https://www.yahoo.com/politics/trump-walks-back-call-to-punish-women-who-undergo-214359354.html
Trump went on MSNBC and said that women should be punished for having abortions but then took it back. He has done this on many issues. You can tell how desperately he is trying to keep the evangelicals on his side. Seriously how many abortions do you think trump has paid for over the years? I’m willing to wager at least a few.
The thing about this that makes me laugh is how all the pro-lifers want abortion to be illegal but then want to pounce on trump for the concept of actually enforcing a law and punishing the culpable actors. They have this notion that every mother that has an abortion is some poor victim and that no clear-thinking person could have one and that only the performers of the abortion should be punished.
Chris Matthews set a good trap for him. If abortion is made illegal, should people that get them face some sort of criminal action for breaking the law?
It’s a great interview question. The idea of “punishing” women for getting an abortion is harsh, to say the least. Very poor word choice. On the other hand (and keep in mind I’m pro-choice) if anything is illegal people should face some sort of reperccussion. A (small) fine, community service, jail time…
But what Chris Matthews did, he actually got pro-lifers to say Trump went too far. Pretty damn brilliant.
It’s the millionth example of trump being treated unfairly by media. I mean, do people realize how ridiculous it is to pounce on a guy for the concept of enforcing a law and punishing lawbreakers? It’s not revolutionary. Im pro-choice as well, but I support trump here as usual. If someone breaks the law, there should be repercussions. Otherwise, what is the point of having the illegality in place?
The point is that the law shouldn’t be there. If even pro-lifers are uncomfortable with capital punishment for women carrying out abortions, perhaps on some level even they…Maybe the next question for Trump should be, “If slavery was legal and slaves were required to stay put unless sold, would you punish them for running away?”
The purpose of making abortion illegal really just comes down to access. You would limit access to virtually nothing as the punishment would be for providers. Similar to how much of Europe treats drugs. Punishing the end user is rather pointless, they want a service. You punish the dealer (in this case the doctors providing the abortions) if the activity is illegal. If Trump was quick on his feet he wouldnt have responded about women & mentioned they would go after people running clinics.
It is obviously a gotcha question, but Trump is hardly the only candidate to ever encounter these. Most politicians are skilled enough to side step the question and not say something rather pointless. Trump could say he wants to suck the souls of children in america and his supporters (Vandy included) would find some way to give him a pass.
Trump needs to think before speaking. I don’t believe many ppl think women should be punished if they go ahead and abort a fetus. The question wasn’t phrased to actually get his real opinion on the matter (if he has a real opinion), the question was phrased and drawn out to trap Trump.
If Trump was more intellectually skilled and had his thoughts and opinions structure properly, he would have battled the question easily. The issue is, Trump says what he thinks people want to hear, and he doesn’t think enough so BS just comes out sometimes.
Is throwing a newborn baby in the dumpster punishable by law?
Punishable by law. Yes.
The abortion issue is surprisingly tricky. Most people just pick a side and stick with their talking points and think that therefore it is clear cut and simple. But weird situations can come up where you think you are saying something obvious and consistent and then suddenly you find you are on the opposite side of where you thought you were.
The tricky issue of course centers around whether there are one, two, three, or four people involved in the decision to do something like this, and what the rights and responsibilities of each person is.
I didn’t realize the context of the Trump sound byte on abortion was “If it were illegal, should the law be enforced,” in which case it is hard to argue that law should not be enforced (that said, the executive does have a choice in how much effort to put into enforcing one law versus another). The way it came to me was the idea that women who have abortions need to be punished. I think this is a line that many conservatives like.
I actually thought that Trump tried to be thoughtful when he refused to say what the punishment should be. He just needed to say “I need time to think about that” but somehow couldn’t find that set of words.
I get the sense that what’s driving the abortion movement on the right is not that they love babies so much (if they did, there would be more support for things like prenatal care for poor communities and support for poor mothers raising children). Rather, I get the sense that the right is afraid that if abortion is legal, women won’t face punishments for having had sex for non-reproductive reasons, and this is what people find most objectionable.
I land on the pro-choice side of the debate because life is complex and I don’t think a simplistic law can divide the justifiable cases from the unjustifiable ones easily, and we need to allow ciizens and medical professionals to work it out on a case by case basis. Nobody has an abortion just for the fun of it, so there is already a big disincentive out there for getting to a point where you need one. But I don’t think the pro-life argument is crazy, I just think that a lot of pro-lifer’s care more about being anti-sex than pro-babies.
If a newborn baby is actually murdered, then yes I would absolutely expect the culprit to be prosecuted. It’s much more common though to hear of a newborn abandoned somewhere like a church or hospital. And in those cases, the authorities usually are quite sympathetic to the mother (if found). Often no prosecution follows and actually social services will try to help the mother out.
Chris Matthews is such a jackass for this setup, he asked about illegal abortion of course there should be punishment since it is “illegal”, but it was very poor choice of words by Trump, could’ve used “ramifications” instead of punishment, much more palatable.
Pro-choice is not really pro-choice in current day America. The biggest representative of pro-choice is planned parenthood. If you’ve ever read some material on how their business model works, it’s not a company giving a choice to prospective parents. They have pamphlets on adoption and say they offer counseling services, but their business model can only survive on a pro-death stance. They need to have a certain number of abortions in the clinics to stay afloat or they go out of business. The directors of the clinics literally have a quota of abortions they need to meet per month. If they are low on numbers they are likely to shuffle someone in and crank out an abortion.
Abby Johnson details these sickening practices from her experience working as a director in her book "
Unplanned: The Dramatic True Story of a Former Planned Parenthood Leader’s Eye-Opening Journey across the Life Line"
If we were truly pro-choice, why does the government push for planned parenthood and is somewhat lacking in the adoption side of pro-choice? Just because you can’t financially afford a child doesn’t mean you have to kill it. There are other options that would make pro-choice more reasonable in this country, but pro-choice most of the time means doing the easiest thing at the time and not worrying about the permanent repurcussions. Where are the adoption centers? Why does pro-choice in the governments perspective always lean on the pro-death side of the choice? We spend enough money on the most ridiculous budgets that this is one thing we can surely afford. Put them in gifted school programs that give special care to those in need. Something … death is so easy when pro-choice has but only one choice.
^That doesn’t stir any emotion in me. Most people that go to Planned Parenthood for an abortion should not be talked out of it. If anything, we probably need more abortions.
you are entitled to your opinion … and vote
Im with StL. While I want a place like that to provide information about many of the options available, I find it hard to believe that a person who was planning on giving up her baby to adoption is just going to switch to an abortion.
Serious question. When do pro-abortion people start caring about the baby. In the birth canal? When the head appears? When the feet clear? Or maybe the afterbirth has to be completely out? When does killing it become a murder I guess is my question. If I hit a women in the stomach and the fetus dies, what do pro-abortion people think my punishment should be? Just general battery? As bchad said, this shit can get complicated.
I don’t think it’s unfair. I think it’s a great setup of questions. I wish more reporters asked difficult questions rather than simply posturing.
Typically when the baby qualifies as a “person”, now the definition of a person or individual is a philosophical question up for debate.
Ok, now this is just stupid. Clearly everyone or nearly everyone on this thread is talking about something they have no clue of.
Having had a child with someone I dated very casually for about four months beforehand, I talked her into going to PP. Partly because we were broke and treatement (including sonograms) is basically free.
So, we went in after about 4-5 weeks and asked for information on where we were in the process and what an abortion entailed. First they spoke to her alone for a bit to ensure she wasn’t pressured. Then they gave us a very unbiased just factual view of what the process would involve. It was taking a pill at that point. They gave us pamphlets and talked about adoption and everything and then also gave us a sonogram (our first). The sonogram is a requirement. In addition, they are obligated to show a book on fetal development that describes day by day and week by week the development and even shows pictures of the fetuses (they may have been drawings). They tell you that fingernails develop at like 10 days or something like that. Then, if you still want it, you have to schedule it and it’s usually at least a week out. When you come back in, there will be another short session (and I think a sonogram) and then your procedure.
I can’t garuntee that every clinic adheres to it, but this is the actual process. Obviously, we ultimately chose to keep the baby (but did schedule an appointment as a placeholder that we later canceled). We definitely made the right choice and it has taken me from pro-choice to undecided. For us, going through the process made things feel like we were back in control and it was our choice to have the baby. For some people, maybe a 14 year old girl or something, or a lady with 11 kids in the ghetto, I could see the best choice being different, so I’m not ready to go pro-life either.