the bad fight

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the Supreme Court upheld the abortion ban, but it is still troubling when we see an issue that is so clearly decided by the composition of the court rather than anything else.

While I generally don't agree with them, I understand what motivates anti-abortionists who view a fetus as a life as worthy of protection as all of ours. I think this most recent case really misses the target by focusing on late term pregnancies where the pregnant woman has demonstrated a serious commitment to caring for her child, but by some tragic misfortune is faced with a significant risk to her own health or the possibility of giving birth to a child with substantial debilitating physical or mental defect. In many ways, the early term abortions present a much more compelling moral argument for regulation. But that is neither here nor there.

What really troubles me is that this law doesn't actually save any life - it doesn't prevent a woman at a certain point in pregnancy from getting an abortion. All it does is prevent a woman who has made that difficult decision from getting the safest available treatment - she will still have an abortion, just with a procedure that presents a greater risk to her health. That is something that anti-abortionists are not talking about, and that is why this particular law looks more like paternalism designed to restrict women's freedom than a law motivated by saving fetal life.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/18/AR2007041802253.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/19/washington/19scotus.html