Illinois compiled statute 720 ILCS 510/6 states that physicians performing abortions when the fetus is viable must use the procedure most likely to preserve the fetus’ life; must be attended by another physician who can care for a born-alive infant; and must “exercise the same degree of professional skill, care and diligence to preserve the life and health of the child as would be required of a physician providing immediate medical care to a child born alive in the course of a pregnancy termination which was not an abortion.” Failure to do any of the above is considered a felony.

The law Obama voted against would have required the state to take immediate custody of any surviving infants without a hearing and would have charged the taxpayers for extremely expensive intensive care for any premature fetus regardless of whether a doctor thought it had any chance of survival. It also would have classified a fetus as viable if it had a heartbeat, regardless of size or gestation time, which would have made many more abortions illegal.

The article deals with fetuses (late term abortions) who, by all rights, should have been destroyed in utero. For whatever reason they were not, and were subsequently born, meaning a separate entity from the mother, breathing on his or her own.

The question here is whether it is okay to simply allow that baby (now born) to die, or does that baby deserve the rights afforded all Americans under the constitution.

It begs the question, would it be okay for a woman to decide that her full term baby would create a hardship, so it would be okay to allow it to die? What about your dependent children? If it is okay to allow one to die, why not all? Why can’t we subject healthy full-term babies to “live birth” abortion? it is a slippery slope and it is not okay to allow a baby to die without attempting to save it.

This isn’t even about a mother choosing a DNR for her baby. This is about babies with heartbeats, functioning brains, and breathing on their own being neglected to death within hours of birth, and no matter where you stand on abortion, this practice is wrong.

After conception, the cells come to life and maintain the functions of living cells. To say they are dead is like saying we need to keep a watch on cemeteries for two months after a burial in case the dead come back to life and will need help getting out of the grave. Ask yourself: WAS I DEAD OR ALIVE AFTER CONCEPTION? If you say dead, they you will have to explain how you exist since something dead doesn’t come to life on its own. That’s called spontaneous generation. The Greeks believed in it. But scientists disproved it centuries ago.

Most females choose to go through the actions required to make them pregnant. They can’t say it’s a accident. They did everything required to make them pregnant since they most likely acted purposely. If they choose to have an abortion, they are going against the choice they made of becoming pregnant. Technically they could be called ANTI-CHOICE. An abortion is the taking of a life. That is a scientific fact. As I write so often, just because you don’t like the facts doesn’t mean the facts are wrong.

I will leave this debate alone from this point. But let me leave you with this: “The end of the eighth week marks the end of the “embryonic period” and the beginning of the “fetal period”.”

Note that 8 weeks is 2 months and not 1. I said “through the majority of the first trimester it is not a fetus, but an embryo.” I believe 2 out of 3 is a majority, but if you’d like to correct me on simple mathematics, I encourage you to do so.

That’s from MedlinePlus, in case you need my source: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002398.htm

Eric, I addressed your point specifically. Yes, I first used the word ‘blob’ and you merely used it instead of another term. Fine. I’m not concerned with the frivolous term, but instead your viewpoint that that there is this large chasm between development at the 12 week (first trimester) and that of the 14 week (second trimester).

And your correction is incorrect. It is really only in the first month of pregnancy that it is an embryo. Starting in the second month, it becomes a fetus.

If people want to rely on the scientific evidence, then don’t dismiss it when it doesn’t support your viewpoint. If viability is your standard, then you have to accept that banning abortions after the 21st week of pregnancy is perfect acceptable because scientifically, that is a baby and medically, it can survive outside the womb.

That can be tough when you’re dealing with kids who can’t make up their mind about a Wii or a PS3.

As for the religious vs. biological argument, you’re absolutely correct, and in a way is exactly the distinction I’m trying to make. Too often the case against abortion revolves around treating 2 month old embryos as tiny babies, which is just not true.

The reasons for this are that, as our current separation of church of state stands, you can’t legislate against abortion because a majority believe an embryo has a soul. The best legal case is to act as if a baby is biologically similar through its entire development, and thus prove that life began somewhere close to the moment of fertilization.

My point is this (and is general; the “you” is not Partnenon): If your reasons for abhorring abortion are spiritual in nature, I respect that. But please stand by that reasoning and not make an unfair link between a premature baby that survives and the embryo in the mother to try and convince people who don’t share your spiritual beliefs that there’s a scientific basis for what’s being said. In return, I promise not to dismiss the moral component of your points simply because I don’t think they form the basis of sound legislation.

Thanks for the good postback, Parthenon.

Eric Sipple

Rather than debate the real issue I was addressing, you attached to a moment of frivolous word usage. My larger point – the one you have conveniently avoided by focusing a paragraph on a word I requested be ignored – was that there is a vast sea of difference between premature babies that survive and the embryo that exists in the first trimester and any baby that has every survived after being born prematurely. The youngest being about 21 weeks old; nearly a full trimester older than the embryos of which we speak.

But since you seem compelled to give me a science lesson about when arms and lips form, let me offer a correction of my own: through the majority of the first trimester it is not a fetus, but an embryo. There is a scientific distinction between the first trimester and the remaining pregnancy. And that is the distinction which was relevant to my point, not my use of the word “blob.”

Sorry Eric, but that is not correct. A baby’s heart starts to beat at 3 weeks along with development of the central nervous system. By the 5th week the nose and lips are forming and the brain has formed. By the 8th week, major organs have formed. Hands and feet can been seen and the baby is now reactive to its environment. This is all within 2 months of conception. That’s no blob.

But, then again, if you actually listened to what I was actually saying, you might have noticed that I’m not in favor of all abortions right up until delivery.

And if you’d stop to listen to what I have to say, you’d learn I’m not some right wing religious fanatic that says to pass a constitutional amendment banning all abortions for any reason at any time. So I declare a cease fire.

I don’t agree with your beliefs about fertilized ova being equivalent to a fully independent human, and I don’t think anyone should be legally required to consider them as anything but beliefs.

Well, as I said earlier, I see it more as a societal issue than a legal one. But if education is going to be part of the process, then these women should also be educated about what it is they’re going to be terminating. They should be informed of the fetus’s development and what stage it is (like I pointed out to Eric above) and that it is something that is alive. Sorry, but I still think as a society, we’re still far too cavalier about our attitudes towards abortion.

And you are misrepresenting the pro-choice point of view (in particular my pro-choice point of view), once again, with this statement. You think that this type of decision is equivalent to having your tonsils out for women?

No, what I am saying is that if you’re going to have the debate, frame it in honest terminology. If the issue is abortion say “abortion” not “medical procedure.” In addition, stop framing it as some kind of absurd issue where men just want to “control women” because that’s a load of crap.

That’s a fair point Eric. But should the prospective father desire a role in the child’s life, and not be a ‘gone moments after conception’ kind of chap, then he deserves it as much as the mother does. Seems to me that if the abortion decision ought to be a mutual one – i.e. both must want it before it can be done.

Biologically they are completely different situations, and we’ll never have a fair discussion as long as people on both sides continue to treat them as the same thing.

With such a religously charged issue, we’re not really discussing biology. You could prove beyond doubt that a fetus ‘feels’ beyond four months, and mainstream Christianity would still find the one-to-three month abortions reprehensible, I suspect.

Actually, I’m not arguing for aborting viable fetuses that are forced to come out prematurely. Or advocating that it’s nothing but a blob until it’s born. But, then again, if you actually listened to what I was actually saying, you might have noticed that I’m not in favor of all abortions right up until delivery. That might have not met your straw man needs in this particular debate.

For the record: I am in favor of letting women have the ability to choose whether they bring a child to fruition. If they choose to abort when a fetus is not yet viable outside the womb, then they have the choice – but after that, deliver the child and put it up for adoption. Before that, whatever they choose is up to them – it’s their choice, they’ll have to live with it. Which means educated choices about the whole situation (one of those other things you dismissed outright which Planned Parenthood does and the current junta doesn’t want women to know about), ready and available contraception if that’s the choice of the woman, and, yes, abortion (within the currently legally defined parameters that you’ve dishonestly said aren’t there) until independent viability. I don’t agree with your beliefs about fertilized ova being equivalent to a fully independent human, and I don’t think anyone should be legally required to consider them as anything but beliefs.

Actually, I said that in counter to the absurd notion that it’s about blocking “access to medical procedures” for women as if they’re having their tonsils removed.

And you are misrepresenting the pro-choice point of view (in particular my pro-choice point of view), once again, with this statement. You think that this type of decision is equivalent to having your tonsils out for women? How many women do you know who have actually had an abortion? Have any of them said they approached the decision to carry a child to term in the same way as they decided whether to have their tonsils taken out? Because that is very insulting to women.

Also, your translation device is sadly malfunctioning. I’d prefer civil discourse and rational debate, but that’s kinda hard on the tilted playing field we have today where liberal hunting licenses are really funny jokes, but saying McClueless is old is insulting his time as a POW. Maybe you could save the Republican’t rhetoric for conservative blogs’ comment sections (if you could find one)?

Actual translation: why do Republican’ts feel entitled to act like motherCheneying iceholes when they’re visiting virtual liberal living rooms?

Moving on.

I’m very much pro-choice, but I’m open to limits on abortion past the first trimester. Prior to that it is basically is – and I’m only using the term because you did, so please don’t jump me on a technicality – a blob. Health of the mother not withstanding, it does get harder to defend the lack of sustainable life later and later in the pregnancy.

But here’s one counterargument against late terms abortion laws, and politicians who are hesitant to support bills that, on the surface, only ban “infanticide.” These bills are rarely fair-minded things, typically containing politically charged, legally questionable language meant to use this as the beginning of a larger campaign against all abortions.

In other words: can we please, please separate late term abortions, and the moral issues contained therein, from abortions within the first trimester? Biologically they are completely different situations, and we’ll never have a fair discussion as long as people on both sides continue to treat them as the same thing.

All well and good, for premature babies who are delivered early. Just because premature infants can survive before they would otherwise be viable doesn’t necessarily mean they should. I mean, where is the line? Does it get to the point where a 6 week old fetus can be made viable? Will they be removed from the “host” via court order if she even considers abortion?

Give me an example of where I have done this. Just one.

B. I would chastise you, then proceed to rip apart your arguments until they were confetti.

Yeah. Anyway…

So a fetus is a human life, except when it isn’t?

Uh, no dummy. It just means that I don’t support the human life amendment.

That sentence could NOT make any less sense.

It makes perfect sense. Bayh voted for the bill to ban partial birth abortions and voted for the bill that would require parental notification for girls under the age of 18 to seek abortions outside of their state. That’s too “anti-choice” for the likes of NARAL and their ilk.

I usually don’t respond to pagan occult superstitionists

Actually, the pro-choice movement is losing ground in the scientific arena. Medical technology is making easier each day for very premature babies to survive outside the womb making it more difficult for pro-choice advocates to convince people it’s nothing but a blob until they’re born.

But, since you felt it was okay to cavalierly dismiss every single pro-choice argument that you encounter here with one convenient catch-all

Actually, I said that in counter to the absurd notion that it’s about blocking “access to medical procedures” for women as if they’re having their tonsils removed.

IMHO there has never been any way to rationally discuss these things with Reich wing trolls who enjoy polluting liberal blogs’ comments sections with Republican’t hypocrisy.

Translation: I WANT AN ECHO CHAMBER!

And of course, as I have said before, once the “troll” accusations fly, then you know they have nothing left.

And it does largely affect women. Many of the women who would get abortions are in situations where the specific man – the father – has little to no interest in the child and the mother will be left with the full responsibility. It’s not simply that the man is a non-carrier. It’s that he can be gone moments after conception and never have another worry. The woman, even if giving the baby up for adoption, has had her life changed for no less than the next 9 months.

We’re not talking about every phase of women’s lives. Just the phase pertaining to pregnancy.

And with respect to that phase…Why shouldn’t men have a say? Takes two to get pregnant. If there isn’t a health issue involved, why shouldn’t the non-carrier have a say in whether the kid is born or not?