Coffee or Tea?: ProChoice or ProLife? How about ProReason.

I am sure McCain voted ProLife, or antiabortion depending on your viewpoint, for at least the past four years in anticipation of running for president. He needs the ProLife vote. There is even a chance that he may actually be voting his conscience on this one. Obama has been recorded as saying he would not want to "punish a woman with a baby." There is a chance he actually sees having a baby as a punishment and he is speaking his conscience on the issue as well. We will never know for sure since this issue is so politicized and so wholly owned by the parties - Republicans must be ProLife and Democrats must be ProChoice. We demand that it be so.

Abortion is a sticky issue. I may be a Democrat and a liberal, but this is one issue where I take exception to the party line. I am not in favor of a "free-for-all" for abortion. I would call myself ProLife although the radical ProLife groups would not consider me so because I believe that abortion should be legal but very rare. And with that stance I would not be considered ProChoice. Maybe I am simply ProReason. Let me explain my ProReason stance. I oppose abortion on demand for two reasons. First I do believe that human life scientifically begins at conception and therefore abortion is technically taking a human life. Secondly, it is an invasive procedure that puts the woman at risk and her future fertility at risk as well.

Having said that, I think it would be very detrimental to make the procedure illegal. Women would get illegal abortions if the procedure is made illegal and would put themselves at even greater risk doing so. Illegal abortions with no regulations would be dangerous. Also, it needs to remain legal for those rare instances that the life of the mother is at risk. The woman and her family should have the right to make a choice in this circumstance if only one life will survive.

I believe the issue needs to be depoliticized and returned back to a health care status where people can think reasonably about it and where doctors are free to give solid medical advice. I believe that most doctors would not recommend it as a medical procedure if depoliticized unless it were truly indicated as a measure necessary for the health of the mother. Currently I believe that the real risks of the procedure are not accurately communicated to women because the issue is so political. Also, if depoliticized, the procedure could be returned to the hospital setting (except for Catholic run hospitals for religious reasons) where the patient would receive better care as an outpatient with the full hospital for back up.

Then when it comes to late-term abortions, I do firmly believe unless there is a clear choice between saving the life of the mother or the life of the child, that there is no legitimate reason for these procedures to be performed. There are very few cases where a child in utero must be terminated in order to save the life of the mother. Dilation and Extraction, D&X , Intrauterine Cranial Decompression or Partial birth abortion, are many names for a single procedure in which the body of the baby is delivered yet the head remains in the birth canal. The contents of the child's head is aspirated and then the head crushed before the head is allowed to pass through the birth canal. The woman has not escaped labor at this point so the only reason for this type of abortion is to terminate the child, not to prevent the woman from going through the "dangers" of labor. Except in very rare cases, this procedure could not be seen as a life-saving measure for the mother but a life-ending measure for the child. You can read the clinical description of other surgical methods used for abortion on the site of the American Pregnancy Association. A more experiential description of a Dilation and Evacuation procedure is given by Dr. Levantino, a former pro-choice abortion provider.

I believe as liberals we are wrong to accept that all abortion is good on the basis of this being a right to choice. This is one of those issues that lives in the wrong camp. We are proabortion (prochoice if you must dress it up) and yet against the death penalty and in favor of gun laws, while the right is prolife (or antiabortion) yet pro-gun and pro-death penalty.

The stance I take is the one I believe is most accurate to my liberal philosophy: Keep abortion legal but very rare. Depoliticize abortion and put it back in the hands of doctors to decide with their patients. Don't make it a "right" by law but don't outlaw it either.

The proponents of both sides of this issue are making a living off of it and neither would benefit by having the issue resolved. Millions of dollars are raised for both sides. Executive directors make big salaries to keep the issue alive. We would be much better off with a solid compromise...legal but rare and depoliticize it. Make it a medical issue not a political issue. And above all we do not want an amendment to the constitution either way about this. That would only prolong the debate into perpetuity.

Buzz it up