Three Positive Signs for Obama's Re-Election Chances

[_Abyssinia]

Support of abortion can be direct or indirect. One party supports it directly, another indirectly. Does that make a difference to the babies? No, dead is dead no matter how you got dead or why.

As for your bolded part, abortion is already legalized here so how can we oppose efforts to legalize it? All we can do is support efforts to make it illegal - which obviously are not working - or work to convince people not to practice it regardless of the law.

Nothing in what you quote tells me that it is against Catholic doctrine to vote for Obama.

Do you think it would specifically say ‘Do not vote for Obama’ in the Magisterium or elsewhere in Catholic teaching? I don’t think it is legal for the Catholic Church to specifically say who or who not to vote for, what is clear is the teachings by the Bishops and Pope Benedict ans the Bible itself on the value of human life and the fact that there is no justification to vote for a pro abortion candidate when you have a pro life alternative.

Both parties are not the same, they have two different goals which are clearly established in the platforms of both parties. The Republican platform says unequivocally the aim is to reverse roe vs wade. The Democrat Party platform is unequivocal support for Roe vs wade and rejects any attempt to reverse it. Democrats want to keep abortion legal.

**DEMOCRAT PLATFORM **

"The Democratic Party strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman’s right to choose a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right.

The Democratic Party also strongly supports access to comprehensive affordable family planning services and age-appropriate sex education, which empower people to make informed choices and live healthy lives. We also recognize that such health care and education help reduce the number of unintended pregnancies and thereby also reduce the need for abortions.

The Democratic Party also strongly supports a woman’s decision to have a child by ensuring access to and availability of programs for pre- and post-natal health care, parenting skills, income support and caring adoption programs."

— from the 2008 Democratic National Platform: Renewing America’s Promise

www.democrats.org/about/party_platform

REPUBLICAN PLATFORM

Maintaining The Sanctity and Dignity of Human Life

"Faithful to the first guarantee of the Declaration of Independence, we assert the inherent dignity and sanctity of all human life and affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed. We support a human life amendment to the Constitution, and we endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children. We oppose using public revenues to promote or perform abortion and will not fund organizations which advocate it.

We support the appointment of judges who respect traditional family values and the sanctity and dignity of innocent human life. We have made progress. The Supreme Court has upheld prohibitions against the barbaric practice of partial-birth abortion. States are now permitted to extend health-care coverage to children before birth. And the Born Alive Infants Protection Act has become law; this law ensures that infants who are born alive during an abortion receive all treatment and care that is provided to all newborn infants and are not neglected and left to die. We must protect girls from exploitation and statutory rape through a parental notification requirement.

We all have a moral obligation to assist, not to penalize, women struggling with the challenges of an unplanned pregnancy. At its core, abortion is a fundamental assault on the sanctity of innocent human life. Women deserve better than abortion. Every effort should be made to work with women considering abortion to enable and empower them to choose life. We salute those who provide them alternatives, including pregnancy care centers, and we take pride in the tremendous increase in adoptions that has followed Republican legislative initiatives."

— from the 2008 Republican Platform

www.gop.com/2008Platform/Values.htm#5

 

[JimG]

Dr. Walter Williams had an excellent column recently on why Obama will be reelected. Hopefully someone can find it and post. Meanwhile, the crux on his article was that the American electorate is so economically ignorant that most don’t realize the precarious position we are in as far as our economy goes. And this president has done nothing but make it worse.

Not sure which article you have in mind, but here is his website: econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/

 

[Ridgerunner]

This is a misrepresentation of what I said – I said Obama was the least “pro-death” candidate, the others being much more “pro-death.” And I was referring to environmental problems (on which no candidate is good, but the Republicans are extremely pro-death on, and the Democrats only somewhat pro-death on) – see

But I think the real problem is the term “pro-life” as it is used by Republicans and many Catholics – to mean only abortion, and ony medical abortions, and not to include abortions caused by pollution (which many call miscarriages) or killing of people through environmental and other harms (both directly and indirectly). If we persist in a business-as-usual path, these deaths and harms will be increasing perhaps exponentially in decades, centuries, and millennia to come triggered by the pollution and greenhouse gases we emit in our current time frame, until most if not all of life flatlines. That is the mother of all pro-life issues in my books, and one not being addressed adequately by either party, especially not by Republican candidates who to a man and woman deny it and assassinate the character of good and decent scientists to boot…and misrepresent every little word they say like “hide the decline” (which means hide the decline in the proxy data NOT the real data, so as to splice the current real data with the proxy data, since the current warming is perhaps even responsible for harming the trees from which the proxy data is taken). Anything to deny the truth of what is happening.

We need a candidate who will address this seriously and help the country and the world (the U.S. is the largest per capita emitter of GHGs) to reduce in sensible ways that also help the economy and the common good.

It is a very sad thing that pro-life for Republicans only means putting women who have had abortions in prison, thinking that will solve or end the medical abortion problem, but in no way includes reducing our killing of fetuses and born people in the many other ways that we do so.

Perhaps on the medical abortion issue Republicans are partly (not fully) pro-life and the Democrats mainly pro-death, but on other serious life issues Republicans are extremely pro-death.

I realize that killing most if not all people on planet earth is an effective way to reduce medical abortions, but I’m against that method. Sorry. And I don’t care how many priest tell me I’m wrong. One priest told me my morally reasoning was sound, but another told me we had to vote for laws against abortion, even if it meant more deaths and abortions. Well, let him vote for the pro-deather Republicans. My conscience will not allow me to do so. I’ve been pro-life since I was a Proestant kids, and I have not waivered. I cannot vote for the worse pro-death candidate, and do feel bad about voting for the least pro-death candidate.

I don’t see any reliable sources telling us how many people, with scientific certitude, died as a result of pollution in the U.S. If one cannot draw a clear causal relationship, then one ought not to claim someone is responsible for any particular death.

But there is another caution here. Obama has promised to “make utility costs skyrocket”. That, it seems, is the thrust of his “environmental policy” aimed at curbing “global warming” notwithstanding that he admits such measures in the U.S. alone won’t do that.
When his promise is fulfilled, we’ll see how many people die due to exposure to cold, heat, lack of refrigeration, lack of transportation, increased costs of food, etc, and THEN we’ll know how prolife his environmental policies really are.

And no Repub candidate is calling for putting women in prison who have had abortions. Nor have I ever seen any other prolife person call for it. Doctors who perform them, perhaps. Boyfriends or relatives who force them, perhaps.

 

[seekerz]

You’re not committing murder by voting for a pro-choice politician who has no authority to either end or expand the right to an abortion. Abortion remains legal regardless of the stance of the President. Its ridiculous that people focus so narrowly on a single issue that the President can’t even address.

Especially ridiculous when they refuse to even look at or discuss, on a societal level, the real reasons why women choose to end a pregnancy. Reasons that can be addressed right NOW. The only interest seems to be in unrealistic expectations of restricting abortion legally.

Then again, why would one care about why people don’t want to have babies, unless one took more than the slightest personal interest in the people carrying those babies…The more this discussion goes, the more clearly I see.

 

[Scott_Lafrance]

Let me make sure I understand this. It is okay for Catholic support pro-abortion candidates because the Republican party wants to annihilate all life on earth.?

Apparently it is more humane to kill them in the womb than let them starve, get poisoned by the toxic environment, suffer due to lack of medical care, food, and shelter, and eventually burn to death via man-made global warming.

 

[_Abyssinia]

Especially ridiculous when they refuse to even look at or discuss, on a societal level, the real reasons why women choose to end a pregnancy. Reasons that can be addressed right NOW. The only interest seems to be in unrealistic expectations of restricting abortion legally.

Then again, why would one care about why people don’t want to have babies, unless one took more than the slightest personal interest in the people carrying those babies…The more this discussion goes, the more clearly I see.

That is delusional. The position on abortion that a president has directly influences who is in the Supreme Court, which directly influences the legality of roe vs wade.

 

[seekerz]

Do you think it would specifically say ‘Do not vote for Obama’ in the Magisterium or elsewhere in Catholic teaching? I don’t think it is legal for the Catholic Church to specifically say who or who not to vote for, what is clear is the teachings by the Bishops and Pope Benedict ans the Bible itself on the value of human life and the fact that there is no justification to vote for a pro abortion candidate when you have a pro life alternative.

Both parties are not the same, they have two different goals which are clearly established in the platforms of both parties. The Republican platform says unequivocally the aim is to reverse roe vs wade. The Democrat Party platform is unequivocal support for Roe vs wade and rejects any attempt to reverse it. Democrats want to keep abortion legal.

**DEMOCRAT PLATFORM **

"The Democratic Party strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman’s right to choose a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right.

The Democratic Party also strongly supports access to comprehensive affordable family planning services and age-appropriate sex education, which empower people to make informed choices and live healthy lives. We also recognize that such health care and education help reduce the number of unintended pregnancies and thereby also reduce the need for abortions.

The Democratic Party also strongly supports a woman’s decision to have a child by ensuring access to and availability of programs for pre- and post-natal health care, parenting skills, income support and caring adoption programs."

— from the 2008 Democratic National Platform: Renewing America’s Promise

www.democrats.org/about/party_platform

REPUBLICAN PLATFORM

Maintaining The Sanctity and Dignity of Human Life

"Faithful to the first guarantee of the Declaration of Independence, we assert the inherent dignity and sanctity of all human life and affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed. We support a human life amendment to the Constitution, and we endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children. We oppose using public revenues to promote or perform abortion and will not fund organizations which advocate it.

We support the appointment of judges who respect traditional family values and the sanctity and dignity of innocent human life. We have made progress. The Supreme Court has upheld prohibitions against the barbaric practice of partial-birth abortion. States are now permitted to extend health-care coverage to children before birth. And the Born Alive Infants Protection Act has become law; this law ensures that infants who are born alive during an abortion receive all treatment and care that is provided to all newborn infants and are not neglected and left to die. We must protect girls from exploitation and statutory rape through a parental notification requirement.

We all have a moral obligation to assist, not to penalize, women struggling with the challenges of an unplanned pregnancy. At its core, abortion is a fundamental assault on the sanctity of innocent human life. Women deserve better than abortion. Every effort should be made to work with women considering abortion to enable and empower them to choose life. We salute those who provide them alternatives, including pregnancy care centers, and we take pride in the tremendous increase in adoptions that has followed Republican legislative initiatives."

— from the 2008 Republican Platform

www.gop.com/2008Platform/Values.htm#5

I am clear on what the church teaches. I am also clear in my personal conviction that there is not a “pro-life” alternative in any real sense of the word.

However, I do have a question: how is it that the efforts to reverse Roe v Wade get most of the publicity and the united front, yet there is no, united concerted movement or organization to help women considering abortion? You know, a household name that a pregnant woman would immediately think of if she were tempted or pressured to abort? We’ve had 30+ years to give both strategies (legal and supportive), at least equal priority and pregnant women in crisis still have no pregnancy 911? Abortion is still more about political action than Christian charity…that says volumes to the at-risk population.

 

[seekerz]

That is delusional. The position on abortion that a president has directly influences who is in the Supreme Court, which directly influences the legality of roe vs wade.

You’re talking about legality and I’m talking about reasons people have abortion. Two separate issues, but *you *talk about delusional.

 

[seekerz]

Google ‘reasons for abortion’ and you will not find in the research, a single mention of politics, judges or presidents as the reason a woman decided to abort - I promise you.

 

[seekerz]

“The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me.” Matt 26:11.

Did He say that it was wrong for governments to help them? Did He give free reign to simultaneously deride and deny them? Did He say it was okay to treat or refer to them less respectfully than the rich as our Republican presidential candidates have been doing recently?

Have you ever thought that that statement was instead prophetic, because the Lord knew the hardness of the human heart?

 

[_Abyssinia]

I am clear on what the church teaches. I am also clear in my personal conviction that there is not “pro-life” alternative in any real sense of the word.

However, I do have a question: how is it that the efforts to reverse Roe v Wade get most of the publicity and the united front, yet there is no, united concerted movement or organization to help women considering abortion? You know, a household name that a pregnant woman would immediately think of if she were tempted or pressured to abort? We’ve had 30+ years to give both strategies (legal and supportive), at least equal priority and pregnant women in crisis still have no pregnancy 911? Abortion is still more about political action than Christian charity…that says volumes to the at-risk population.

There are many crisis pregnancy centers which help women considering an abortion. I believe there are over 4000 in the USA. This outreach already exists and it continues to grow. Mobile education units near or outside abortion clinics. There is a concerted effort to help women considering an abortion, it may often be invisible to the many, but it exits.

 

[seekerz]

There are many crisis pregnancy centers which help women considering an abortion. I believe there are over 4000 in the USA. This outreach already exists and it continues to grow. Mobile education units near or outside abortion clinics. There is a concerted effort to help women considering an abortion, it may often be invisible to the many, but it exits.

That was exactly my point: why should it be invisible if it’s going to be a strategy aimed against a very visible problem?

 

[_Abyssinia]

You’re talking about legality and I’m talking about reasons people have abortion. Two separate issues, but *you *talk about delusional.

According to the Guttmacher Institute (research arm of Planned Parenthood):

The reasons women give for having an abortion underscore their understanding of the responsibilities of parenthood and family life. Three-fourths of women cite concern for or responsibility to other individuals; three-fourths say they cannot afford a child; three-fourths say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or the ability to care for dependents; and half say they do not want to be a single parent or are having problems with their husband or partner.

guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html

When it comes to affording a child, there are pro life organizations that are willing to pay women who decide to keep their child, for the resources that they need to care of the child. The other reasons show the lack of understanding of the responsibility of sex and and what sex produces, namely a child. People should not be having sex if they do not want children. All of the reasons are actually selfish, help is out there for these women.

 

[lynnvinc]

Apparently it is more humane to kill them in the womb than let them starve, get poisoned by the toxic environment, suffer due to lack of medical care, food, and shelter, and eventually burn to death via man-made global warming.

You don’t understand, Republicans want to kill babies in the womb by allowing toxins in the environment, and refusing to reduce them.

I don’t know what the number of miscarriages and stillbirths are compared to medical abortions. I do know they are a lot higher than abortions, esp when including those that are not detected bec the woman just thinks her cycle was a bit late and never got a pregnancy test. Now most of these miscarriages and still births are probably caused by other factors, but many may have been caused by environmental toxins (many of which have been linked to miscarriages, still births, and birth defects in scientific studies). And this does not include the toxins that cause birth defects and harm people of all ages, especially those already suffering health problems or feeble with age, sending many to early graves. And if we include those killed by the effects of climate change (increased intensity of hurricanes, floods, droughts, wildfires, disease vector spread, etc) then I’m thinking the total environmentally-caused deaths are a lot higher than abortions. If we then look into how long GHGs last in the atmosphere (a portion of CO2 can remain up to 100,000 years), and how our GHG bullets in this current time-frame will go on and on killing for decades, centuries and millennia, then the death tolls will surely much greatly exceed medical abortions.

I’m not saying the Democrats are good on environmental issues. They are not. But the Republicans (except Nixon) have been and are currently atrocious on it…like they’re out to kill as many as possible, or something.

Let the Republicans put forth a candidate that is truly pro-life (not just narrowly focused on reducing medical abortions or ending embryonic stem cell research – which are good projects, but not nearly enough) and perhaps that candidate will win…except that we live in this pro-death culture and society that would more likely put a candidate in office on economic grounds (whether the perception is the Republican or the Democrat as being best on the economy), not pro-life grounds.

It’s like we’re aiming for “The Matrix,” except without the people, only machines surviving and carrying on the economy.

 

[estesbob]

Especially ridiculous when they refuse to even look at or discuss, on a societal level, the real reasons why women choose to end a pregnancy. Reasons that can be addressed right NOW. The only interest seems to be in unrealistic expectations of restricting abortion legally.

Then again, why would one care about why people don’t want to have babies, unless one took more than the slightest personal interest in the people carrying those babies…The more this discussion goes, the more clearly I see.

Sounds like extortion to me-unless we adopt the far left wqing view on how to best care for the poor and needy these childrn will continue to die. Also seems to echo another common theme we hear from abortion supporting catholics. That is "Since Republcans dont do enough to stop the Democrats from promoting unrestricted taxpayer funded abortion on demand its ok to vote for those who support unrestircted taxpayer funded abortion on demand.

 

[rlg94086]

Let me make sure I understand this. It is okay for Catholic support pro-abortion candidates because the Republican party wants to annihilate all life on earth.?

That’s the way it read to me, too.

 

[Scott_Lafrance]

You don’t understand, Republicans want to kill babies in the womb by allowing toxins in the environment, and refusing to reduce them.

I couldn’t read any more after this. I am not even a Republican, but this was serious Twilight Zone material.

 

[seekerz]

According to the Guttmacher Institute (research arm of Planned Parenthood):

The reasons women give for having an abortion underscore their understanding of the responsibilities of parenthood and family life. Three-fourths of women cite concern for or responsibility to other individuals; three-fourths say they cannot afford a child; three-fourths say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or the ability to care for dependents; and half say they do not want to be a single parent or are having problems with their husband or partner.

guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html

When it comes to affording a child, there are pro life organizations that are willing to pay women who decide to keep their child, for the resources that they need to care of the child. The other reasons show the lack of understanding of the responsibility of sex and and what sex produces, namely a child. People should not be having sex if they do not want children.

All people, whether they can afford a child or not, have sex in circumstances when they shouldn’t. That is, sadly, a universal propensity of human nature with which we are all intimately familiar. We can dismiss it or face it - either way children get conceived and if we’re going to make *them *our business, we have to be willing to take action to help the parents.

Telling people without means to not have children, is pointless and self defeating, if the intention is to prevent or reduce abortion.

 

[_Abyssinia]

That was exactly my point: why should it be invisible if it’s going to be a strategy aimed against a very visible problem?

It may be invisible to some maybe, but Care Net for instance, which has one of the largest networks of pregnancy centers has had over 1 million calls, texts, emails etc. since 2003. So people must know Care Net and other organizations out there exist. They do advertise on BET, MTV, internet, billboards etc.

 

[seekerz]

Sounds like extortion to me-unless we adopt the far left wqing view on how to best care for the poor and needy these childrn will continue to die. Also seems to echo another common theme we hear from abortion supporting catholics. That is "Since Republcans dont do enough to stop the Democrats from promoting unrestricted taxpayer funded abortion on demand its ok to vote for those who support unrestircted taxpayer funded abortion on demand.

Right about now would be a good time for me to look up ‘extortion’ in the dictionary, seeing as how it seems totally unrelated to anything I’ve read or written on this thread today.