Texas Senate panel OKs abortion sonogram bill

To answer both you and max yes I joined the discussion but that doesn't make me responsible for responding for other posters especially when I particular comment is direct at me. And frankly I have seen both of you react similarly when some other poster has either intentionally or inadvertantly responded to a comment you made with a comment that was brought up by someone else.

 

you were arguing with me about the very same discussion i was having with donny. the very same topic.

 

I think you're reading something different than he and I are. You joined the discussion and he responded to you. That's it. I'm not sure what he's attributing to you that you weren't intending to be a part of? I think this is one of those cases of people talking past each other. You're seeing something he's not. He's seeing something you're not. So you're talking about two totally different things and everything is getting misinterpreted.

 

Not exactly since I never used the same terms as donny and the term "social costs" has a specific meaning.

Anyway I don't want to belabor this discussion regarding the minutia of the debate and apologize for dragging it out.

 

That is probably the case, whoops sorry for dragging it out more. Will catch back up on this thread later.

 

fewer abortions would be a good thing

 

My point was simply that...if you intend for laws to match your policy goals as I understand them from our discussion here...then your hope is for abortions laws which are far broader than Roe v. Wade.

I wasn't telling you there are other examples of govt telling us "no" when it comes to flirting with the definition of life...I guess I wasn't clear. I said there are instances where the government says if you play loose and fast with life, itself, then the govt says no. Ultimately, that's what the Court did in Roe in some measure....they didn't say abortion on demand, though they watered it down enough in subsequent decisions to pretty much get us there. They did put restrictions on when an abortion could happen...because they realized they were dealing with what MAY be human life...and tried to draw distinctions with respect to time.

 

Since Communism fell in the Czech Republic, and contraception was made easily and widely available for all citizens, abortion rates have fallen by MORE than 2/3. That's what I consider progress, not this bull$#!%.

 

the best way to reduce abortions is by creating more opportunities and more incentive for people to not make this choice. anti-abortionists are barking up the wrong tree if their goal is truly to reduce abortion rather than eliminate it altogether.

 

This is one of the first things you have posted with which I agree. Will you go on to support comprehensive sex education (basically, everything in the book "Taking Charge of your Fertility" http://www.tcoyf.com/) and universal, free access to birth control? Those two things will actually reduce abortion numbers far more than either the law proposed in the OP or making abortion illegal.

 

Max, what's the harm? The harm is taking away the woman's right to control of her own body. I've got two children, one in college, and yes, we saw their sonograms, and yes, it was pretty impressive. In fact, if you are the future parent looking at that, it is more than impressive, it is deeply moving. What Sishir doesn't understand is the context of viewing a sonogram. If you are eager to be a parent, have been working at becoming one, and then get to see a sonogram, even being able to tell the sex, frequently, it has an emotional impact difficult to explain to one who hasn't been in that situation.

However, context is everything here. We chose to view the sonograms. No government entity, no law forced us to view them. It was a choice. This law would take away that choice. It is clearly designed to hit the woman wanting the abortion over the head with an emotional hammer she doesn't want, has no need for, and shouldn't be required to view. You mentioned "abortion mills" earlier, that they were money making enterprises. Pardon me for saying so, but all doctors offices, excepting those run by a government entity or charity, are money making enterprises. Doctors will make money off of giving these suddenly required sonograms. Should we describe them now as "Sonogram Mills?" You will say there is a difference and of course you will, because it supports an agenda that wants to make abortions illegal, unless the health of the mother is at risk, although there are those who would blow off the health of the mother in their eagerness to outlaw abortion in all its forms. Again, it misses the crux of the argument from my side, which is that a woman should have control of her own body. She shouldn't be required to do something to it, or not do something to it, unless it is her choice. No more than a man should be required to have a vasectomy. I would love to see the "real world" reaction from men told they HAVE to have a vasectomy, that it is required by the government, and if you want to have children, you have to get government permission to have it reversed.

As always in this male-centric world, women are told to do things, required to do things, that men wouldn't put up with in a million years. A partial ban on abortions after the first trimester? I would be for it, because by that point, a fetus has a chance of viability outside of the womb and the woman has had plenty of time to abort the fetus should she choose to do so. Why a partial ban? If the woman's life is at risk, or the fetus has been shown to have horrific and irreversible birth defects, the woman should have that choice. In my opinion. The government has no place in sticking its nose into these very difficult and personal decisions, and if anyone thinks a woman makes these decisions lightly, they are either ignorant, or fools.

 

as problematic as abortion is, eliminating it would cause disastrous social effects. aiming to make abortion safe, legal, and rare is a desirable, rational way to to tackle the problem.

I don't want to get into an argument, it's just too great of a day so far. i'll leave with the immortal words of everlast- God forbid you ever had to walk a mile in her shoes, 'Cause then you really might know what it's like to have to choose.

 

i'm not arguing with you, cue the louis armstrong:

I hear babies cry...... I watch them grow
They'll learn much more.....than I'll never know
And I think to myself .....what a wonderful world

 

Max, I think you are having a hard time separating the legal issue and your religious bias. You must accept that in a multi-cultural society there will be positions that are contrary to your beliefs that have been deemed by the legal process to be accepted practice.

THE key to this thread is the hypocrisy of a of a political party that professes a guiding principle of rolling back government regulation, deciding to intrude upon a most difficult, legal, medical decision of a private citizen and her doctor.

It exposes Texas conservatives for what they are, false libertarians, who really just want to enrich the rich, promote the Christian religion into law, and short change the institutions that support the general welfare. It's some sort of weird Theocratic Olicharchy, the exact opposite of what I interpret as the intent of the Founders.

 

I know, I like responding to people just to agree with them. I think some more cynical posters have dubbed this the "liberal circle jerk."

 

The silly "social engineering" trope needs to be set aside because it's meaningless. Pretty much everything the government does can be labeled like this - I mean the government exists in order to support the functioning of a more optiimal soci-ety than would exist in its absence, so everything basically fits this definition.