Should a US President really be making this kind of promise to the Pope? Firstly, it has nothing to do with the Pope anyway and secondly it has nothing to do with the Federal government whether a woman chooses to abort or not.
Does Obama really plan to increase pressure on women not to abort? Or is this just talk to please the Pope, with no action intended at all? Anybody know Obama’s position on abortion?
Fortunately for Obama, whether any policies “reduce abortion” is even harder to measure than whether the stimulus is working. And it’s even harder to enforce than Waxman-Markey CO2 reduction caps.
He didn’t promise he would reduce abortion, he promised he would try, but do not be alarmed. He is not talking about anti-abortion legislation, but about supporting policies which will reduce unwanted pregnancies in the first place. It was just an extremely diplomatic way to tell the pope that he’s going to pass out Jimmy hats in schools.
Decreasing the number of abortions has been on every Dem Presidential candidates platform since Clinton articulated the “legal, safe and rare” strategy.
Here’s Obama during one of the Presidential debates:
His promise to the Pope is just a reiteration of what’s been the boiler-plate Dem position on abortion since the 90’s.
Obama stance has always been strongly pro-choice, to the point that he has voted against “late-term abortion” bills when they have not provided for exceptions for cases in which the life or health of the mother is at risk.
He is in favor of reducing abortions through education and contraception. Not “pressure not to abort,” but reduction of the likelihood of a woman getting pregnant in the first place. The Pope isn’t going to like the heavy emphasis on contraceptive access, but who cares what he thinks?
And it IS possible to strongly reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies.
I have linked to this stat before, but a comparison between some western European countries and the US breaks down like this:
Percent who have not had intercourse by age 20: (Boys Girls)
Belgium 61 63
Netherlands 58 62
Germany 33 28
Norway 33 25
U K. 24 23
France 9 25
United States 12 16
Percent of sexually active single 15 to 19-year olds using birth control:
Germany 95%
United Kingdom 92
Netherlands 88
Norway 87
Sweden 79
Denmark 70
United States 56
Teen pregnancies per 1,000 teenagers:
United States 98.0
United Kingdom 46.6
Norway 40.2
Canada 38.6
Finland 32.1
Sweden 28.3
Denmark 27.9
Netherlands 12.1
Japan 10.5
Total teen abortions per 1,000 teenagers:
United States 44.4
Norway 21.1
Sweden 19.6
Denmark 18.2
Finland 17.9
United Kingdom 16.9
Canada 16.2
Japan 5.9
Netherlands 5.5
All Obama needs to do is adopt the strategy proven to WORK in those countries, which means:
-more and better sex-ed
-demystification of sex
-better acess to birth control for teenagers.
I think the notion is to do things that prevent unwanted pregnancies (e.g. better sex ed, access to cheap or free birth control).
(ETA: I swear all these other responses weren’t here. vBelch.)
There’s a two-pronged approach to “reducing abortions”: Reduce the incidence of unwanted pregnancies (sex ed and contraception, as per above) AND also make it less burdensome to keep and support the child (more access to health care, child care, education, etc.)
The latter is in accord with the RCC’s current policy stance. The first, of course, is at odds with it.
My outrage meter is registering about a “1” on this. If he really promised to do “everything possible”, then that was not a very smart thing to say. Still, I don’t see it as a big deal. I think most Americans would like to reduce the number of abortions just like we’d like to reduce the number of triple bipass surgeries. But the way you do that is through preventive measures, not by outlawing the procedures.
Following Roe, conceptions rose by nearly 30 percent, but births actually fell by 6 percent. So for every six fetuses aborted in the 1970s, five would never have been conceived except for Roe
Also Freakonomics was wrong; abortion did not decrease crime, and it looks like it didn’t decrease unwanted children either. You can support it as a “rights” argument, but you can’t support it as a social improvement policy, and abortion did not decrease the number of unwanted pregnancies. But clearly there is a long way to go - and lots of low-hanging fruit, if you actually wanted to reduce the number of abortions as Obama promised.
Of course the pope promised to do something about the pedophile priests abuse scandal, or killing of people in poor countries by by fighting condom distributiona and education. Right?
Who’s arguing for abortion as a “social improvement policy?” Who has said that it decreases unwanted pregnancies?
Your first stat is a gigantic false correlation, by the way, not there’s any way to measure “conceptions” in the first place, but the overall population has grown significantly since Roe, and the social stigmas against reporting them have decreased.
If he promised then he should not have any. Hope his wife is on board.
Do you even bother reading threads before you post?
Obama’s goal is to reduce abortions by increasing sex education, contraception availability and assistance for parents. His goal is not to reduce abortion by outlawing abortions. Obama is firmly pro-choice.
Not according to congress or the courts. Roe v. Wade did not create an absolute right to an abortion. In fact it explicitly recognized that the state had a legitimate interest in protecting the life of the fetus.
If you think the state of the law is (or should be) abortion on demand then you have another think coming.
I think he intends to reduce abortions by improving sex education and maybe passing out condoms.
I think Obama wants to teach personal responsibility, that could mean waiting until one is capable of rearing a child, or using a method of birth control that will work. Not just having sex when the woman or girl cannot conceive.
Obama is not telling followers of the RCC (or others) that they must have an abortion or practice birth control. But that parents should not expect the state to support their children, there are cases where this is necessary, but responsible parenthood is the best way. In the case of a rapist, a woman should not reward him with a child, if she chooses to have the child for her own sake then that is a different matter.
I’m hoping that “reduce abortion” means “increase sex education and distribution of birth control”.
I think the plan is to offer abortions to some and miniature American flags to everyone else.
Whatever public policy reduces the incidence of unwanted pregnancies will reduce the incidence of abortions. The government can legitimately encourage contraception and sex-ed. Abstinence-only education has the same thinking behind it, after all – same in principle, different in methods.
Abstinence only “education” isn’t in the same area of the same principle. One positively encourages the absence of knowledge. The other is actual sex education.