Has OBAMA gone too far to protect ROE vs WADE? Will he finally declare when a person first gets human rights?

Question

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/08/voters_should_be_trouble.html

Excerpt:

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Well, not really. Some people fear that this fundamental protection, ensuring to all the first of the rights of "life, liberty and pursuit of happiness," is in reality a sneak attack on a woman's right to choose an abortion. To prevent this "Trojan horse," they insisted, and got, in the federal law a guarantee against construing the law to "affirm, deny or contract any legal status or legal right applicable to any member of the species homo sapiens at any point prior to being 'born alive'. . ." This mumbo jumbo is supposed to mean that abortions can't be restricted.

To mollify pro-choice concerns, including Obama's, this was inserted in several versions of the Illinois legislation. But it didn't matter, because the legislation died anyway, with Obama's help. Whether or not he refused to vote for a version that contained the right-to-an-abortion provision isn't what's important here. What is important is that Obama put the supposed and vague threat to an abortion right ahead of a real and concrete threat to the most innocent of human lives.

Obama's response to all this is to sidestep any discussion about when human personhood begins, the key question in the abortion debate. Some say it begins at the moment of conception; others say it begins at birth. (Still others look for a middle ground, suggesting it begins when brain activity starts.) But by arguing against the born-alive legislation because it might in some distant and ambiguous way obstruct abortion, Obama implies that the right to an abortion trumps an infant's right to life, even after he is born.

Answer 1

Legally, a "person" must be born, which is a perfectly reasonable, logical and normal starting point.

Answer 2

The law in America says that one cannot be a citizen until they are born.  I think life starts at conception (according to science's definition of life, it does), but I know citizenship does not.  I think this needs to be addressed, but I feel it will remain that citizenship starts at birth if it were.

Even still though, Obama's proposal to not protect babies that survive attempted abortion is abominable.  He is clearly legalizing the murder and non-protection of infants that are legally deemed citizens by the law.

Answer 3

It's not up to him. It's up to the Supreme Court.

I do believe it should be a state issue.

Answer 4

As for your claims on Obama's position on PBA and the Born Alive Infant Act, they've been debunked dozens of times in these forums, so you really have no excuse for reposting them.

If one wants to wade through it, here are some relevant links:

http://mediamatters.org/items/2008082200...

http://mediamatters.org/items/2008081500...

http://mediamatters.org/items/2008080200...

http://www.truthfightsback.com/site/smea...

As he said at Saddleback Church

transcript:http://www.rickwarrennews.com/transcript...

Obama wants to reduce the abortion rate, just like the rest of us.  He's just unwilling to take his anti-abortion stance so far as to make illegal a woman's choice in the matter, including in cases of rape, incest, or even the endangerment of the life of the mother.

Slightly off-topic, it is interesting to note that McCain's saying to great applause at Saddleback that life begins at conception (actually it begins before conception; sperm and egg cells are respiring cells) of course doesn't reconcile with his support of embryonic stem cell research.  I don't think the subset of his voters concerned about prohibiting abortion are going to pick up on this discrepancy, so he probably netted political points with his two-word response.

But back to the exceptions: note also that prohibiting abortion even in cases of rape, incest, of even the endangerment of the life of the mother has been in the GOP platform since at least 2000.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but that last prohibition dictates that, when both lives are in danger, the fetus's has primacy over the mother's?  I find this hard to believe.  Even parity seems a bit much.

McCain scolded Bush in a 2000 debate for not knowing that the GOP platform did not make exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_Yszait8...

In '07, McCain exhibited the same hostility to the platform.  http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/...  But in the past few days McCain has backed off his intent to change the platform language, just as the abortion attacks on Obama heated up.  

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/...

Mere coincidence?

Answer 5

How is placing a live human being in the dump with the medical waste and allowing them to die there with no medical attention or human touch protecting human rights.

That's an abomination!

While every other pro-choice Dem supported the Born Alive Infant Protection act in the US Senate, Obama killed it in IL.  

This act would have allowed babies who are BORN ALIVE to receive medical treatment and care.  But Obama's take is if the parents wanted the child aborted, it should die, even if it survived the induction of labor.  

These are babies whose mothers have opted to induce labor early with the hope that the child will not survive -- but plenty do!  In IL, thanks to Obama, these children are placed with medical waste and left to die.  

Obama’s defensive that the language was not like the US version is a LIE because the 2003 bill had exactly the same language and if Obama did not like the language he could have had it changed.  The 2003 bill was the same.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfL_H7zg1...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kdWN5Wll...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8ACR0cjd...

Answer 6

No.  If you want to protect some innocent lives, there are plenty of them in need.  Funny enough neocons usually want to ignore them.  Why is that?

Answer 7

There are people that actually argue that a woman should have a right to kill or "abort" a child up until three months "after" they are born.  It seems Obama is closer to this school of thought than I would be comfortable with..  

The left has managed to convince two generations that a fetus is not alive or worthy of protection, I could see them convincing people that infants to a specific age are in the same category..