thin air. So please, don’t lecture me about the government dictating what a woman can and cannot do with her body when the government unilaterally decided by judicial fiat the Constitutional “right” to abortion without even giving the people a chance to make their voices heard on the matter. That inability to question government dictat sounds a little more to me like that intolerant Islamic fanataticism you were talking about, Lee. If Roe v Wade is overturned, the question goes back to the individual states, where the people will have a chance to vote on it. I am not sure why this thought terrifies the “pro choice” side so much.

Cases of rape, incest and failed birth control aside, in the overwhelming majority of cases, a woman has a right to choose what to do with her body before she decides to sleep with a man. I disagree heartily with your assertion, David, that the sexual revolutions introduction of abortion and birth control have somehow “freed” women. The sexual revolution and the myth that women are as free to be as promiscuous as men without consequences is perhaps one of the biggest lies perpetuated by so-called “feminist” organizations like Michelman’s NARAL. Women who sleep around are not envied or respected by their peers or members of the opposite sex (though, to be sure, there are certain types of men who find these women useful). Unlike men who sleep around that are respected, if not worshipped, as “playas” and/or “ladies men,” women who enjoy the benefits of “sexual freedom” are derided as “sluts” and “ho’s.” The “walk of shame” that happens the morning after frat parties at campuses around the country is not taken by young men; it’s taken by young women. The self-esteem of women is harmed, not improved, by their engagement in meaningless sex. It may not be fair, but almost fifty years after the sexual revolution, I think it’s time that we finally admitted that men and women are wired differently, especially when it comes to sex and intimacy. It’s time to stop lying about the consequences, especially to women, of the sexual revolution.

As a corollary, I always look askance at men who argue so vigorously for abortion, since perpetuating the notion of sex without consequences clearly benefits men of a certain character.

You are both operating under the prejudice that my pro-life views generate from some sort of religious belief. I am, in fact, a lapsed Catholic and was, in my youth, a very vocal proponent of the right to an abortion. Life and experience have taught me otherwise.

That all being said, it was never my intention to engage in a debate on abortion. However, now that I have graciously indulged your questions, perhaps you, David, would finally be willing to address the subject of my initial comments here, which were, in effect, that Joe Hoeffel’s portrayal of Kate Michelman as representing “all women” is a disingenuous and offensive claim.

Lisa

To the contrary of what you wrote, you, I and every other person in this country has the right to choose between being pro life or pro choice. You don’t, however, have the right to put words in my mouth and call me pro abortion when I am not.

And the government doesn’t, and shouldn’t, have the right to take the choice of being pro life or pro choice away from individuals. It would be wrong for the government to require a woman to have an abortion. It is equally wrong to require a woman to have a baby.

I believe rape is morally wrong, but completely banning it would be impractical. Also, the decision whether or not to rape a woman is intensely personal and should be no one’s business but the rapist (and his God). I believe that rape should be “safe, legal and rare.” We need to focus on common ground solutions that will reduce the number of rapes in this country.

Lisa-
She’s representing “all” of them by protecting their right to choose. She’s not representing the choice they might make, just their right to make it.

“Sounds to me frighteningly like Islamic fanatacism (i.e., it’s righteous to kill non-believers in the name of one’s religious beliefs). That is not the America that I know.”

Seriously, Lee, are you lecturing me about hyperbole?

You may be one of those “safe, legal and rare” folks, a position I can certainly empathize, if not totally agree, with, but make no mistake: NARAL is a pro-abortion organization. I don’t believe that I called YOU pro-abortion, specifically, and if I did, it was not my intent. MY focus was specifically on Michelman and her involvment with Hoeffel’s campaign for governor.

NARAL was fonuded in 1969 as the “Natioanl Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws.” In 1973, after Roe v. Wade, they changed their name to “National Abortion Rights Action League.” It was not until 2003, when it was finally undisputed that abortion is not simply scraping out stops a beating heart, that NARAL dropped the acronym and changed it’s name to NARAL Pro-Choice America. They are still only concerned with the right to an abortion–or if we must, the right to “choose” to have an abortion. NARAL is not concerned with the many women who choose to carry their unplanned pregnancies to term, nor planned pregnancies, nor is adoption a viable consideration for this organization even though many couples suffer from infertility. So you see, NARAL exists only to make one “choice” available to women: the choice to terminate their unborn baby.

That being said, you are correct when you state that “the government doesn’t, and shouldn’t, have the right to take the choice of being pro life or pro choice away from individuals.” Yet that is exactly what it did when it made Roe v. Wade the law of the land by judicial fiat rather than democratic process.

I wonder, how many degrees of seperation before one won’t have the mistakes of a loose-relative held against ye?

Using the “Damian is related to” argument is a pathetic reason to discount his candidacy.

…and Amen Peter!!

David:

She does not represnt me. And Hoeffel will be my special project this election season because he has claimed that she represents my interests. She does NOT.

Joe Vod Varaka wants to save Christmas