I am posting this for discussion but am a little confused by the headline as my understanding from other info was that a majority has wanted abortion legal for years now. http://firstread.nbcnews.com/_news/...nt-abortion-to-be-legal?lite&ocid=msnhp&pos=1 NBC/WSJ poll: Majority, for first time, want abortion to be legal By Mark Murray, NBC News Senior Political Editor As the 40th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision takes place on Tuesday, a majority of Americans – for the first time – believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases, according to a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. What’s more, seven in 10 respondents oppose Roe v. Wade being overturned, which is the highest percentage on this question since 1989. “These are profound changes,” says Republican pollster Bill McInturff, who conducted this survey with Democratic pollster Peter D. Hart and his colleagues. McInturff adds that the abortion-related events and rhetoric over the past year – which included controversial remarks on abortion and rape by two Republican Senate candidates, as well as a highly charged debate over contraception – helped shaped these changing poll numbers. “The dialogue we have had in the last year has contributed … to inform and shift attitudes.” The 1973 Roe v. Wade decision established a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion, at least in the first three months of pregnancy. According to the poll, 54 percent of adults say that abortion should be legal either always or most of the time, while a combined 44 percent said it should be illegal – either with or without exceptions. That’s the first time since this poll question was first asked in 2003 that a majority maintained that abortion should be legal. Previously (with just one exception in 2008), majorities said abortion should be illegal. In addition, a whopping 70 percent of Americans oppose the Roe v. Wade decision being overturned, including 57 percent who feel strongly about this. That’s up from the 58 percent who said the decision shouldn’t be overturned in 1989; the 60 percent who said this in 2002; and the 66 percent who said this in 2005. By comparison, just 24 percent now want the Roe v. Wade decision overturned, including 21 percent who feel strongly about this position. Much of this change, the NBC/WSJ pollsters say, is coming from African Americans, Latinos and women without college degrees -- all of whom increasingly oppose the Supreme Court decision being overturned. The NBC/WSJ poll was conducted Jan. 12-15 of 1,000 adults (including 300 cellphone-only respondents), and it has a margin of error of plus-minus 3.1 percentage points.
A bit different a short 5 months ago: http://www.lifenews.com/2012/08/24/cnn-poll-majority-of-americans-want-abortions-prohibited/
“Our garbage is collected early in the morning. Sometimes the bang of the cans and the grind of the city trucks awaken us before our time. We are resentful, mutter into our pillows, then go back to sleep. On the morning of August 6th, the people of Woodside Avenue do just that. When at last they rise from their beds, dress, eat breakfast, and leave their houses for work, they have forgotten, if they had ever known, that the garbage truck had passed earlier that morning. The event has slipped into unmemory, like a dream. They close their doors and descend to the pavement. “It is midsummer. You measure the climate, decide how you feel in relation to the heat and humidity. You walk toward the bus stop. Others, your neighbors, are waiting there. It is all so familiar. “All at once you step on something soft. You feel it with your foot. Even through your shoe you have the sense of something unusual, something marked by a special 'give.' It is a foreignness upon the pavement. Instinct pulls your foot away in an awkward little movement. You look down, and you see... a tiny naked body, its arms and legs flung apart, its head thrown back, its mouth agape, its face serious. A bird, you think, fallen from its nest. But there is no nest here on Woodside, no bird so big. It is rubber, then. A model. A joke. Yes, that's it, a joke. And you bend to see. Because you must. And it is no joke. Such a gray softness can be but one thing. It is a baby, and dead. “You cover your mouth, your eyes. You are fixed. Horror has found its chink and crawled in, and you will never be the same as you were. Years later you will step from a sidewalk to a lawn, and you will start at its softness, and think of that upon which you have just trod. Now you look about; another man has seen it too. 'My God,' he whispers... There is a cry. 'Here's another!' and 'Another!' and 'Another.' “Later, at the police station, the investigation is brisk, conclusive. It is the hospital director speaking. 'Fetuses accidentally got mixed up with the hospital rubbish... were picked up at approximately 8:15 am by a sanitation truck. Somehow, the plastic lab bag, labeled hazardous material, fell off the back of the truck and broke open. No, it is not known how the fetuses got in the orange plastic bag labeled hazardous material. It is a freak accident.' “The hospital director wants you to know that it is not an everyday occurrence. Once in a lifetime, he says. But you have seen it, and what are his words to you now? He grows affable, familiar, tells you that, by mistake, the fetuses got mixed up with the other debris. (Yes, he says other, he says debris.) He has spent the entire day, he says, trying to figure out how it happened. He wants you to know that. Somehow it matters to him. He goes on: aborted fetuses that weigh one pound or less are incinerated. Those weighing over one pound are buried at the city cemetery. He says this. “Now you see. It is orderly. It is sensible. The world is not mad. This is still a civilized society... But just this once, you know it isn't. You saw, and you know.” http://www.amazon.com/Mortal-Lesson...qid=1358864730&sr=1-1&keywords=richard+selzer
I would bet $10 that the post before mine is cynical, petty, and lazy. Cut n' paste, amiright? OP, I too am confused by the claim of the article title. Maybe I've been in a liberal fog of misinformation, but I thought the majority (barely) wanted to keep R. v. W.
What does it say about a society that condones the willfull stopping of a human heartbeat (and calls that progress)? http://www.patheos.com/blogs/thecre...ayers-comforted-me-while-i-fought-demons.html
American public opinion is becoming more liberal. Another nail in the coffin of the Republican Party.
it says government bans to enforce nominally "good results" (ex: national security or the war on drugs) are heavy-handed, and ineffective. Isn't that your stock line?
It says that we value existing life over potential life, which is a good thing. It says that we value the rights of women who want to make their own decisions regarding procreation, another good thing. It says that people who want to stick their nose into another person's uterus will not be able to do so in our nation's future, which is a GREAT thing.
Are you saying you'd be for an abortion ban if it could be effectively enforced? Protection of human life is one of the only morally legitimate uses of force. We expect it for ourselves, but shrug when it is denied to the most innocent and defenseless among us.
There's nothing potential about a living organism with unique human DNA. You don't have the right to take another life. The destruction of a human existence is a sad thing. It's disheartening that some would celebrate it.
a) First of all, human life and a fetus are not interchangeable. Just because the latter is further along the stage of development from a zygote does not make it "human life". That's the crux of the debate for most people, and you've assumed that away. b) Second, your first question is nonsensical because an abortion ban cannot be effectively enforced. In fact, any ban on social vices can't be. There's a host of reasons why, but for someone who spends a lot of time up googling those reasons and pasting them here en masse for the War on Drugs, economic intervention and etc., you seem to be behind the 8-ball on this. I mean, would I believe in God if he/she/they existed and was talking to me about the divine plan to stop Harden? Probably. As it is, economic disincentives work best. Glad you're with me on the need for single-payer and an effective healthcare system not to save 45,000 zygotes a year, but 45,000 lives.
<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/EdTjLZPnvKM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Sorry.... looking for video of a woman getting raped to get my point across... give me a few, I will find one...
I don't think you were just in a liberal fog of misinformation. Here is some other polling data showing that majorities have been supporting keeping abortion legal for awhile now. To explain it looks like support for legal abortion dropped below 50% in 2009 and the latest polling shows that it is now back over 50%. Here is the article that graph is from: http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles_of_faith/2009/10/abortion_suppor.html
Life does "exist" in the womb, which is a good thing Women have the right already before conception - just need to exercise it Personal freedom always has responsibilities - see government Obviously I haven't ever been an advocate of abortion - just see life wasted instead of the burden the advocates see it as.
