{"id":5588,"date":"2022-05-26T08:37:47","date_gmt":"2022-05-26T12:37:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dahlman.online\/?p=5588"},"modified":"2023-07-13T11:23:53","modified_gmt":"2023-07-13T15:23:53","slug":"they-arent-pro-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dahlman.online\/index.php\/2022\/05\/26\/they-arent-pro-life\/","title":{"rendered":"They Aren\u2019t Pro-Life"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Pro-Choice<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I am pro-choice, and always have been.  My thought process is pretty simple.  I\u2019m a man, and I can\u2019t put myself in the place of a woman who has to make the decision to have an abortion or not.  And, while I understand and appreciate that different folks have differing views on the beginning of life; that moment is an ethical\/religious decision.  What is the belief of one person is not the belief of another.  And like all religious tenets, I don\u2019t have the right to force my religious view onto anyone else.  That\u2019s what pro-choice has always been about \u2013 the choice that others get to make, not that I or other \u201cold white men\u201d get to decide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And I have always understood how folks get to be \u201cpro-life\u201d, or at least \u201cpro-birth\u201d.  I worked for a Democratic United States Congressman who was \u201cpro-life\u201d.  It was back in the 1970\u2019s, and the partisan line that now divides Republicans and Democrats over this issue wasn\u2019t delineated yet.  It was perfectly acceptable for  Democratic operatives in the office to be pro-choice, while the \u201cboss\u201d was pro-life.  The Congressman was deeply religious, an Irish Roman Catholic from the West side of Cincinnati, and he listened to his faith leaders. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pro-Life<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

But I do make a distinction between \u201cpro-birth\u201d and \u201cpro-life\u201d.  My Congressman was truly \u201cpro-life\u201d.  He was opposed to abortion, but in favor of early childhood care, Head Start programs, aid to women and children, and all the other issues that improved the lives of those children who came into the world, wanted or not.  He was \u201cpro-life\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But there are many today who are \u201cpro-birth\u201d.  They don\u2019t want abortion, but they are unwilling to \u201cpay the cost\u201d of sustaining the lives they demand come into the world.  In Oklahoma, in Texas, and in all of the states that are moving to end abortion, they are doing nothing; nothing to care for the mothers that are forced into full-term pregnancy, or the children they are mandating to term.  That\u2019s not their problem.  They are taking all of the credit for ending abortion, but none of the responsibility for what happens thereafter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pro-life means for life, not just for birth.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are two days after the latest massacre, of children, in the United States.  This is a uniquely American problem, a toxic mix of our culture, our politics, and the economics of gun manufacturing.  There are now nineteen more children who will not see a full-term life.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pro-Birth<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Texas Governor Greg Abbott determined to place the blame on the lack of mental health facilities in Uvalde. He invoked the inevitability of a \u201cmadman with a gun\u201d, a Satan-incarnate as inexorable and unforeseeable as the tornado.  Candidate for Texas Governor Beto O\u2019Rourke interrupted the Governor\u2019s press conference yesterday, to raise a \u201cpro-life\u201d point.  He called Abbott out \u2013 placing the blame on laws that allowed an eighteen year-old shooter easy access to semi-automatic rifles and ammunition.  It was an ugly but necessary encounter (CNN<\/a>).  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The insurmountable grief of the tragedy feels like it should be beyond politics.  But, of course, it\u2019s not.  The absolute failure of our government to protect us from these continuing tragedies can\u2019t be ignored, and more importantly, should not be deflected as just \u201cevil\u201d or \u201cinevitable\u201d or a failure in mental health.  Every country has mental health issues, but only one country has this plague of mass shootings.  Governor Greg Abbott has done nothing but encourage Texans to buy more guns, bigger guns, guns with all the \u201cbells and whistles\u201d.  He can\u2019t deflect from his own words and actions, and Beto had the courage to call him to task.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Butcher\u2019s Bill<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Abbott and his Texas cohorts claim to be \u201cpro-life\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0But their actions are obvious.\u00a0\u00a0They are \u201cpro-birth\u201d, demanding that their own religious views be followed by others.\u00a0\u00a0But they aren\u2019t pro-life.\u00a0\u00a0It they were, they\u2019d look at their own state: mass shootings in Uvalde, El Paso, Midland-Odessa, Sutherland Springs and Santa Fe High School.\u00a0\u00a0The butcher\u2019s bill in just Governor Abbott\u2019s term is 87 dead in mass killings (Texas Tribune<\/a>).\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0If they were pro-life, they\u2019d do something about it and\u00a0take action to literally stop the bleeding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They would follow the basic founding rights of America:\u00a0\u00a0the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.\u00a0\u00a0For 87 people in Governor Abbott\u2019s term, and so many more, those rights were denied by a man with a gun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They aren\u2019t pro-life at all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pro-Choice I am pro-choice, and always have been.  My thought process is pretty simple.  I\u2019m a man, and I can\u2019t put myself in the place of a woman who has to make the decision to have an abortion or not.  And, while I understand and appreciate that different folks have differing views on the beginning of life; that … Continue reading “They Aren\u2019t Pro-Life”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nThey Aren\u2019t Pro-Life : Our America - Essays on Politics and American Life<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Texas Governor Abbott claims that his is "pro-life". 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