Over on HuffPo, Cristina Page has a fascinating article on the latest example of Senator Obama uniting Americans around his vision for our country. This time, it's the pro-lifers.
In my experience, the "pro-life" voting bloc in the United States tends to be divided into two camps, regarding its ultimate goals. One group (again, in my experience it's the larger of the two) holds as its goal the reduction of the number of abortions conducted in the United States. Eventually, they hope, there will be no abortions at all. The other group (smaller, but much more vocal) has as its goal the overturning of Roe v. Wade. Evidently, they see this as the stepping stone to legislation which would outlaw abortions in all fifty states.
It is this first group, however, which Page feels can be induced to gravitate towards Sen. Obama:
The data show that the pro-choice approach is more effective at achieving what the American public views as "pro-life" goals i.e. reducing the number of abortions, preventing late term abortion, than the so-called "pro-life" approach.
As more and more of the so-called moderates begin to look at Obama, Page suggests that Obama point out to them that it is pro-choice policies which have been leading and will continue to lead to a reduction in the number of abortions. Senator Obama, Page affirms, can convincingly woo these voters by reframing the terms of the debate as less about abortion itself and more about preventing unwanted pregnancies. And it is the "pro-choice approach", with its open access to birth control and its emphasis on education, which will reduce the numbers of unwanted pregnancies.
Page cites a statistic from the Guttmacher Institute, which I find to be very telling:
only 11% of sexually active women don't use contraception and from this 11% comes 50% of the nation's abortions. Ninety-three percent of the American public strongly favors contraception because of this very reason. Very few voters are aware, however, that not one pro-life organization in the United States supports contraception. Or that instead, pro-life groups have been spearheading campaigns to prevent Americans from accessing birth control
We have seen how Senator Obama's campaign has begun to take root in places few ever thought it would. Who would have thought that a Democratic, African-American senator from Illinois could be within striking distance in such places as Alaska, Missouri, North Dakota, and New Mexico? Page's commentary shows that by going on the offensive and showing to the pro-lifers that both pro-choice and pro-life are working towards the same goal -- abortion that is safe and rare -- he might win over even more people who would normally pull the lever for the Republican come November.