Great diary and comments. Thanks for laying out what's been frustrating to make in discussions about abortion: being pro-choice isn't the same as keeping abortion safe, legal and none of your business.

In other discussions about issues that many feel are wrecking it for the Dems, there's a palpable envy of the right wing model that demands (and gets, voluntarily or through pressure) eventual support. Please -- dump this attitude immediately.

Don't accept the right-wing skewed media cud that the country is "divided" ... which is oh so HORRIBLE. As if the concept of one-party rule in perpetuity is GOOD. Why is the phrase partisan-Democrats as common in Mousy Media as partisan Republicans is rare? When did dissent and diversity become BAD?

Who granted George Fucking Bush and his Royal Republicans the divine right of kings?

It's impractical to think that pesky "single issue" people can be made to step back into the margins and STFU except by top-down force.

That noise is people's many different lives and views that won't fit comfortably into the kind of talking points that get handed out for this week's ginned-up Schiavo circus. That static is the hum of grassroots. You wanted em -- well here we are.

I understand Kos's frustration about wanting to focus on strategies, and have said elsewhere that if the Dems dead-on challenged the GOP on their stances, so much hand-wringing and needless scapegoating wouldn't be necessary.

Equality and justice for all is easier to protect -- and "sell" -- than equality and justice only for the people conservative Republicans like.

Trying to outspin the Rethugs here is a losing proposition unless Dems get a flying monkey army that relishes harassing others.

The attitudes behind anti-abortion extremism is about as "pro-life" as invading Iraq was about spreading freedom, and most people know this already. They only need to be reminded of what they already know.

Conservative Republicans want abortion to be unsafe and illegal. Why? What is their plan to make men equally responsible for unplanned pregnancy? What is their plan for modern, efficient, universal pre-natal healthcare?

Conservative Republicans are against modern birth control and disease prevention. Why? Healthcare costs are already skyrocketing so what is the Republican plan to deal with even more disease? When your kid falls off the abstinence wagon -- and most do -- do you think it's only going to be with someone who doesn't have a sexually transmitted disease?

Senate Republican Leader Bill Frist, a doctor, is against giving women complete, current, scientific medical information about an elective procedure. That's not only immoral but illegal, and it's called being a quack. Bill Frist is against a woman basing her decision on her life, needs, and views. Why?

House Republican Leader Tom DeLay, a religious zealot, is against women making their own moral and religious decisions. Tom DeLay is against a woman using her own religious beliefs in her own life, needs and views. Why?

This is the leadership of today's Republican party.

So professional and amateur party strategists do your strategizing to find the magic phrases, but make forcing the GOP to own their bullshit an everyday part of the discourse.