Mixing up Amandas=Teh Funny. Mixing up pro-choice and anti-choice is just losing your grip.
So, this story will amuse everyone. I get an email from Jane Hamsher and she wants to elevate a comment at Firedoglake left by me to a post in and of itself. Thinking she meant a comment on the sexist slurs dust-up, I said, “Oh sure,” and included a picture to use for an avatar. Well, I hope the Amanda who the comment really belongs to likes the picture, because there was a wee mix-up and miscommunication about which Amanda and which comment. That said, I think this Amanda’s comment is extremely good and I wish I had thought of it. So, what Amanda said.
So, here’s the issue if you’re behind on it. Jane caught Nancy Keenan, the president of NARAL, making the most outrageous statement on this attempt by Republicans to pass a law requiring doctors to lie to women and offer them pain medication for the fetus if they get an abortion at 20 weeks, which is about 8 weeks, or two months for the “pro-lifers” in the audience who might have trouble with the math, before there’s enough neurological structure to a fetus for it to even feel pain. This should be a no-brainer (no pun intended) for pro-choicers—laws mandating that doctors deliver misinformation to women in an attempt to intimidate them are anti-woman, end of story. It’s a clear-cut example of how sexist anti-choice laws really are, since the law doesn’t try to override reality and force doctors to lie to men.
So what was Keenan’s statement?
While the measure has provoked strong opposition from Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Federation, NARAL Pro-Choice America, perhaps the nation’s leading abortion rights group, has stayed neutral.
“Pro-choice Americans have always believed that women deserve access to all the information relevant to their reproductive health decisions. For some women, that includes information related to fetal anesthesia options,” Nancy Keenan, NARAL’s president, has said in a statement on the bill.
Okay, I thought while reading this, Keenan is a little hazy on what the whole cloth pro-choicers are talking about. NAPW is a good organization to look to if you want information on what the expansive view of choice is. Still, it’s hard to be generous, because Keenan is abandoning the pro-choice side’s greatest asset, which is the truth. As in, we’re arguing from a reality-based worldview versus anti-choicers who are arguing from notions like “god said so”, “all women want more babies”, “pregnancy is never dangerous”, and “sperms deliver souls to eggs”. So why is Keenan wary of using her biggest asset in the argument?
Well, Fred at Stone Court sheds some light on the issue. Apparently, Keenan is politically pro-choice, but also Catholic and personally opposed to abortion. Which could, in theory, be just fine, since the whole point of being pro-choice is to maintain your right to your personal views on these things, but in reality seems to be a problem. See, philosophically and logically, the right to an abortion is based in the right to your bodily autonomy. However, on the political side, a lot of Americans are swayed by a combination of uneasiness with sex, sexism, and religious belief to be more fascinated by the red herring discussion of when life begins. Which means that whoever is going to be in leadership positions in the abortion rights leadership needs to be firmly committed to opposing all attempts to define fetuses as some sort of pseudo-citizens, in that they don’t have names or rights, except the one right no real citizen has, which is the right to commandeer another person’s body for your sustenance against their will. Which is where the other Amanda’s excellent point comes in.
Which leads me to a question that popped into my head this morning: How many of the people who think that fetuses are citizens are also the people that think Jose Padilla is not? I’m guessing the crossover percentages run into the high 90s. Call them the Propagandized Americans.
36 Responses to “A mix-up on names, personhood, and citizenship rights”
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It is legally impossible for a fetus to be a US citizen, though I’d love to hear the anti-choicers argue that citizenship should be granted based on country of fertilization rather than country of birth. Tough spot for those who oppose legal abortion and want to “get tough” on immigration.
I’d love to hear the anti-choicers argue that citizenship should be granted based on country of fertilization rather than country of birth.
How funny! We call my son the “Italian stowaway” as he’s a honeymoon baby.
Maybe we ’stole’ him from legitimate potential Italian parents–just like Mary Cheney!
Oh, I can see it, anonymous. Watch for them to argue that babies born in the US shouldn’t be citizens because they were conceived in another country. That’ll prevent all those pregnant Mexican women running over the border! After all, they’re only doing it so they can have a citizen baby and mooch off of US generosity. (/sarcasm)
“… at 20 weeks, which is about 8 weeks, or two months …”
Wha? I’m not seeing where the 8 weeks came from.
BTW, I found the bill online:
http://www.nrlc.org/abortion/Fetal_Pain/S512005.html
Pardon the pimping, but I figure this is as good of a topic as any:
Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida is giving away free emergency contraception to people who show up at one of their clinics today until 1 p.m. This includes their clinics in St. Pete, Sarasota, Tampa, Lakeland and Fort Myers. I know I personally will be making my way down there today, not just to pick up some EC for myself, but also to thank them for being such fabulous supporters of reproductive freedoms.
Well, what did Keenen actually say (I have meeting in an hour, so no time to look it up)?
If she just conceded this fight, that would be teh stupid. However, it would be strategically smart to make a statement conceding the fight (which would make our side look moderate and reasonable and willing to compromise) provided she (1) made very clear that this was a concession (and implicitly made it clear that the other side would need to concede something) and (2) insisted that the bill be changed to 28 weeks when the fetus is actually potentially capabable of sensation (avoiding the words “feeling pain”) and in the process pointed out how dishonest the anti-choice side was being.
If she just conceded the fight, then she is to blame. But if people got the story wrong, which is a distinct possibility if the media is involved if you know what I mean, then it is the misreporters who are to blame.
WTF, Nancy Keenan?? Women should be given “information” that’s flat-out wrong?
This is unbelievable.
“How many of the people who think that fetuses are citizens are also the people that think Jose Padilla is not? I’m guessing the crossover percentages run into the high 90s.”
And you would be correct.
Also, I can’t believe (I seem to say that hundreds of times a day) that doctors would KNOWINGLY give false information to their patients. And still they wonder why malpractice insurance is so expensive.
Legislating scientific theories. “We’re declaring THIS one to be right and THIS one to be wrong based upon our feeeeeeeeeeeeeeelings…” yeah. People that are too chicken to point this out as the pitiful excuse that it is…um, are not usually people who are openly president of glaringly public pro-choice organizations. wtf? Something does not compute here.
I suppose it is possible (although not terribly likely) that NARAL got confused by reading too much technical research on the issue. Like, for example, the review of the available literature by the the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (the chief Brit ob-gyn journal), which said: “Given the anatomical evidence, it is possible that the fetus can feel pain from 20 weeks and is caused distress by interventions from as early as 15 or 16 weeks.” Or maybe the writings of the Dr. Kanwaljeet Anand of the U of Arkansas, one of those guys with an inch-thick resume, whose research tranformed pain control in premature newborns — he wrote recently, “It is my opinion that the human fetus possesses the ability to experience pain from 20 weeks of gestation, if not earlier, and the pain perceived by a fetus is possibly more intense than that perceived by term newborns or older children.”
Really, it is best not to get bogged down in such material. Just stick with that objective 2005 JAMA article, the chief author of which was a medical student previously employed as a lawyer at NARAL. The JAMA authors assure us that the fetus doesn’t experience pain until about 29 weeks. True, that article has been critized by many specialists. For example, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, founder of the American Pain Association, wrote, “In the recent JAMA article on fetal pain, a similar presumption is being made that the fetus brain is not fully developed till 29 weeks and therefore fetus will not feel pain before that age. There is no evidence that a fully developed cortex circuitry is required to feel pain. In contrast, we do have evidence from the neonatal experience that this presumption is wrong.”
By “neoatal experience,” he was referring to the treatment of premature newborns, from 22 weeks on. Apparently it has been recognized for a couple of decades now that these premature newborns do experience pain, and steps are taken to minimize it to the extent possible, since it is stressful for them. Those anti-choice zealots, in their simple-minded way, think that if these infants cry when stuck with a needle in the neonatal unit at, say, 24 weeks, then they are probably experiencing pain when their limbs are twisted off during a D&E abortion at 24 weeks. (The bill actually applies at 22 weeks in the system used by ob-gyns.) There is no reasoning with people like that.
Anyway, NARAL is blind if it can’t see — as most of the posters on this thread so clearly see — that pregnant women are incapable of evaluating this sort of confusing information. Or, if, if not entirely incapable, at least not equipped to evaluate such claims with the dispassionate perspective that the posters above so clearly bring to the task.
I recall a study suggesting that when in utero they are in a continual state of unconsciousness. Last I checked, I personally mind quite significant pain less when I’m asleep than I do needles when I’m awake.
Kyra wrote: I recall a study suggesting that when in utero they are in a continual state of unconsciousness. Last I checked, I personally mind quite significant pain less when I’m asleep than I do needles when I’m awake.
Those anti-choice zealots would say, “Even if that is so, if somebody started twisting your leg off, you would wake up pretty quick.”
On a quick search, I could not find the study you referred to — please post a link. I did come across this item in the Daily Telegraph (London):
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2Fnews%2F2003%2F03%2F10%2Fnfoet10.xml
Foetuses ‘may be conscious long before abortion limit’
By David Derbyshire, Science Correspondent
Last Updated: 11:49pm GMT 09/03/2003
Foetuses may develop consciousness long before the legal age limit for abortions, one of Britain’s leading brain scientists has said.
Baroness Greenfield, a professor of neurology at Oxford University and the director of the Royal Institution, said there was evidence to suggest the conscious mind could develop before 24 weeks, the upper age where terminations are permitted.
Although she fell short of calling for changes in the abortion laws, she urged doctors and society to be cautious when assuming unborn babies lacked consciousness. “Is the foetus conscious? The answer is yes, but up to a point,” she said.
“Given that we can’t prove consciousness or not, we should be very cautious about being too gung ho and assuming something is not conscious. We should err on the side of caution.”
Last year, a Daily Telegraph straw poll found many neurologists were concerned that foetuses could feel pain in the womb before 24 weeks after conception.
Many believed foetuses should be given anaesthetics during a late abortion, after 20 weeks. Some also believe pain relief should be given for keyhole surgery in the womb.
Abortions are allowed up to 24 weeks in Britain, but are rarely given so late. Around 90 per cent of the 175,000 planned terminations that take place each year in England and Wales are in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. Around 1.5 per cent - or 2,600 - take place after the 20th week.
Terminations after 24 weeks are only allowed in exceptional circumstances if, for instance, the mother’s life is threatened.
Lady Greenfield is sceptical of philosophers and doctors who argue that consciousness is “switched on” at some point during the brain’s development.
She believes instead that there is a sliding scale of consciousness and that it develops gradually as neurons, or brain cells, make more and more connections with each other.
She told the British Fertility Society in London last week that she had serious concerns about foetal consciousness.
“The Home Office has legislation that applies to a mammal and they have now extended it to the octopus, a mollusc, because it can learn,” she said. “If a mollusc can be attributed with being sentient, and now has Home Office protection, then my own view is that we should be very cautious after making assumptions.”
In 2001 a Medical Research Council expert group said unborn babies might feel pain as early as 20 weeks and almost certainly by 24. They called for more sensitive treatment of very premature babies, who often had to undergo painful procedures like heel pricks and injections.
— story ends –
I agree that first-trimester abortions need to be made more widely available, CouldBeeWorse. There’s no more excuse for causing a fetus unnecessary pain than for a woman.
I hate the anti-choice ads that say (roughly) “A heartbeat at 18 days…”
I always want to say “Yeah, and at 18 days it also has a tail and eyes on the side of its head…”
(I think the timing they’re using is from conception, not the typical timing used from first day of the last period.)
So none of the anesthesia given to the woman during a late-term procedure travels through the placenta and to the fetus? Funny, I was always given the impression that anything that entered the woman’s bloodstream affects the fetus. Does this only apply to anesthesia, or has everything that we’ve been told about the affects of alcohol and tobacco on a developing fetus bullshit?
Why the hell is this woman the head of NARAL? There weren’t any completely pro-choice people qualified for the job, or what?
When I got home and got an email from the other Amanda last night I thought “oh shit” but since it sounded a lot like what you’d written on fetal anesthesia before I figured well, it could have been worse.
And I think Fred’s discovery is possibly quite relevant to the underlying problem here. I remember during the Alito hearings when Kate Michelman was sitting there and Nancy Keenan wasn’t, thinking “these kinds of things didn’t use to happen when Michaelman was around.”
Treading lightly here, but I’ve had to reverse my stance on this issue since reviewing evidence gleaned from premature infants: it’s apparent they can feel pain, even if inconvenient. Mea culpa for expounding otherwise. And it’s known that a fetus has cycles of sleeping and waking, although any pregnant woman could tell you that, not to mention a loud noise will startle them. In short, it seems from conception to death, humans progress along a continuum of development. Your means of acquiring nourishment and oxygen change, the effect of your mother’s hormones diminish as you get less of them, and your relative location all change at birth, but almost nothing else. This holds true whatever point in gestation you’re born.
All of this is irrelevant to the right to an abortion. Even giving a fetus full human rights (or even citizenship) shouldn’t interfere with our right to bodily integrity. It’s political realities rather than physical ones that make us play these games, but it’s dishonest to pick and choose studies that say only what we like. That’s what the other side does.
I’d say giving pregnant women the facts, whatever science reveals those to be, is essential to informed consent. That and telling her all her options (including the option to have fetal anesthesia) should be the whole of the law on the subject. The truth is we can’t really police every doctor for what bias they are or aren’t passing on, but we can stop institutionalizing it at the government level.
For what it’s worth, knowing what I know now on this and other topics, I couldn’t have an abortion except to save my life, but I still believe I and every other woman has the right.
julybirthday ,
I too have a July birthday, and I’ve noticed this too (and blogged about it) … we seem to have a lot in common, I guess.
Mnemosyne wrote: So none of the anesthesia given to the woman during a late-term procedure travels through the placenta and to the fetus? Funny, I was always given the impression that anything that entered the woman’s bloodstream affects the fetus. Does this only apply to anesthesia, or has everything that we’ve been told about the affects of alcohol and tobacco on a developing fetus bullshit?
I looked into this, and it happens Congress held a couple of hearings on that very question. The then-president of the American Society of Anesthesiologists, Dr. Norig Ellison, told Congress, “Drugs administered to the mother, either local anesthesia administered in the paracervical area or sedatives/analgesics administered intramuscularly or intravenously, will provide little-to-no analgesia [pain prevention] to the fetus.” These are the forms of anesthesia used for most abortions, including late abortions. In the relatively rare cases in which the pregnant woman is given general anesthesia prior to the abortion, some drug does reach the fetus, but at levels far less than in the mother’s own system, according to Ellison and other specialists who testified.
Dr. David Birnbach, at that time the head of the Society for Obstetric Anesthesia, testified, “Having administered anesthesia for fetal surgery, I know that on occasion we need to admnister anesthesia directly to the fetus because even at these early ages [referring to second trimester procedures] the fetus moves away from the pain of the stimulation.”
Even giving a fetus full human rights (or even citizenship) shouldn’t interfere with our right to bodily integrity. - TheGlimmering
Indeed. I wonder how many anti-choicers also believe in granting people the right to “shoot first and ask questions later” regarding intruders on their property, no matter whether the intruder is actually threatening or not? If you can shoot a guy for wandering onto your property, how come you don’t have a right to an abortion when a fetus is actually stealing resources from your body?
Of course, this same crowd also would happily allow police to execute no-knock warrents, so much for intellectual consistency, eh? It does make sense, though, if you follow a certain perversion of Calvinism: the action of a “saint” is always good and the action of non-saint is bad … it doesn’t matter what the action is. So if a police officer is a “saint”, it would be wrong to shoot him. But an burgler is a non-saint, so shooting him’s ok if you’re a “saint”. And no police officer would ever harm a saint, would they? If the police come, you have to be guilty of something, after all, we all are guilty of something and the wages of sin our death, eh?
BTW … Enlightenment fans: the people who brought us this perversion of Calvinism thought of themselves (and in many ways were) as part of the Enlightenment … “Age of Reason” Calvinism was something a lot less hubristic, more introspective, and not surprisingly (in the spirit of the age) more rational.
Treading lightly here, but I’ve had to reverse my stance on this issue since reviewing evidence gleaned from premature infants: it’s apparent they can feel pain, even if inconvenient.
I think there’s a big difference between telling patients, “There are a few studies that may indicate that the procedure could cause some pain in the fetus, but we can administer some anesthesia to guard against that possibility” and “The fetus will feel pain when you KILL IT, so do you want to give it some anesthesia so it’s not in as much pain when you KILL IT?”
Since we’re talking about second-trimester procedures here, it’s already more medically complicated anyway, so adding an extra level of caution can be an option. I’m assuming that fetal anesthesia is already standard for third-trimester procedures where fetal death has not already been confirmed.
Given these statistics, it’s generally pretty pointless to talk about whether or not a fetus feels pain after 20 weeks, n’est-çe pas?
Seriously, who flips out about something that only happens 1.5% of the time, in any context? Hell, even the US Electoral College has a higher failure rate than that.
I’ve been working on a piece on:
Why I don’t give a shit if they clone me tomorrow.
And I don’t because self (and life itself, by extention) is a story-in-the-telling.
And I AM and you ARE really, really ..of the moment.
So, as we develop and record a life-story and story-line we become
stake-holders. We’ve put our time in, we’ve got an investment in life.
The implications for an entity just barely, or not hardly even, a Title- page are clear.
Anyway I liked the way ’stake-holder’ came out and how it might be utilized.
And thought I’d share.
BBC article from awhile back.
Excerpt:
But he says the crucial factor is the environmental difference between the womb - where the placenta provides a chemical environment to encourage the foetus to sleep - and that of a newborn baby, who is exposed to a wide range of stimuli and environments.
“Pain becomes possible because of a psychological development that begins at birth when the baby is separated from the protected atmosphere of the womb and is stimulated into wakeful activity.”
Heh, I’m just glad my comments seem to have come off as I intended, which is not like a bull in a china shop. (I should amend “couldn’t” for “wouldn’t.”) Unfortunately, I still see the same trouble even if similar laws were written in a more reasonable fashion, something along the lines of “prior to an abortion, the doctor should ensure informed consent including informing the patient that current research indicates a fetus of x weeks in gestation may feel pain during the procedure and anesthesia is available if desired.” Nothing prevents a doctor from complying and adding his own slant. After all, it’s not factually incorrect to tell a woman an abortion “KILLS” a fetus, although going so far as to call it murder is definitely begging some questions. We might not like the intent to intimidate, but this is a matter of sticking to the letter of the law and traipsing over its spirit (and the spirit of proper doctor-patient relations). On the other hand, I’m not sure I want to chuck all informed consent laws/guidelines out. They should be there, for the sake of both pro-choice and pro-life/anti-choice ideologies, for the sake of women themselves. Could be a particular pregnant woman wouldn’t abort if she were aware her fetus had passed some specific milestone, informed consent should get her that information just as readily as it debunks myths that would prompt some women to terminate. Facts are neutral entities, they pick sides less often than we pick favored facts
Mnemosyne wrote: I think there’s a big difference between telling patients, “There are a few studies that may indicate that the procedure could cause some pain in the fetus, but we can administer some anesthesia to guard against that possibility� and “The fetus will feel pain when you KILL IT, so do you want to give it some anesthesia so it’s not in as much pain when you KILL IT?�
But what is the big difference between those two presentations? The word “kill”? Why does that matter?
“I think we have deluded ourselves into believing that people don’t know that abortion is killing So any pretense that abortion is not killing is a signal of our ambivalence, a signal that we cannot say yes, it kills a fetus but it is the woman’s body, and therefore ultimately her choice.â€? — Faye Wattleton, President, Center for Gender Equity (former President, Planned Parenthood) (“Speaking Frankly,â€? Ms., May/June 1997, page 67).
“[T]he pro-life slogan, ‘Abortion stops a beating heart,’ is incontrovertibly true.� Naomi Wolf, pro-choice author (Our Bodies, Our Souls,� The New Republic, October 16, 1995, page 29).
Would it make a difference to you if the brochure did not contain the word “kill” but did contain a medical school illustration of the most common second-trimester abortion method?
But what is the big difference between those two presentations? The word “kill�? Why does that matter?
Because second-trimester abortions are, by law, more difficult to get than first-trimester ones. That means that the woman who undergoes one is having one because of special circumstances.
If a woman is having an abortion because she just found out through amniocentesis that her fetus has a severe case of Down’s Syndrome, do we really need to traumatize her further by throwing it in her face that she’s killing the fetus for what is, let’s face it, her own convenience? Maybe we should just have the doctor tell her, “If you didn’t have the emotional and financial resources to care for a severely handicapped baby, you shouldn’t have gotten pregnant in the first place.”
I know you have this myth in your head that a woman can walk into an abortion clinic at any stage in her pregnancy and say, “You know, I’m not in the mood for motherhood today, so kill this fetus,” but that’s not actually how it works. And until you’ve had to talk a friend through waiting for her test results to decide if she’s going to have to abort a much-wanted baby because of possible birth defects, I’m not sure what you have to contribute here.
she just found out through amniocentesis that her fetus has a severe case of Down’s Syndrome
Just a nitpick here, but there’s no way to tell how severe a case of Down Syndrome is. You can tell if there are problems in esophagal or cardiac development, but there’s no way to determine the level of mental retardation.
More on topic, I wish women who do decide to abort b/c of Down Syndrome (and 80% of Down Syndrome feti are aborted) would own up to having abortions. Yes, they wanted a child, but not THAT one, and that’s good enough. There shouldn’t be such guilt associated with it. It just reminds me of the pro-choicer protesters who have abortions and then go right back to protesting the next week.
Fully on topic, I’m sick to death of politicians forcing medical providers to obey rules made up on pleasing the conservative base over scientific research. It’s happened with Plan B, and it’s happening here.
Because second-trimester abortions are, by law, more difficult to get than first-trimester ones. That means that the woman who undergoes one is having one because of special circumstances…
If you are talking about the law in the United States, this is simply not true. The Supreme Court has made absolutely clear that the same standard applies all the way up to viability, referring to the point at which the baby can survive independently of the mother. The Supreme Court has not allowed any state to require any particular reason for an abortion before viability. You can open up the Yellow Pages in most big cities and see display ads for abortions to 24 weeks.
Even though no special circumstances are required by law before viability, one may ask why abortions are sought in the fifth month and later. The Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI), which is basically part of Planned Parenthood, did a survey of women who were actually in the process of obtaining abortions, of which “420 had been pregnant for 16 or more weeks.” Of that group, only two percent (2%) said “a fetal problem was diagnosed late in pregnancy,” and the report did not indicate that any of the 420 late abortions were performed because of maternal health problems. However, 71% who responded “did not recognize that she was pregnant or misjudged gestation,” 48% who said “found it hard to make arrangements,” and 33% who said “was afraid to tell her partner or parents.” (”Why Do Women Have Abortions?,” Family Planning Perspectives, July/August 1988.)
As to those late abortions performed by the much-debated “partial-birth” method, this is what the New York Times reported on February 26, 1997, regarding an interview with the executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers (a lobby for abortion providers), Ron Fitzsimmons: “As much as he disagreed with the National Right to Life Committee and others who oppose abortion under any circumstances, he said he knew they were accurate when they said the procedure was common. . . . In the vast majority of cases, the procedure is performed on a healthy mother with a healthy fetus that is 20 weeks or more along, Mr. Fitzsimmons said.”
20 weeks is the middle of the fifth month.
Could, if you anti-choicers didn’t diligently wipe out abortion clinics in 86% of American counties, women wouldn’t have to spend 5 months trying to get the money together to travel where they could get one. Don’t like late term abortions? Then you should be working diligently to get an affordable clinic into every county in this country.
Could, not true, many states regulate late second trimester abortions with an earlier cutoff than 24 weeks and there aren’t as many providers for them since they’re extremely painful multiday procedures and in many states there are very limited options anyway, which is many women are forced to make the trip to NYC for these procedures. So like Amanda says, if you’re so horrified by this you should make increased access a priority, and help us get rid of regulations that make it expensive and onerous to get an early abortion. Like, say, parental notification (”was afraid to tell her partner or parents”) and waiting periods, which become a problem when you have to have the money and time off to travel far, far away and stay overnight or make two trips due to fanatics closing down your local clinics (“found it hard to make arrangements,â€?). Not trying to gut sex and reproductive health info (“did not recognize that she was pregnant or misjudged gestation,â€?) would also help.
Also, thanks for admitting the lie about the D&X. Conservatives always claim it’s “partial birth,” because that baby is viable and only 5 seconds away from being born. Good for you for admitting you just want to ban a procedure that’s performed in the second trimester and is often safest for the woman and the “pb” bs is just a smoke screen. “It’s partial birth, sure it’s week 20 but that’s only 5 months away from week 40. 5 months, 5 seconds, what’s the difference? It’s fun to make stuff up.”
*scooby-doo double-take* Whuh??
That has actually been said? And isn’t just a “comment for effect” like “sperm magic”?
Mostly a “comment for effect”—but really the subtextual meaning of the endless insistence that conception=BABEEZ.
Isn’t it interesting how Could was SO chatty earlier in the thread, but as soon as people started offering sensible solutions to the scenarios she was raising, suddenly she got very quiet?
Coincidence? Or maybe she had to go make dinner for her eleven non-white special-needs adoptive children. Because someone who’s that passionately against abortion would of COURSE adopt lots of unwanted children who would otherwise languish in foster care until they age out.
WTF is wrong with Keenan? And why the hell is she head of NARAL? IIRC, NARAL also supported “Rape Gurney Joe” in the Connecticut Democratic primary, and endorsed Chafee over Whitehouse in Rhode Island. Pathetic.