http://themoderatevoice.com/52754/an-abortion-c…

No, you're right. Luckily, that doesn't exist, nor is it being proposed by anyone.

It's also obvious that a majority doesn't approve of an unlimited, absolute federal abortion entitlement.

That scares me, too!

Do you believe that 5% of the global population have the right to use up a quarter of the planet's fossil fuel resources? The fact that Americans do, harms many someone elses.

And, it still doesn't account for cross border [Canada] and off shore abortions. As I said before, the genie is out of the bottle, and you just can't put it back in. Leave it legal and argue the morality on an individual basis. The practicalities just don't work to try to get to illegality or even state-by-state, and way too much is at risk, far beyond the abortion issue, in overturning Roe v. Wade.

This is another good point. Although you may not have intended this shade of meaning, what I take from it is that, even if we went back, in a strictly literal and legal sense, to states determining the legality of abortion, women are not going back. Women have had a 35-year taste of individual bodily autonomy, and as a general proposition, they are not going to be willing to return to the days of wire hangers, bottles of bleach, back alleys, kitchen tables, and quack doctors. Been there, done that. Never will do it again.

As for residency requirements to have an abortion, obviously that's not going to help a woman who is already pregnant and needs an abortion. And just so you don't come back at me with the same old non sequitur argument, sometimes a woman finds out, after she has conceived a wanted pregnancy, that the pregnancy is not viable for any one of many reasons, or that there are health concerns she was not earlier aware of, or that come up during the pregnancy.

Aside from the above, I'm not sure how it could possibly be legal to have a residency requirement for abortion services if you're not paying for it with public dollars. If abortion is legal in my state, for example, and a woman travels to New Jersey from Mississippi, where abortion is illegal, assuming she can afford to pay for the abortion herself, how could a state government require her to be a legal resident before she could have one?

If a “liberal minded” woman wants to get an abortion – she can actually MOVE to that state – and preferably stay there.

It isn't just “liberal-minded” woman who need abortions or choose to have one, although there *are* women who never thought they would ever have an abortion who find at some point in their lives that they have to have one.

Read my comment. You may be pleasantly surprised.
As far as the flocking goes. You can require that abortion clients be legal residents of that state. If a “liberal minded” woman wants to get an abortion – she can actually MOVE to that state – and preferably stay there.

I would be willing to bet that Kathy Kattenburg will poop in her pants when she reads that.

LOL

“Legally, it is. It's called viability, and the medical establishment considers …”
There's bunch of different answers with different principles behind them. GreenDreams brought up the constitutional definition (birth), JeffersonDavis uses synapse viability, if I remember right, and, of course, there's the conception group. All of them have good arguments on their side.

“arguing over whether the kid dies legally or illegally.”
I'm not talking about anything medical here, just that the law has effective limits. Speeding, drug use, prostitution, office gambling, and a host of other things are illegal, but because they don't directly impact another person, the law really can't stop them. The kid is obviously affected, but, quite often, no one knows that the mother is pregnant, or at least, no one who would turn the mother in. Yes, late term pregnancies are more of an exception, not just because they're more difficult, but also because the pregnancy is harder to hide.

“Sometimes those reason include…”
Take a look at your list again: not being capable of supporting a child, and just not ready to be a parent are both saying that she can't afford it. Right now, couples will pay $30,000 and more to adopt a child from overseas, since the US market (I'm using that word on purpose) is limited to freewill donors. Although some states allows couples to cover certain expenses for the mother, it's hard to encode into law what all of those expenses might be.

“there are huge moral issues involved here . . .”
You think? Between adoption and abortion, I'd rather deal with the moral problems of adoption.

“women getting pregnant on purpose in order to sell their kids,”
If these kinds of problems really concern you, then are you concerned with AFDC encouraging girls to get pregnant in order to get the payments? The law currently sets the profit (again, I'm using that word on purpose) at $0. It could set at a different level into order to curb the worst abuses.

“This doesn't take into account the fact that giving up your child for adoption is generally way more traumatic than having an early-term abortion.”
We were looking at adoption before we went through infertility treatments. Quite often, a baby adoption works like a divorce, with the mother getting visiting rights and choosing the parents, so that she knows how the kid turned out. I think you may have the “trauma” thing backward, unless you have statistics to contrary.

“This is why I'm pro-choice”.
I'm more anti-law, since I think the unborn have some rights (even if they're not constitutional, GreenDreams) also. Rights aren't rights at all if they harm someone else, so I can't support abortions as a right without diluting the meaning of the word.

In a practical sense, the genie is out of the bottle on abortion and has been for decades. That did play a part in Roe v. Wade, and it's why even some of us who are Troglodilian in our views on the underlying moral issue do not see value in overturning Roe. Truth is abortion should remain safe and legal not because of any moral argument, but because the practical alternative is unacceptable.

Exactly, tidbits. People who want to go back to pre-Roe v. Wade have either forgotten or never knew what the practical state of affairs was before Roe v. Wade. We need to learn from our mistakes, not go back so we have to learn the lessons all over again.

Not only that, but throwing abortion as an issue back to the states will not satisfy opponents of legal abortion because the inevitable outcome of women flocking to the states where abortion is legal would be opponents of legal abortion pushing for a constitutional amendment to ban abortion outright, to prevent women from escaping their own states' criminalization of abortion.

“a fetus has to be considered a baby at some point before birth”

Legally, it is. It's called viability, and the medical establishment considers this the dividing line between the second and third trimesters — about 6 months. This is why it's illegal to get an abortion after this time unless something has gone terribly, horribly wrong. At this stage, the baby can be taken out of the mother's womb and will generally live given the proper medical care, etc. This means that it's rare to have an abortion if the baby's healthy but the mother will die if it doesn't come out — they just take it out. This is already part of the Roe v Wade decision.

“Although there are a few exceptions, for the most part we're arguing over whether the kid dies legally or illegally. “

I'm really curious about what you mean here. Are we still talking late-stage abortion? I would agree with this statement if we're talking about first-trimester abortions, minus the calling the fetus a “kid”. First trimester abortions are extremely easy and safe procedures if done correctly; even DIY (do research first, of course!). Later stage abortions get very dangerous. After about the 4th month of pregnancy, almost all abortions are done for more health-related reasons — not just “I don't want this thing”.

“The real effects of making abortions illegal would be to endanger more women's lives and put some of the women and abortionists in jail afterword.”

Agreed.

“I'd rather allow adopters to pay for healthy infants again. It's not that I'm comfortable with the idea of selling kids like they were a house or a can of beans, but I prefer that to throwing them away like trash.”

This shows some naïveté about the reasons women get abortions. First trimester abortions — remember these are easy, safe, cheap — are done for any reason the woman wants (legally). Sometimes those reason include shame, not wanting to carry a child, an inability to carry a child, not being capable of supporting a child, just not ready to be a parent, can't keep their job while pregnant, whatever. With most of the reasons women get early abortions, it doesn't make sense for the woman to carry that fetus to term, whether they'll be paid for the eventual kid or not. Again, most later abortions are done for other reasons — the fetus has a disease, etc. It doesn't make sense if the eventual kid will have a disease to then keep the pregnancy in the hopes of getting money for it. Of course, there are huge moral issues involved here — women getting pregnant on purpose in order to sell their kids, beautiful but poor women being taken advantage of and used as baby-makers for the rich who may be infertile or don't wish to ruin their bodies through pregnancy, etc. This doesn't take into account the fact that giving up your child for adoption is generally way more traumatic than having an early-term abortion.

I don't think it's the “lesser of two evils”; in fact, I certainly think it's the worse of two evils. This is why I'm pro-choice.

I'd rather allow adopters to pay for healthy infants again. It's not that I'm comfortable with the idea of selling kids like they were a house or a can of beans, but I prefer that to throwing them away like trash. The definition of trash here being something that you don't want and can't sell.

I understand that the change wouldn't save a lot of kids lives, and would have some other, unforeseen problems with it, but I still think it would be the lesser of evils.