Life Links 6/22/09

Career advice columnist Penelope Trunk discusses her two abortions.

I got two abortions to preserve my career. To keep my options open. To keep my aspirations within reach.

I bought into the idea that kids undermine your ability to build an amazing career.

And here I am, with the amazing career.

But also, here I am with two kids. So I know a bit about having kids and a career. And I want to tell you something: You don’t need to get an abortion to have a big career. Women who want big careers want them because something deep inside you drives you to change the world, lead a revolution, break new barriers.

Jill at Feministe claims a resolution (which is currently being blocked) to condemn violence against abortion providers is “not at all controversial.” Maybe she missed this paragraph (my emphasis).

Whereas there is a history of violence against providers of reproductive health care, as health care employees have suffered threats and hostility in order to provide crucial services to patients;

I find it at least somewhat controversial to call performing abortions “provid(ing) crucial services.” I also find it interesting that the resolution never uses the word “abortion.”

We also get a shot of Jill’s less-than-impeccable logic where she argues that because talk show host Joe Scarborough wanted to defend a guy who killed an abortion provider (and who he happened to know) back when he was a lawyer and was later supported by National Right to Life when he ran for Congress as a prolife candidate, therefore National Right to Life and the Republican Party support violence against abortion providers. Maybe MSNBC also supports violence against abortion providers because they hired Joe Scarborough to be a talk show host.


Charmaine Yoest argues in the Washington Post that Judge Sotomayor’s position on abortion would be worse than Justice Souter’s. Yoest argues that Sotomayor likely holds the position of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund which opposes limits on abortion like parental and informed consent legislation.


Jill Stanek has posted videos of Mike Huckabee and Jon Stewart discussing abortion on the Daily Show. I think Huckabee does a pretty good job (and certainly better than most politicians or ex-politicians) but I wish he just did a little more to gently pull away Stewart’s “control their own reproductive system” rhetoric. Something like, “Jon, you can only use that rhetoric if you ignore that some choices end the life of a human being. You’re not prolife if you think a woman should be able to have her unborn child killed.”


Ed Brayton should do some more basic research before commenting on stem cell issues in Michigan and providing a knee-jerk reaction. Ed seems unaware of what Proposal 2 did in Michigan. He seems to think it only allowed the killing of human embryos who were “not suitable” for implantation which is why he opposes legislation which attempts to provide a definition for what “not suitable” means along with a number of other regulations. But if he read the language of Proposal 2, he would know that it allowed the killing of human embryos who were created via IVF for family building but are no longer wanted by their parents and would otherwise be discarded or are not suitable for implantation.

Ed’s a fairly knowledgeable guy, so I’m trying to imagine how little the average Michigan voter knew about Proposal 2.