I just finished watching a segment on MSNBC's Morning Joe with Joe Scarborough. He had on Chris Matthews and his brother Jim Matthews "Chairman of the Montgomery County Commissioners" and Mike (?) Barnacle. Joe was trying to get them to talk about whether it was appropriate for the Palin Daughter Pregnancy issue to be above the fold on all the East Coast Newspapers (I assume we are to understand that that means "Liberal Rags"). Chris wouldn't answer it because he had his own agenda. He wanted to talk about Choice.
Joe asks Chris "almost everyone is in agreement that the media stepped over the line when they reported on the 17 year old girl." "Do you think talking about a 17 year old girl should have littered the front pages of the New York Times and other newspapers?"
Chris comes back with an analogy about getting a new shirt and getting all the pins out and that's what's happening with Palin.
"We're meeting somebody new and we're learning all about them. You've got to put it in perspective though. But there's a big question and I think it's really informative about what we argue about in politics... here's a woman who took a baby to term with Down's Syndrome and I grew up with - Jim and I grew up, in Ocean City, New Jersey with a lot of Catholic families we met a lot of kids who were Down's Syndrome growing up cause those are really nice people and they took responsibility that came with delivering a child who had problems and challenges. So that's very familiar to us. We're one of 5 children - 5 brothers, so we're used to this kind of family there's nothing different about it to us. But I think that when you run for office of the Vice President you have to answer different questions. For example she made a choice about continuing the pregnancy after having amnio or whatever. Her daughter is making the choice to get married to the husband the father of the baby. Those are wonderful decisions, they're graceful, they are the decisions we make in a free society. If you go to a different kind of society where nobody is allowed to make those choices, the full power of the government says you cannot make those decisions, those decisions are made for you, the full power of the government says you can't choose whether to have that baby or not, you will have it, there will be no abortions even in cases of rape and incest - you will live in that kind of society. The full power of the state..
at this point Joe realizes that he has lost control of the reins. It's supposed to be about whether the New York Times is being mean to a poor teenager. Chris has jumped to an issue-based question of whether a woman should have the right to choose. And he's making a damned good argument. I'm not a big fan of Chris Matthews, but he's making sense and a pretty good argument for the right to choose.
The discussion devolves into Chris and Mika agreeing that Palin is Anti-Choice. She would like to see Roe vs. Wade repealed and would like to have all abortion outlawed. Joe takes the pure state's rights argument that it's for state's to decide not the federal government. It's about state's getting to have a choice and people choosing in their state what's right for their state. He gets pretty hot at Matthews about this and keeps arguing that Palin is not for outlawing abortion which of course she is, but for states to choose. He doesn't see that once the state chooses to outlaw abortion then the people in that state no longer have the right to choose.
Matthews: "If a woman, this very impressive person, the governor of Alaska, can make all the decisions she's made in life, whether to run for office continue in public life with all the challenges facing her at home those are big decisions, let her make them, but don't come in with a whole new kind of government that says people aren't allowed to make those decisions."
Joe counters that "The Pro Life position adopted by John McCain and Sarah Palin doesn't say women can't make those decisions what it does say is the Federal Government is not going to federalize the issue of abortion."
Chris isn't having it. "But her position is in the state she lives in to outlaw abortion. That's her position. It goes beyond getting rid of Roe vs. Wade. Her position is outlaw abortion in all states."
Joe goes on to assert against all reason that "Nobody associated with John McCain is suggesting that abortion should be outlawed." Oh, really, Joe?!
Then Joe gets himself all twisted up in trying to say it's a Constitutional question. "You guys go take a Constitutional Law class" and then you'll understand that I'm right. He starts to rant that that's the whole misrepresentation of the Roe vs. Wade thing. That if Roe is overturned then "all abortions will be outlawed." Waving hands and doing his best Chicken Little voice.
Chris keeps pushing that making all abortions illegal is Palin's stance and asks "why are you denying what her position is?"
I like it that someone is bring up Choice because that's what we should be talking about here. As well as the failure of abstinence only education - I think that's a fair topic as well. I believe they have the right to choose how they handle this very personal issue. There are those who would take that right away from them. They, themselves, would take that right away from others. Can they not just have their moral superiority and leave others to choose for themselves?
Obviously, Joe is making either a specious argument or he really doesn't understand that outlawing at the state level is the same as outlawing federally. In the real world it's a class issue. If you are rich enough you will have access to safe abortions and effective means of birth control. If you are poor you might not. It will depend on if the voters in your state at whatever date the state decides vote to allow abortions or outlaw them. Then even if you weren't even born when they decided or are not old enough to vote you will be stuck with their decision for you. If you have the money to travel to another state for an abortion you will probably be OK.
I think that discussing the fact that Sarah Palin knew that her daughter's pregnancy was going to be an issue while she was running for Vice President is fair. She could have said, I'm sorry I can't do that to my daughter.
UPDATED: In the comments this struck me
It's true - outlawing in Alaska (8+ / 0-)
is no different than outlawing federally, same with Hawaii. It's not like the RW can use their BS argument, "well, can't she just go to where they ARE available?" Uh, not at 4-800$ for a roundtrip flight, no.