Video: Obama Says He’s “Pro-Choice” on Third-Trimester Abortions

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John McCormack @ The Weekly Standard:

The Washington Post reports that President Obama is running his reelection campaign as a “culture warrior,” trying to cast his opponents as extremists on such issues as abortion in the case of rape and requiring religious institutions to pay for contraception. But could Obama’s own extremism on abortion come back to bite him?

During a 2003 press conference, Barack Obama indicated that he thought abortion should be legal in all situations, even late in pregnancy:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YEvBTwDqBY[/youtube]

OBAMA: “I am pro-choice.”

REPORTER: “In all situations including the late term thing?”

OBAMA: “I am pro-choice. I believe that women make responsible choices and they know better than anybody the tragedy of a difficult pregnancy and I don’t think that it’s the government’s role to meddle in that choice.”

 

In another interview, Obama said: “I voted no on the late-term abortion ban, not because I don’t recognize that these are painful issues but because I trust women to make these decisions.”

But over the years, Obama has been shifty on the issue of late-term abortion. As an Illinois state senator, Obama opposed the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act. The problem, in Obama’s own words, was that in some cases the “fetus, or child — however you want to describe it” was “not just coming out limp and dead.” Supporters of the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act wanted to require doctors to provide medical care to these infants, while Obama wanted to leave it up to the discretion of the abortionist to determine whether these infants had a reasonable chance of sustained life.

But when Obama ran for president in 2008, he said that he supported states’ banning late-term abortions so long as the bans contained a “strict” exception for the physical health of the mother. Days later, Obama modified his position, saying he also supported an exception for “serious clinical mental health diseases.” Supreme Court reporter Jan Crawford noted at the time that Obama’s position was still “startling” because the exceptions Obama claimed to support were narrower than the Supreme Court’s 1973 edict in Doe v. Bolton that there must be “emotional, psychological, familial, and … age” exceptions to late-term abortion bans.

Obama’s 2008 endorsement of late-term abortion bans also appeared to be in conflict with his support for the Freedom of Choice Act. In 2007, Obama cosponsored the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA), which would strike down restrictions on abortion at the state and federal level. The bill stated that all abortions must be legal before “viability” for any reason and that abortions must be legal until birth if a woman’s health is at risk. FOCA does not contain a definition of “health,” therefore “anything an abortionist says is related to ‘health’ is sufficient,” according to Douglas Johnson, legislative director of the National Right to Life Committee. “A state would not be able to adopt any limiting definition (for example, defining ‘health’ to exclude emotional distress), because that would be to narrow and infringe on the federally guaranteed right which FOCA would establish.  The entire purpose of FOCA is to prohibit any narrowing of the federally guaranteed right — for example, by requiring parental notification, or by refusing to fund abortions.”

In a direct challenge to the very broad definition of “health” in Doe v. Bolton, a number of states in recent years have banned abortions from being performed after 20 weeks of pregnancy, the time when an unborn child can feel pain. But, in contrast to his vocal opposition to state legislation such as Arizona’s immigration law and Wisconsin’s labor reforms, Obama has remained silent on these late-term bans.

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Republicans are religionists, in general, which they believe the strange myth—bested only by the myth of the ancient Greeks—of the Bible, and the non-empirically verifiable concepts they draw from their religious leaders that are often contrary to the facts of science—such as “human life begins at conception”.

@Liberal1 (objectivity):

Can you find a ”scientist” who claims that what a pregnant woman carries inside her is not ”HUMAN?”
I mean, we all carry a host of beneficial bacteria, but, you know what I mean, what her umbilical is attached to in her womb?
And if it IS human, do scientists somewhere teach that it is not ”a life?”

@Liberal1 (objectivity):

Republicans are religionists, in general, which they believe the strange myth

It’s quite possible that atheists believe a “strange myth” of their own. That is, that God doesn’t exist. And why wouldn’t they believe that. They’ve never heard him speak. They haven’t seen him personally.

Of course, in order to believe in God, one must have faith. Which, incidentally, is why they call it faith, and not “knowing”. You’d think that a group of “intellectuals”, and I use that term very loosely, that believe beyond a shadow of a doubt, despite actual science on the matter, that AGW is true, that have the faith to know it’s true, wouldn’t be so judgmental about someone else’s beliefs, or faiths.

@Liberal1 (objectivity): BOHICA man2: Just too hard getting worked up today to answer your misogynist, prattle. Please do us all a favor when you bend over in BOHICA supplication to not groan or whimper. Maybe the BOHICA experience will provide you some insight into what a woman feels as she unknowingly gives her own life at the hands of the dumbocrat, Eugenicists of (U) Planned Parenthood.