Steubenville, Feb 18, 2008 / 06:29 pm (CNA).- At a Sunday night campaign rally for his wife in Steubenville, Ohio, former President Bill Clinton was greeted by pro-life students protesting legalized abortion. In response, he volleyed allegations that the pro-life position requires jailing women who have abortions.
After shouts and calls from the protesters, President Clinton responded angrily. A video posted to YouTube recorded his reply.
"You want to criminalize women and their doctors and we disagree. I reduced abortion. Tell the truth, tell the truth, If you were really pro-life, if you were really pro-life, you would want to put every doctor and every mother as an accessory to murder in prison. And you won't say you want to do that because you know, that you wouldn't have a lick of political support," President Clinton said. The video can be found at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XfmJeIJpns
Baylor University Professor Francis Beckwith, author of “Defending Life: a Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice,” responded to the video in a post at the weblog "What's Wrong with the World."
Beckwith said the students should not have heckled the president. "What the students did was disrespectful, and as a pro-lifer I condemn such conduct," he wrote.
However, he said the former president's argument was flawed, writing, "this argument ignores the pre-legalization laws and penalties for illegal abortion and possible reasons why they were instituted. Although it is clear that these laws considered the unborn human persons, in most states women were granted immunity from prosecution and in other states the penalties were very light."
Beckwith continued, "jurists and legislators in the past believed that the best way to prevent abortions from occurring and at the same time uphold the sanctity of human life was to criminalize abortion, prosecute the abortionist, grant immunity or a light penalty to the woman, and show her compassion by recognizing that she is the second victim of abortion."
Father Frank Pavone, president of Priests for Life, replied to a similar question about criminal penalties for abortion in a Feb. 1 Priests for Life newsletter.
"The pro-life movement is not out to punish women. Our goal, instead, is to stop child-killing. What would throwing women in jail do to accomplish that goal? Their children have already died, yet the abortionist goes on killing hundreds and thousands of others. It makes far more sense to put the abortionist in jail, so that he or she can no longer kill children," Father Pavone said.
He noted that in prosecutions of abortionists, the testimony and co-operation of such women would be necessary, justifying lesser criminal penalties, if any, for women who had abortions.
He suggested that it is a cause for optimism that the question is being asked.
This particular question will be raised more and more as we to come closer to restoring protection to the unborn. The question is actually part of the well-planned public relations attack that abortion advocates always try to make on us in the pro-life movement," said Father Pavone.
The above article is reposted with permission from Catholic News Agency.
____________________ Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand. - Augustine
For those who prefer an embedded video, you'll find it here:
____________________ Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand. - Augustine
Damn! I was split between seeing him in Steubenville, or Obama in Youngstown all on the same day. It was to tough of a decision, though, so I just stayed home. Sounds like the Steubenville stop would've been a bit more interesting. I didn't hear anything like this happening on the Youngstown State University campus.
I've never once heard, in my 26 years in the pro-life movement, a person calling for the prosecution and punishment of a woman who aborts her child (and I've often heard express denials that this is desired at all). Clinton is engaging in his usual gross caricature of his opponents (we'll see Hillary doing more of this, too, now that her campaign is in serious trouble).
It's the typical pro-abort mentality of ridiculously making out that pro-lifers do not respect life and women, when the butchery continues every day, with over 3000 murders day in and day out.
I guess this is all they can do. They can't defend the genocide, or make a decent, serious argument against our position, so they have to come up with some trumped-up charge against those of us who expose their evil deeds.
And let's not forget that Bill Clinton (and Al Gore and Jesse Jackson and Richard Gephardt) all used to be pro-life (so they said, anyway), and ditched those views as soon as they wanted to run for President.
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On one of the news programs, they were discussing this with former Clinton employee Dick Morris last night. They mentioned that the decrease in abortions Clinton talked about was a "decrease" of, if I remember correctly, somewhere around nearly 2 million to 1.2 million! SIGH!! TSK, TSK!! I would have to ask, "HOW ABOUT ZERO?!" One thing that annoys me about abortions, in addition to the fact that it is (here's a clue) KILLING A BABY, is that people KNOW what causes pregnancy! And they also treat pregnancy as if it was a disease ("poor lady, she was affilicted with pregnancy, just out of the blue, it HAPPENED")! One thing that has annoyed me about the feminist movement is that apparently they never have carried assertiveness training into the area of women saying "NO" to men, or at least demanding much more caution, when they might get pregnant or possibly get an STD. You CAN be careful and AVOID pregnancy WITHOUT the use of contraceptives (not saying that is in harmony with Catholic doctrine, however, it IS EASY to do). Our society could also EASILY eliminate the spread of STDs, HIV, etc. even without the use of vaccines or further research! Sometimes I think that a new, official religion will eventually develop - a religion in which people worship what is between their legs although many apparently already do that! Sorry! I just get irked with people sometimes! Lord have mercy upon me!
By the way, speaking of getting "irked", Dick Morris alleged, on the air, that Clinton can have a terrible temper at times. He alleged that one night he and Bill Clinton were arguing, back when Clinton was still Governor of Arkansas, and that he started to walk out in disgust. He alleged that Clinton tackled him and was going to punch him in the face when Hillary grabbed her husband and got him calmed down, preventing him from punching Morris then walked Morris around the Governor's mansion grounds, getting Morris calmed down and talking him out of saying anything about it at the time. I have no idea if what Morris was saying was true, however, he DID make the allegation on the air! I dunno, maybe Hillary would make a great Secretary of State after having to deal with "Bubba" for years now although I have also heard that Hillary has a temper of her own. Oh well! May God bless and save the United States!
EMarshallBuckles wrote: On one of the news programs, they were discussing this with former Clinton employee Dick Morris last night. They mentioned that the decrease in abortions Clinton talked about was a "decrease" of, if I remember correctly, somewhere around nearly 2 million to 1.2 million!
And I would wonder how many doses of RU-486 and how many condoms and birth control pills they handed out to bring about that reduction?
In other words, is it a reduction, or just a transfer of numbers from one column to another?
____________________ Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand. - Augustine
They mentioned that the decrease in abortions Clinton talked about was a "decrease" of… somewhere around nearly 2 million to 1.2 million!
Wasn’t this the epoch of the senate debate on partial birth abortion? And wasn’t this debate what opened the eyes of millions of people to what abortion really is, so that the pro-life viewpoint gained support by leaps and bounds, until shortly after the Chad Incident in Florida, it became the majority position among US citizens? Then how can Clinton claim any credit for the reduction in surgical abortions? It was simply a sea-change in public opinion — a change that he was clearly opposed to at the time it happened.
David W. Emery wrote: Then how can Clinton claim any credit for the reduction in surgical abortions?
This is the man who "did not have sex with that woman -- Miss Lowenski" and who reminded us that "it depends on what your definition of 'it' is."
Obviously he can say and do and and claim credit for anything he wants.
At least until he stands before the Throne.
____________________ Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand. - Augustine
