Patricia,

–In the vernacular of the looney-left, “you go girl!” Well said. It’s rather obvious you didn’t leave a lot of room for liberals to attack.

–Falsehood also produces backlash, something liberals are starting to understand, though forcibly.

–“Per Veritatem, Vis”, indeed!

Ms. Reichardt,
Some excellent observations. I’d like to point out that, if we cannot restrict abortion for moral reasons (and the continuous assertions that we have a moral imperative to enact health care reform and financial reform have completely taken the air out of the pro-choice argument that “you can’t legislate morality”), then perhaps we can appeal to self-interest: Washington University’s ill-advised embrace of abortion will no doubt eliminate children who one day would become Wash U students. (No, abortion is not the exclusive provice of the poor - in fact, I am dubious about the link between resources and abortion rates, since the more liberal Northeastern states have the highest abortion rates, but also presumably have the most generous social safety nets.) Ultimately the pro-life movement will win - after all, only one side of the debate is eliminating its own future voters and supporters.

Bryan Kirchoff
St. Louis

Ms. Reichardt, The proposed reforms of health care will NOT pay for abortions. You completely and deliberately mis-state what the legislation may do. Even Mr. Wilson did not yap out “You Lie!” when President Obama said so in his speech to the joint session of the Congress. However, “You Lie!”, ma’am, which completely undermines any moral authority of your position. If you cannot keep your rhetoric free of deliberate deceptions, you will simply further fuel the upcoming electoral disaster for the far right in 2010.

Mr. Hogan makes a fair point, in that none of the candidate bills appears to explicitly fund abortions. However, thus far - correct me if I’m outdated - none of them carries an amendment that specifically excludes the funding of abortion. Thus, the concern: Abortion advocacy has a long history of using any term but “abortion” to cover abortion. (For example, why was the term “choice” developed only for abortion? After all, we choose to speak freely, we choose to assemble peaceably, we choose to petition government, yet we have no trouble labeling these rights as what they are. As another example, the clinic on Forest Park Avenue is named “Planned Parenthood Reproductive Health Services of Greater St Louis”, even though the very reason Planned Parenthood was organized is quite the opposite of “reproductive”.) In short, the anti-abortion side is concerned that, without an explicit ban, abortion advocates will seek friendly court venues to have terms such as “essential services” ruled to include abortion. So, one could quite reasonably forsee an outcome where the federal health care system does, indeed, pay for millions of abortions, and I have no doubt abortion advocates will immediately seek to implement that interpretation upon passage of health care reform. Checking the statements and communications of NARAL, NOW, and Planned Parenthood on various health care bills would say much about the prospects of abortion in that legislation.
As a secondary point, it is only in a very small number of cases where pregnancy presents a health threat. The vast majority of abortions end a pregnancy that was a sign of a healthy reproductive system functioning as designed. Thus, the inclusion of abortion (explicitly or implicitly) seems to go against the very name “health care” reform.
As a final aside, I would be cautious about the prospects of long-term electoral defeat for the “far right”. After all, only one side of the debate is aborting its own future voters and supporters. If you check CDC statistics, abortion rates are markedly higher in the liberal Northeast. Almost all of the ten or so congressional seats that will get reapportioned after the 2010 census will be coming from Blue and Blue-tinged battleground states and going to Red and Red-tinged states. Ironically, the one thing that may mitigate that transfer for the Blue side is the recession - people are now having a harder time leaving the Northeast for other parts of the country.

Bryan Kirchoff
St. Louis

Hogan and Kirchoff,

–The simple phrase “health of the mother” is all a physician needs to include in a diagnosis to get abortions covered by health insurance of any type. This phrase is so nebulous that even the “mental” health of the mother can be so classified. This is and has been the practice for decades.

–I have been saying for years that liberals have been killing off their own potential voters for years, and is why they need illegal aliens and convicts to firm up their base.

Ms. Richardt, I think you and Planned Parenthood have more in common than you think: prevent pregnancy before a woman even has to think about abortion.
Planned Parenthood does much, much more than perform abortions. More than 97% of their offices DO NOT offer abortion services. What they do offer is low-to-no cost of birth control (which probably saved me from ever deciding whether or not to have an abortion), to condoms to STD education.

And, Pattie, you are wrong. The health care bill will NOT subsidize abortions.
Perhaps you remember when you were young and had sex? If not, perhaps a friend did? It’s not going away, better to have youth make informed decisions. BEFORE they are thinking about an abortion. Planned Parenthood offers that choice.

Well since Ms. Reichardt is so big on truth, perhaps I should point out yet another truth: Abortion is legal. For that reason, our society must produce qualified, well-trained professionals who can perform these LEGAL procedures for the women who choose to seek them out. Washington University has always been a progressive leader in medicine, and I applaud them for partnering with Planned Parenthood for benefit of reproductive health. Your idea of truth, Ms. Reichardt, is extreme and overzealous. The majority of Americans support a woman’s right to choose to have or not to have an abortion. Apparently that’s a truth that you don’t want to face.

“why they need illegal aliens and convicts to firm up their base.”
Illegal aliens and convicts can vote now? Another intelligent comment by a genius Racist Party supporter!

“not to mention the reproductive truth: the joining of a sperm and an egg produces a live, in-uterine baby”
I would love to see the text book used in med school that refers to a newly joined sperm and egg as an “in-uterine baby.”
A family member of mine would have died giving birth to her tenth child, if she hadn’t had an abortion. Then again, it’s more important that the child is alive than to have a mother to car for him/her. If this is such a Racist Party issue, why haven’t they taken care of this during the many years of Racist Party control?
Get a clue you religious nutcases: they are just pretending to care about abortion to get your vote. There aren’t enough old white men to keep the Racist Party afloat, so they have to get the religious nutjobs on their side.

Bernie,

–You are quickly climbing the ladder of useful-idiot tools. Your reactionary synthesis of all things MSNBC is transparently revealing.

^just as you are so transparently beholding all things fox news. you are such a hypocrite, which is pretty much status quo for you on these boards.