WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Supreme Court Wednesday upheld a controversial law banning a specific abortion procedure critics call "partial birth," a ruling that could portend enormous social, legal, and political implications for the divisive issue.
In other words, only "critics" would dare call it "partial birth." And it is only this ruling against it that will have implications for such a "divisive issue."
The sharply divided 5-4 ruling could prove historic, and offer a possible signal of the court's willingness, under Chief Justice John Roberts, to someday revisit the basic right to abortion guaranteed in the 1973 Roe v. Wade case.
Vote 5-4 for abortion, and it is a "mandate." Vote 5-4 against abortion, and it is a "sharply divided" court... And of course, it was a "basic right" to abortion that was "guaranteed" in the Roe v. Wade case. I don't see any biased language there. Do you?
...The legal sticking point was that the law lacked a "health exception" for a woman who might suffer serious medical complications, something the justices have said in the past is necessary when considering abortion restrictions.
The "health exception" is why the Supreme Court has routinely stricken down legislation banning this obscene practice. The propaganda that was fed us, of course, is that the "life of the mother" has precedence over the life of the baby (but we call it a "fetus" which helps us de-personalize it, despite the fact that we were all 'fetii' at one time, with the possible exception of some lawmakers and justices who were probably hatched in a more reptilian manner).
I have never figured out how a partial birth abortion could help the health of the mother. In case you haven't heard, the partial birth process involves pulling the baby feet-first from the womb until just the head is left inside. Since the head is still in there, it's not yet a "person" and the brain can be damaged and/or removed by rather heartless procedures. When a normal child is being born feet first, it is called a "breach" birth, and such a form of birth can damage the mother permanently. With partial birth abortions, the child is intentionally turned around and the mother is put at risk of a "breach" birth and the potential dangers it involves. To suppose there is any consideration of anyone's life -- mother or child -- is utmost hypocrisy.
So some people on the Supreme Court have come around to thinking like human beings again. I can only hope the other four get there some day. While I'm at it, I guess I ought to add something also about another victim of abusive surgery -- the Fourth Amendment.
It was the Fourth Amendment that was abused and twisted to allow the Roe v. Wade ruling that overrode state sovereignty regarding the killing of the unborn. I need to add first that before Roe v. Wade, abortion was not prohibited by the federal government. It was an issue left to the states. Some states had allowed abortion decades before Roe v. Wade. All that ruling did was force all states to allow it. Beforehand, someone had to go to a state that allowed it. That state then got to perform it, pay for it and/or arrange billing, and then live with the decision. Doctors who had a conscience also had an option to move to a state where they would not be forced to violate their hippocratic oath. The Roe v. Wade ruling just made the drive a little shorter for those who wanted the procedure, forced all 50 states to allow the procedure, and paved the way for taxpayers' money to pick up the tab.
And the basis for this? A so-called "right to privacy" in the Constitution. Actually, that right was intended to prohibit illegal search and seizure and the investigation of a citizen without "probable cause." This was interpreted as the right to -- yes, you guessed it -- kill babies!
What the 4th amendment actually says is that no one may illegally enter a safe, private place, and remove or endanger the inhabitants or their possessions. How does that guarantee abortion? It sounds like an abortion, actually!
If the Roe v. Wade decision is ever overturned, the media tells us that our country will be driven back into the dark ages. Women will be frequenting back alleys, and dying in hospitals because the doctors' hands are tied. Actually, if Roe v. Wade were overturned, nothing would change immediately. The decision regarding abortion would merely be put back into the place it belongs -- the authority of the states, as was intended by the framers of the constitution. Then if, oh, say, Massachusetts wanted to kill the unborn, force doctors to do it, subsidize hospitals and clinics that did it, and pay for the procedure while taxing their residents, they could do it. But if, oh, say, Idaho decided they did not want to do this, no one in Washington, D.C., or anywhere else could tell them they had to. Sounds pretty totalitarian, doesn't it? But what if some poor Idaho girl needed to terminate a preganancy? Maybe she could move to Massachusetts? What if some doctor wanted the big bucks for a quick procedure? He could go there, too! What if some doctor with a conscience in Massachusetts decided he could not kill unborn babies anymore, but he wanted to keep his license? Hey, he could move to Idaho or some other state that didn't force him to do the procedure! Or how about a pharmacist that didn't want to sell the "morning after" pill as if it were a Tic-Tac or a Tylenol? He could move, too!
There's one drawback, of course. States would have to pay for their own decisions in this area. There would be no more federal funding. Oops, that might be the catch. We sure don't want to slow down the production of the big cash cow we call Medicaid and Medicare. We might actually have some money left in it by the time Generation X gets ready to retire.
A 5-4 vote is only a small victory, but lest we forget, it was the same 5-4 vote that kept innocent children on Death Row in 1989. It was a 5-4 vote in 1972 that voided all death penalties on the books. But that day, remember, it was a "mandate," not a "sharply divided" court, that made the decision and overrode 50 state legislatures.
No comments:
Post a Comment