Abortion war reignites in US

[Q]

- For those who still don't 'get it'...the "religious" Right intends to BAN abortion with the help of the fascists in control of this country.

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Abortion war reignites in US
 
Laws to outlaw late terminations and give a foetus rights raise fears of an outright ban, reports Ros Davidson in San Francisco

With President Bush poised to sign a law protecting the rights of embryos and foetuses, America’s pro-life war has again jumped to the fore as the country’s most explosive social issue.

Indeed, another battle begins tomorrow in simultaneous trials in San Francisco, New York and Lincoln, the capital of Nebraska. At issue is whether a certain type of late-term abortion can be banned, even when the mother’s life is endangered.

The ban, passed last November by Congress and signed by Bush, is the first to limit abortion significantly since its legalisation in America 31 years ago. It is highly unusual for the government to criminalise a procedure that is accepted, albeit in rare instances, by medicine.

Groups that support abortion sued the US Justice Department in the three cities, arguing that outlawing the procedure is unconstitutional. “We will do everything to keep this law from taking place,” said Louise Melling of the American Civil Liberties Union, the country’s largest civil rights group.

The law has yet to be implemented, because of the trials. Abortion opponents have already won in terms of framing the debate, at least in much of the US media. The emotive term “partial-birth abortion”, coined by the pro-life movement, is becoming standard for a procedure that medical textbooks describe as “intact dilation and extraction” – or D&X.

In the New York case, US district judge Richard Casey has also denied a key motion by the plaintiff, the National Abortion Federation, which represents abortion physicians. The federation had argued that defence testimony from a paediatrician, that a foetus may feel pain during the procedure, is unreliable and irrelevant.

http://www.sundayherald.com/40873

[Cursive_Knives512]

1. This makes me so sad

Because even if you are personally opposed to abortion, there are so many other ways of decreasing it without hurting women! All we have to do is look at some ways that other counties have used... oh wait, I forgot xenophobia. We don't want to be associated with any Europeans!

And the "partial birth" thing really irritates me. I always try to make it a point to say "D&X," even though no one knows what I'm talking about.

[Maat]

2. As a 45-year-old who fought for the right to take the

'morning after' pill or to have a D&C (the right to an abortion) many moons ago, I am distressed I am having to fight the battle again. By the way, I noticed something as a social worker -- Rethugs would convince every woman not to terminate a pregnancy -- say a drug-addicted poverty-stricken birthmother -- but would be no where around to adopt the child when it had to be taken into protective custody by the state when BioMom went to jail for being in a methlab. They talk big -- while they are busy killing any programs that either help keep families together or that help kids in desperate situations. They disgust me.

[sweetheart]

3. stupid banal battle for ignorance

I remember when i first encountered this banal debate in high school.
The classroom had to debate "political" issues and this was listed
in the handout.. "abortion". I read what it meant, and thought, well.... if a body of cellular tissue cannot live outside the body,
then it is not independent. It has all the rights of a cancerous
tumor.

If it can live outside the body without support, then it is independent. Until this happens, it is 100% the mothers choice
regarding her own body.

That was my seat-of-the-pants observation some 28 years ago. My
observation has not changed. It was never a debate for me.