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  •  You are wrong on one thing. (4.00 / 9)

    The president of the Democrats of Life in 1997, still active with them....gave a speech in TX and said that abortion was essentially murder and then she brought up Judgement Day.

    I also wrote a diary about that speech.  

    They are not about to give an inch once they get a foothold.

    "I'm willing to say things that are not popular but ordinary people know are right." Howard Dean

    by floridagal on Mon Sep 19, 2005 at 04:20:53 PM PDT

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    •  To say that abortion is murder (none / 1)

      is not the same as calling women or doctors murderers.  War is murder, and illegal most of the time, but we don't usually call soldiers murderers either.  

      by eastsidedemocrat on Mon Sep 19, 2005 at 04:35:47 PM PDT

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      •  Yes, it is the same thing. (4.00 / 8)

        If a person says it is murder, then the one having it committed murder.  It is a serious accusation.  It should not be made lightly.

        Our party has some very big decisions to make.  Decisions have great consequences.

        "I'm willing to say things that are not popular but ordinary people know are right." Howard Dean

        by floridagal on Mon Sep 19, 2005 at 04:42:37 PM PDT

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        •  It is not made lightly, (none / 0)

          but neither is blame being placed.  As I said before.  We do not generally condemn soldiers as murderers, even though we all agree that war is tragic and should be stopped, and that murdering is, in fact, what soldiers do there.

          Why are you so suddenly seeing the world in only black and white on this particular issue?

          by eastsidedemocrat on Mon Sep 19, 2005 at 08:17:27 PM PDT

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          •  This is a complex issue. (none / 1)

            It is about men in mostly religious based groups getting together and deciding about the role of women in society.  

            It is not a black and white issue, and anyone who sees it that way is either in denial or being simplistic in their thinking.

            "I'm willing to say things that are not popular but ordinary people know are right." Howard Dean

            by floridagal on Mon Sep 19, 2005 at 10:12:18 PM PDT

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            •  I agree, but I've seen many of these groups, (none / 0)

              and women are in leadership roles there as often, if not more so, then men.  And no one ever talks about "women's role" in society.  What they do say, and that might be setting you on edge, is that women, and men, should not have to feel pressured by society to be career-oriented any more than they should be pressured to be homemakers.  I don't find anything objectionable about that, particularly when it is women saying it.  Do you?

              Yes, there are a few creeps that show up sometimes in such groups, as in any group, but despite the press they get such people are not the norm among pro-lifers, particularly among those prone to vote Democrat.  

              by eastsidedemocrat on Tue Sep 20, 2005 at 07:21:39 AM PDT

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      •  sorry (4.00 / 3)

        but this fails logic 101.

        If you drive a car, you are a driver. If you eat something you are an eater. And so on.

        The problem here may be that people use the term "murder" in different ways. Whether or not something is "murder" is either a technical legal question determined by precise matters of law or a question of whether "murder" is an appropriate metaphor to apply to a particular act of violence - an argument which depends on people's ethical beliefs. People can argue about whether killing animals is "murder" for example, and thus about whether or not it is ethical to kill animals, without thinking that the killing of animals should be punished by law.

        If you are arguing on the metaphorical level, then to say that abortion is murder is the same thing as saying that the people who perform them are murderers - on a metaphorical level. I.e, that they are morally responsible for a horrendous act, but not that they are guilty of committing a violation of law. This would be the same thing as saying that killing people in war is murder.

        If you are saying it in a technical legal sense, then you would of course be wrong - at least for the time being.

        The problem here, is that when many people who are opposed to abortion call abortion "murder," they not only mean it on the methaphorical level but also that the act SHOULD be included within the technical definition of the crime we call 'murder.'

        I hope that helps clear things up.

        By the way, if you think abortion is "murder," do you think it should be punished as such? I.e., that it should be included within the legal definition of the crime?

        Write Al Gore a letter asking him to run: The Honorable Al Gore 2100 West End Avenue Suite 620 Nashville, TN 37203

        by MonkeyDog102 on Mon Sep 19, 2005 at 04:57:31 PM PDT

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        •  You're missing the point that (none / 0)

          even if it were to be legally called murder, it does not have to follow that criminal repercussions must follow.  There are some horrendous acts that we, as a society, allow to happen for the simple reason that we can't figure out a better way to do it.  We still mostly agree that it is wrong and often even criminal to partake in warfare, but soldiers are usually not called criminals or murderers, even though most would admit that murdering is precisely what they are doing in war, and that most wars are, techincally, in violation of treaties, including the adventure that got us into Iraq.

          by eastsidedemocrat on Mon Sep 19, 2005 at 08:25:04 PM PDT

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          •  No, you're missing the point (none / 1)

            We don't call all killing murder.  People who call soldiers murderers generally do think they have committed a crime, and people who don't think they have committed a crime don't call them murderers.  Murder is not the only kind of killing, we have homocide, self-defense, and all kinds of shades that describe different situations and balances of the rights of different people, and abortion is one of these terms.

            If you call it murder rather than any other term, you're saying the person who does it is a murderer.  If you're saying it's murder and should be against the law because it's murder, then you're either saying a person who does it should be prosecuted as a murderer, or you're just twisting the language.  You might have a leg to stand on if you called it homocide, but that doesn't have the same emotional impact, does it?

            Working to turn Virginia Blue -- and succeeding!

            by Redshift on Mon Sep 19, 2005 at 10:02:22 PM PDT

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            •  Murder is killing (none / 0)

              when it should not have had to happen.  Most soldiers I've met who have killed do believe they murdered, but not that they were wrong, personally, for doing so, given the situation.  By recognizing that war results in murder, even when legal, we can all try to work towards ending war and making it less destructive (not that we have a good record of doing that, mind you).  

              The same goes for abortion as an institution.  Most pro-lifers would not want to criminalize people who participate in it if, as a society, there was a general agreement that abortion is wrong and we could focus on the question of how best to reduce its practice while protecting individual freedoms.  We are a long way from that, based on the number of people who advocate that abortion is a good and responsible thing.

              by eastsidedemocrat on Tue Sep 20, 2005 at 07:37:19 AM PDT

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              •  Guess we'll have to disagree (none / 0)

                on the murder thing.  If you're talking about soldiers' feelings, then that's a different arena.  But when you're saying something should be illegal because it's murder, you're talking about the legal definition of murder, or you're being dishonest.

                On the "most pro-lifers would not want to criminalize it," I call bullshit.  In fact, most on the pro-choice side would much rather be focusing on how best to reduce abortion while protecting individual freedoms, but the pro-life side is more concerned with everyone agreeing that it's wrong, and only supporting measures that purport to get rid of it completely, not reduce it (and if that's not what the rank-and-file pro-lifers want, they should damn well stop supporting leaders who do.)  Look at the steady stream of anti-abortion laws that are struck down solely because they fail Roe v. Wade's "life and health of the mother" exemption -- are those an honest effort to reduce abortion?

                You claim that the opposites the two sides supposedly believe are "wrong" and "good."  But those aren't opposites.  I can believe something is not wrong, and also not good.  I believe that it's good that abortion is legal, because it's less bad than the alternatives in so many cases.  I believe that it's good for abortion to be relatively unrestricted, because it's less bad for some people to have abortions for what pro-lifers would consider insufficient justification than for a great many more people already in terrible circumstances to have to go through onerous government procedures and expose their personal life to official scrutiny.

                So show me pro-life Democrats whose primary focus is on reducing abortion and not on imposing legal restrictions (such as Tim Kaine, who's running for governor here in Virginia), and I have no problem working with them.  They're not hard to spot -- they're the ones Republicans call "not really pro-life."

                Working to turn Virginia Blue -- and succeeding!

                by Redshift on Tue Sep 20, 2005 at 09:13:21 AM PDT

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                •  "Not really pro-life" (none / 0)

                  is what Republicans call virtually all pro-life Democrats.  

                  Harry Reid is a pro-life Democrat and is representative of the typical position of not just pro-life Democrats, but most people who identify themselves as pro-life.  Only the extremeists want to lock anyone up, but pro-lifers do want a societal committment to reduce abortions, both by reducing occurences of unwanted pregnancy, AND by WANTING the children that result from them in demostrable ways.

                  by eastsidedemocrat on Tue Sep 20, 2005 at 11:34:14 AM PDT

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                  •  but the problem here (none / 0)

                    is that the extremists are driving the politics, right? And that is what is worrisome to a lot of people around here about working with Democrats who identify as pro-life: that it will end up helping the extremists, and the next thing you know we will all end up in the equivalent of A Handmaid's Tale.

                    It sure is a valid concern, ain't it?

                    Write Al Gore a letter asking him to run: The Honorable Al Gore 2100 West End Avenue Suite 620 Nashville, TN 37203

                    by MonkeyDog102 on Tue Sep 20, 2005 at 04:11:17 PM PDT

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                    •  Single issue politics give extremists power (none / 0)

                      This does not mean that all single issue people are extremists, but that most extremists are single issue people.  

                      Most pro-lifers, and virtually all pro-life Democrats, are not single issue people.  This means that they are not leading the battle on pro-life issues, but that they can be counted on to collaborate with the single-issue pro-life leaders on some of them.  The single issue people need them, so they have a bargaining position.  

                      This is no different than the pro-choice side of the debate.  Most pro-choice people, and virtually all pro-choice Republicans, are also not single issue people.   But pro-choice folks can count on them in some key battles.

                      The single issue people on both sides gain power by being able to threaten their friendly party by endorsing friendly supporters of their issue in the hostile party.  This keeps their issue at the top of the agenda of the friendly party, even as it works against the friendly party's immediate interests in winning elections.  It's smart politics whether NARAL does it or National Right to Life.  But it makes life for us multi-issues partisans much more difficult.  It's supposed to, and it's just as valid a part of democracy as being a partisan Democrat is.

                      by eastsidedemocrat on Wed Sep 21, 2005 at 07:33:33 AM PDT

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