I think it was the opinion of a person from the center of the country. And I agree with it.

I agree with you, but he needs to refine that answer to 3 sentences instead of a huge dialog. People were getting lost in his long but simple answer.

Do you want a dummy as President or do you want someone with an intellect equal to the job ?

He gave an honest answer despite the fact he knew it would not be well received by that audience. That's integrity. He could have qualified it without getting the pro choice crowd's knickers in a knot. He didn't.

As to the criticism of his answer as far as longevity is concerned... while it may be better given that sentences of more than a few syllables are difficult for some to process, it makes me smile to see how brilliant those who are not the ones on the firing line always are. Why aren't all you geniuses running ? It isn't as easy as you think to dumb down to the masses. Do you want a dummy as President or do you want someone with an intellect equal to the job ?

He gave an honest answer despite the fact he knew it would not be well received by that audience. That's integrity. He could have qualified it without getting the pro choice crowd's knickers in a knot. He didn't.

As to the criticism of his answer as far as longevity is concerned... while it may be better given that sentences of more than a few syllables are difficult for some to process, it makes me smile to see how brilliant those who are not the ones on the firing line always are. Why aren't all you geniuses running ? It isn't as easy as you think to dumb down to the masses. Do you want a dummy as President or do you want someone with an intellect equal to the job ?

I'm with you CO. However, I do think he needs to use the services of a good speech coach. He
does not speak as well sitting down as he does standing up and his head gets locked too far
to the side which tends to be correlated with stuttering.

Good point, rla. Many think he's lost without a teleprompter.

Well, 2000 and 2004 elections answer that question.....

Are you aware that there is a major smear campaign going on from the right about Obama's opposition to the Illinois BAIPA (Born Alive Infant Protection Act) law? This was contained in the Corsi book. I don't know that Obama has explained in full why he voted against this act while it was still in committee. I understand why he opposed it, but he has not given a complete answer on this matter.

Well the dummy beat the democrats twice,what does that make them?

It makes the voters who voted for the "dummy", dumber than the dummy they voted for.

Oh...OK. I guess that makes democrats elitist then; I had always wondered, thanks for the scoop Amy.

He specifically addressed that in the interview carried by CNN with the CBN(Christian Broadcast Network)right after last night's forum. He was very annoyed about it and went into detail about the bill they are talking about. He explained it fully and why the Illinois Medical Association had the same position he had on that specific bill -and pointed out there is already a law on the books in Illinois which mandates treatment for those babies.

Those who want Roe v Wade overturned will distort Obama's positions and votes to suit their own purposes. I won't belabor the issue by posting many of Obama's statements about the partial birth abortion vote or the Illinois vote because the info is easy to find on the net. Distort or lie about his positions...what else can we expect?

At least the CBN reporter is trying to get the truth out. He also carried it in his blog.

I give CBN credit for allowing Obama to set the record straight but too many people just listen to and accept as fact the lies and distortions that are "out there".

Is it like this in Canadian politics...distortions and lies during election season?

We also don't have the primary season. Members know when an election is going to be called and well in advance of that the various ridings ( precincts) elect their candidates at a meeting of card carrying party members in each riding. So that doesn't take up time during the election cycle. And there isn't the primary election scenario such as you have.

Sounds like Canada as alleviated about 80% of the issues people fight over in the US. This has been an incredible long, arduous, and not to mention the ridiculous amount of time and money spent on this campaign. I hope in the future they can shorten it up because attention span becomes an issue.

Is Obama "Pro-Infanticide"? Analyzing a Vote in the Illinois Senate
By SHERRY F. COLB

Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2008

Across the blogosphere, right-wing commentators have been accusing Barack Obama of defending infanticide. In support of this claim, they cite Obama’s opposition, as a state senator in Illinois, to a 2002 proposed law entitled the “Illinois Induced Birth Infant Liability Act” (“the Liability Act”). This proposed legislation would, among other things, have provided a damages action against doctors and hospitals who failed to take proper care of a baby born after a failed abortion. Obama voted against the bill.


Critics have compared the Illinois Liability Act to the federal “Born Alive Infants Protection Act,” (“the Born Alive Act”), which President Bush signed into law in 2002 after near-unanimous Congressional support and a statement by NARAL Pro-Choice America that it had no objection to the legislation. Critics have suggested that Obama is therefore such a radical on the issue of abortion that he outflanks even NARAL, an organization dedicated to the protection of a woman’s right to choose. Is there any truth to the accusations? In this column, I will consider that question.

The Born Alive Act: Federal Legislation for Which Obama Has Expressed Support

The federal Born Alive Act (on which Senator Obama did not have an opportunity to vote but for which he has expressed support) offers two sets of definitions. It first defines “person,” “human being,” “child,” and “individual” – when used in federal legislation – as including a “born-alive infant.” It then defines a “born-alive infant” as a member of the homo sapiens species that has been completely expelled or extracted from its mother and, after expulsion or extraction, either breathes, has a beating heart, has an umbilical cord pulsation, or has definite movement of voluntary muscles.

The statute adds that the definitions apply regardless of whether or not the umbilical cord has been cut, and regardless of whether the expulsion or extraction resulted from natural or induced labor, C-section, or induced abortion. The statute then states that it may not be read to expand or contract legal rights applicable to members of the human species prior to their being born alive.

Put simply, according to the statute, any person who is completely born has all of the same basic rights under law as any other person who is completely born, regardless of whether or not it was wanted. Even if the person’s mother was attempting to terminate the life of the fetus within her, once it is completely outside of her body and alive, its status changes and the law treats this person no differently from any other.

Defending the Born Alive Act

This law makes perfect sense. The reason that a woman has the right to terminate a pregnancy is that the law may not compel her to have an embryo or a fetus inside her body, invading her physical integrity (albeit innocently) against her will. The right to terminate a pregnancy is not based, in other words, on an interest in procuring the death of an unwanted fetus, even though prior to viability, it is impossible to separate termination from fetal death. The definition of “viability,” as articulated in Roe v. Wade, is the time at which the removal of a fetus from its mother’s womb is potentially consistent with its survival. And it is at viability, under Roe, that abortion loses its constitutional protection (other than to avert threats to the mother’s life or health).

If the right at issue for those who are pro-choice is the right to terminate a pregnancy rather than the right to terminate the life of a fetus, then, one might ask, why are methods other than pre-term induction of labor permissible? That is, most abortion methods actively kill an embryo or fetus prior to its expulsion from the woman’s body rather than simply delivering the fetus to die on its own. If there is no right to kill the fetus as such, then why aren’t these other methods prohibited?

There are two answers to this question. The first is that when abortion occurs prior to viability – when expulsion of the fetus necessarily results in fetal death – it seems arbitrary to distinguish between killing the fetus while it is still in the womb and then removing it, on the one hand, and removing it so that it can no longer live, on the other. As long as a fetus is not viable, the method of abortion (whether induction or drugs or surgery) makes no real difference to the longevity of the fetus.

The second answer has to do with the woman’s health. Given that she has a right not to endure the ongoing invasion of her bodily integrity that a pregnancy represents, she also has an interest in a safe termination method that is associated with few complications and side effects. Requiring that she terminate only by inducing labor would interfere substantially with that interest. As long as the fetus is not viable, moreover, the woman’s entitlement to choose a safe method of abortion would appear to be especially powerful, because the fetus will die no matter how the abortion is performed.

Let us suppose, however, that an abortion somehow fails to result in the death of the fetus and instead produces a live birth – a baby who has emerged completely from the womb and is still alive. In that instance, neither the woman nor her doctor has the right to deny that live baby the same access to care that any other live baby in the hospital would have.

NARAL was therefore correct to find a law recognizing the personhood of a separate baby to be both unobjectionable and entirely consistent with a woman’s prerogative to choose abortion. The right for which NARAL fights is the right to terminate a pregnancy, not the right to make sure that the baby dies. For the same reason, Senator Obama’s support for this law is sensible and consistent with his support for the right to choose abortion as well. The Born Alive Act is one piece of legislation on which pro-life and pro-choice advocates can agree.

The Liability Act: The Illinois Statute Obama Voted Against

Like the Born Alive Act, the Illinois Liability Act also concerns itself with the interests of those who are “born alive as the result of … abortion.” Unlike the Born Alive Act, however, the Illinois law does not define its terms. It therefore seems likely that Obama refused to support the Act because of its ambiguity.

The Illinois Liability Act does not tell us, for example, at what point during the process of birth the infant can be said to have been “born alive.” This is important, because so-called “Partial-Birth Abortion” laws regulate the process of terminating a pregnancy, not simply the rights of an infant who survives that process. The difference between regulating abortion and protecting surviving infants who are born alive turns on when in the process of birth the law says that an infant has already been “born.”

One could read the Illinois Liability Act as unclear on the question of whether it applies more broadly than the Born Alive Act – to include the fetus still inside its mother’s womb, with part of its body expelled, and regardless of how early in pregnancy the abortion occurs.

There is, in fact, good cause for concern about ambiguity in the Liability Act, given what it does say about the meaning of “born alive.” It explains that “[c]hildren who are born alive as the result of an induced labor abortion or any other abortion are in special need of protection due to the fact that the intent of their birth is to cause the death of the born child.” If one is speaking of all abortions, as the statute purports to do, this statement is not quite accurate. An abortion provider’s intent is generally not to cause the death of a born child.

The provider’s intent, on the contrary, is ordinarily to cause death prior to the emergence of a “born child,” assuming that “born child” refers to a live birth following complete expulsion or extraction from the mother’s body. We are thus left to guess at the meaning of “born child,” because the statute – unlike the Born Child Act – does not tell us that the definition entails complete expulsion or extraction and at least hints at the possibility that it does not.

Therefore, when Obama’s critics claim that he opposed a statute that is “similar” to the federal Born Alive Act, they are missing (or perhaps disregarding) a critical distinction between the two statutes and, accordingly, between infanticide (the act of killing of an infant who has completely exited the mother’s body) and abortion.

Another Difference Between the Born Alive Act and the Illinois Liability Act

In addition to its lack of clarity on the subject of its protection, the Illinois Liability Act is distinct from the federal Born Alive Act in another respect that ought to concern conservatives. The Born Alive Act requires that a child born after a failed abortion be treated like every other child under existing laws. The Liability Act, by contrast, would authorize a parent or guardian to bring a lawsuit against a doctor or hospital for failing to take care of the child that survived the failed abortion. Stated differently, the Liability Act would create a new cause of action for money damages.

It is not clear what such a threat of litigation is intended to accomplish, particularly if it only applies in the relatively rare case of a baby who is actually born alive after an attempted abortion. As Senator Obama pointed out in disputing the need for such a law, there is no evidence to support the proposition that doctors stand by and let viable infants die. One might guess, however, that the purpose of the proposed law is to chill the practice of abortion – to deter doctors and hospitals from terminating pregnancies at all – by creating yet another associated risk for providers to take into account.

That being the case, it is hardly surprising that a pro-choice Senator, even one who supports the Born Alive Act, as Senator Obama does, would take a principled stand against the Illinois Liability Act. Contrary to right-wing accusations, his position in no way reveals support, either express or tacit, for infanticide.

Correction 8/15/08:

It has been pointed out to me that at least some of the controversy surrounding Senator Obama's position as a state legislator stems from his opposition to an Illinois bill that much more closely resembled the federal Born Alive Infants Protection Act than did the bill that I discussed in my column (and which Obama also opposed and was also criticized for opposing, in similar terms). To the extent that one criticizes Obama for this opposition, as the National Right to Life Committee does here, my column does not directly address that critique. Rather than explore in detail what might have led Senator Obama to oppose this other bill, I refer readers to The Huffington Post discussion of this issue.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sherry F. Colb is a Professor of Law and Charles Evans Hughes Scholar at Cornell Law School. Her book, When Sex Counts: Making Babies and Making Law, is currently available on Amazon.

Well, I bet that folks will find out that there are a bunch of things where Obama will say one thing and do another. Matter a fact I heard a republican ad on the radio the other day which if this was all anyone knew about Obama they's never know where he stood on anything from all the flip flops. It was a pretty well put together ad too, a montage of Obama's own speeches. I'd guess Obama's position on an issue depends upon the audience.

What was Obama's response again?

I do remember McCain's response to being
asked when a child gains human rights...
"at the moment of conception".

What was Obama's response again?

I do remember McCain's response to being
asked when a child gains human rights...
"at the moment of conception".

And the Pope can't even vote in US elections.

What was Obama's response again?

I do remember McCain's response to being
asked when a child gains human rights...
"at the moment of conception".

Oh...OK. I guess that makes democrats elitist then; I had always wondered, thanks for the scoop Amy.

the MSM is not liberal.

CNN is as biased as FOX and all the others on the conservative/neo-con propaganda mata-hari type thingydingy

the MSM is not liberal.

CNN is as biased as FOX and all the others on the conservative/neo-con propaganda mata-hari type thingydingy

BTW, aren't all these mentions of the Pope a cheap shot? Is Rick Warren even a Catholic? But in line with the thread about the smear against Obama, and Muslims, in saying that he is a Catholic, aren't we seeing something similar here with the inevitable "the Church should not be running things" red herring whenver the abortion debate comes up?

And this "Pope is a Nazi" thing is total BS. Graham, would you disqualify every politician in Eastern Europe who ever was a member of a Communist youth group? Somehow I don't think so. But common sense should work with the Pope as well. Criticize him if you want, but you shouldn't have to distort the truth to make your point.

this pope was INDEED a NAZI YOUTH...
that doesn't make him Hitler but it makes him a NAZI YOUTH
separation of state and religion and all that jazzyjazz

Do you have any idea what a totalitarian state is?

And who else would you disqualify from public life because they were members of the "right" groups under the total sway of a dictatorial regime? You didn't answer my question about the Eastern European politicians.

us IS BASED on separation of state and church

let's worry about home before other places.

The Pope and his disciples have no place in our elections.