Sen. Barack Obama: "I don't know anybody who is pro-abortion."

Perhaps he hasn't looked in the mirror lately. I don't say so glibly. But I wonder: how glib is Sen. Obama being with Christianity Today?

For many evangelicals, abortion is a key, if not the key factor in their vote. You voted against banning partial birth abortion and voted against notifying parents of minors who get out-of-state abortions. What role do you think the President should play in creating national abortion policies?

I don't know anybody who is pro-abortion. I think it's very important to start with that premise.

Well, sure it is. Otherwise people might get the wrong idea and think that your 100% NARAL rating and unrelenting supporting of abortion might actually be pro-abortion. By the way, just so we're all clear: the prefix "pro" means "in favor of a proposition or opinion."

Does Obama know Wesley Clark? He has stated that he's "pro-abortion rights." How about Howard Stern? Has Obama ever done a Google search for "I'm pro-abortion"? Regardless, props for taking a page from the Hillary's Book of Brazen Double-Talk: "I have met thousands and thousands of pro-choice men and women. I have never met anyone who is pro-abortion." If only Obama, Hillary, and Co. had the guts to simply fess up like some folks do.

Obama's "premise" is essential, because as soon as you give into the "argument" that, "Hey, no one really is pro-abortion," you are engaged in a highly subjective argument over sincerity and intention, not about whether or not the abortion kills a child. Here's what I mean:

I think people recognize what a wrenching, difficult issue it is. I do think that those who diminish the moral elements of the decision aren't expressing the full reality of it.

I sense a big "But..." coming.

But what I believe is that women do not make these decisions casually, and that they struggle with it fervently with their pastors, with their spouses, with their doctors.

See? It's about sincerity. But this does beg the question: why is this such a difficult decision if abortion really is simply a medical procedure and the fetus is merely cells and tissue, not a baby? Or, in other words, if abortion is not wrong, why try to get around saying, "I'm pro-abortion"?

Our goal should be to make abortion less common,

Then why does Obama always support, in every way possible, making abortion more common?

that we should be discouraging unwanted pregnancies, that we should encourage adoption wherever possible. There is a range of ways that we can educate our young people about the sacredness of sex

So sex is "sacred," but the result of sex—a human life—is not? Naw, it's only sacred and meaningful and viable if you want it to be.

and we should not be promoting the sort of casual activities that end up resulting in so many unwanted pregnancies.

If you think that abortion should be readily available to any woman, anywhere, anytime, for any reason, you really have no business pontificating about how "we should not be promoting...casual activities."

Ultimately, women are in the best position to make a decision at the end of the day about these issues.

Strangely enough, when it comes to, say, school choice or gun control or definitions of marriage or property rights, it's rarely the parents of students, gun owners, married couples, or property owners who are said to be "in the best position to make a decision." No, those things require experts, especially judges, legislators, government officials, sociologists, politicians, etc., etc. Just thought I'd mention it. But, more importantly, this simply obscures the real issue (again): is it right to kill an unborn baby?

With significant constraints. For example, I think we can legitimately say — the state can legitimately say — that we are prohibiting late-term abortions as long as there's an exception for the mother's health. Those provisions that I voted against typically didn't have those exceptions, which raises profound questions where you might have a mother at great risk. Those are issues that I don't think the government can unilaterally make a decision about. I think they need to be made in consultation with doctors, they have to be prayed upon, or people have to be consulting their conscience on it. I think we have to keep that decision-making with the person themselves.

Never mind that such an argument is clearly absurd when applied to any other moral choice: killing someone, committing rape, using crack cocaine, drunk driving, robbery, making racist remarks, and so forth. For example, let's say that I want to use meth and attempt to argue that "It's my body" and "I'm following my conscience" and  "I'm not hurting anyone else." Will anyone take that as a serious argument for using such a drug? But isn't the government, in making laws that prohibit using meth, unilaterally making a decision about it? Of course! The government does it all of the time, about all sorts of things. Again, this is pulled off only because the emphasis, wrongly, is on the woman, and not on the nature of the act and what that act does to the unborn child. (For a far more detailed and systematic elucidation of these basic arguments, see Defending Life by Dr. Francis J. Beckwith.)

Finally, one more quote from Sen. Obama:

I am a Christian, and I am a devout Christian. I believe in the redemptive death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. I believe that that faith gives me a path to be cleansed of sin and have eternal life. But most importantly, I believe in the example that Jesus set by feeding the hungry and healing the sick and always prioritizing the least of these over the powerful. I didn't 'fall out in church' as they say, but there was a very strong awakening in me of the importance of these issues in my life. I didn't want to walk alone on this journey. Accepting Jesus Christ in my life has been a powerful guide for my conduct and my values and my ideals.

Read the entire CT interview.

Comments

[Ed Peters]

I never understand the pro-abort who says "abortion is a wrenching, difficult issue". What the H-E-double-toothpicks is so wrenching and difficult about it? Only this: it's a baby getting whacked. If abortion ain't a baby death, it ain't wrenching and difficult. But if it is a baby, then man, why are you doing about it?

[Spirit of Vatican II]

No one is pro-abortion. Obama probably wants abortion to be safe legal and _rare_, as opposed to unsafe, illegal and frequent, which was the concrete effect of church-inspired policies in Mexico and Italy. Abortion frequency has been halved in Italy since it was legalized.

[Carl Olson]

No one is pro-abortion

I think we've heard this before...

[Kevin]

SOV2 -

"Abortion frequency has been halved in Italy since it was legalized."

Please provide evidence of this.

(Abortion was legalized in Italy through the 12th week in 1979 and upheld in a referendum in 1981. See this page: http://www.pregnantpause.org/lex/lexeuro.htm)

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/ab-italy.html

The overall numbers have gone down steadily since 1984, three years after it was legalized. I also might add that it increased by 62% in the four years after 1979.

[rcb]

"Who's pro-abortion? "
How about Barbara Ehrenreich, Katha Pollit, and just about anyone who's ever written for "The Nation", not to mention elements in the environmental movement.
Out of curiosity where in the "Spirit of Vatican II" do you find even reluctant acceptance of abortion? Oh, right. Just like the Constitution. "Emanations and prenumbras" no doubt.

[Kevin]

Another item of note: the birthrate in Italy has decreased from 2.44 births/woman in 1970 to 1.22 in 1997, and is still about 1.23 births per woman. The fact that births have declined with abortions likely points to the fact that most people are either using artificial contraceptives or sterilizing (I suppose that the entire country could be using NFP, but that would have to be the best kept secret in the western world, aside from some secrets kept by albino Opus Dei monks).

[Ed Peters]

I just like to remind somebody that the "Spirit of Vatican II" was the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, the same Holy Spirit Who animated every ecumenical council. So I'd be real, real careful, about what words I put in His mouth. God has long memory.

[Carl Olson]

I included this link in my post, but just in case SofVII didn't see it, here is what one pro-abortion blogger has to say about the silly argument, "No one is pro-abortion":

I am pro-abortion. Not pro-choice. Pro-abortion. I think this is an important distinction because I hear some pro-choicers say they support the right of a woman to choose, but they would never want to have or would want their lover/girlfriend/wife to have an abortion.

I don’t get that. I can’t say I support the right for a woman to get an abortion and then say abortion is bad. Abortion is good. When a woman evaluates where she is in the universe and decides that she should have an abortion, she is doing the right thing. And she is doing a good thing.

An abortion is nothing to be ashamed of. However, saying you are pro-choice and with the next breath saying you would never get an abortion is shaming those who have.

I hate that. “I’m pro-choice, but I would never get an abortion.” Or, “I’m pro-choice, but I would never want my girlfriend to have an abortion.” Or, “Abortion is never a good thing, but we need to protect a woman’s right to choose.”

If the right to choose is good, then abortion is good. Does that mean we need more abortions – more of a good thing? No. We need as many abortions as we need. No more, no less.

[Jeff Miller]

That is just the latest in the run of rhetorical double plays that is becoming more common as an excuse.

I wonder if he would consider someone who always voted for slavery as pro-slavery? Or would he think it a choice of a landowner to make? Somehow I doubt if he would see it that way.

Though the pro-abortion side has always only had lies on their side for armament so we can't expect something different.

[Spirit of Vatican II]

The Italian statistics can easily be found on the web, and they are constantly cited by Italians. When an effort was made to overturn the 1978 law in a 1981 (or so) referendum it was defeated by a huge majority. Was there a rise in abortions in the first years of the legislation? Not in comparison with the statistics alleged for illegal abortions before 1978.

[Spirit of Vatican II]

For the Italian abortion statistics, here is a place to start: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3634/is_199611/ai_n8756099.

[Spirit of Vatican II]

"Subsequent to the legalization of abortion in Italy in 1978, abortion rates among Italian women first rose and then declined steadily, from a peak of 16.9 abortions per 1,000 women of reproductive age in 1983 to 9.8 per 1,000 in 1993... Data from 1981 and 1991 indicate that age-specific abortion rates decreased during the 1980s for all age-groups, with the largest declines occurring in regions with the highest levels of abortion. Moreover, a shift in the age distribution of abortion rates occurred during the 1980s, with women aged 30-34 registering the highest abortion rate in 1991, whereas in 1981 the highest level of abortion occurred among those aged 25-29. The abortion rate among adolescent women was low at both times (7.6 per 1,000 in 1981 and 4.6 per 1,000 in 1991). These data are based only on reported legal abortions; the number of clandestine abortions remains unknown. (Family Planning Perspectives, 28:267-271 & 277,1996)"

[Spirit of Vatican II]

In 1978 the number of legal abortions was legal, so naturally the first line on the graph was a straight ascent. But since 1983 the line is going down, so that in concrete the law is accompanied by abortions getting rarer. A problem with interpreting this is the lack of reliable statistics for illegal abortions.

[Spirit of Vatican II]

Correction -- shd read: Up to 1978 the number of legal abortions was zero.

[Peter Brown]

It always sounds cockeyed to me when somebody argues for the legality of abortion and then talks about Jesus "prioritizing the least of these over the powerful." What in the world are unborn children, if not "the least of these"—in fact, the very "least of these," the most defenseless people in our society bar none?

Peace,
--Peter

[sky]

Well since we don't have any accurate evidence of the number of abortions before they became legal we can't really know if that trend is due to abortion being legal or if it's a trend predating it or if it's due to something else altogether. So I don't see how it can be claimed that there are absolute proofs that making abortions legal lowered the rate. It's like claiming that legalizing divorce would decrease the amount of marriages that fail... Nonsense!

[Dan Deeny]

Let's all pray for Sen. Obama. Let's pray that Jesus helps him change his mind. Is Sen. Obama aware of blackgenocide.org? Does anyone ever ask him about African-Americans and abortion? As far as I know, only one member of the Black Caucus has been against the abortion business. That was Mickey Leland from Texas and he died in a plane crash in Ethiopia. The Prince of Darkness himself must have thought of this program. Imagine getting the public leaders of a group you are trying to exterminate help you exterminate their group!