{"id":1136,"date":"2005-01-27T18:27:42","date_gmt":"2005-01-27T22:27:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/nateptest\/2005\/01\/27\/were-all-a-bit-suprised-andrew\/"},"modified":"2005-01-27T18:27:42","modified_gmt":"2005-01-27T22:27:42","slug":"were-all-a-bit-suprised-andrew","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/2005\/01\/27\/were-all-a-bit-suprised-andrew\/","title":{"rendered":"We’re all a bit suprised, Andrew"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

From the mouth of Andrew Sullivan, over at TNR.com<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Hillary Rodham Clinton is
\nabsolutely right. I’ve waited many years to write that sentence, but,
\nhey, if you live long enough. … I’m referring to her superb speech
\nearlier this week on the politics and morality of abortion. There were
\ntwo very simple premises to Clinton’s argument: a) the right to legal
\nabortion should remain, and b) abortion is always and everywhere a
\nmoral tragedy. It seems to me that if we are to reduce abortions to an
\nabsolute minimum (and who, exactly, opposes that objective?), then
\nClinton’s formula is the most practical. Her key sentences: “We can all
\nrecognize that abortion in many ways represents a sad, even tragic
\nchoice to many, many women. … The fact is that the best way to reduce
\nthe number of abortions is to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies
\nin the first place.”\n<\/p>\n

Echoing her husband’s inspired notion that abortion should be “safe,
\nlegal, and rare,” the senator from New York seemed to give new emphasis
\nto that last word: “rare.” Hers is, in that respect, a broadly pro-life
\nposition. Not in an absolutist, logically impeccable fashion–which
\nwould require abolishing all forms of legal abortion immediately–but
\nin a pragmatic, moral sense. In a free society, the ability of a woman
\nto control what happens to her own body will always and should always
\nbe weighed in the balance against the right of an unborn child to life
\nitself. And, if she and the Democrats can move the debate away from the
\nquestion of abortion’s legality toward abortion’s immorality, then they
\nstand a chance of winning that debate in the coming years….\n <\/p>\n


\nIn some ways, this does not mean a change of principle. Democrats can
\nstill be, and almost certainly should be, for the right to legal
\nabortion. But, instead of beginning their conversation with that right,
\nthey should start by acknowledging a wrong. Abortion is always wrong.
\nHow can we keep it legal while doing all we can to reduce its damage?
\nCall it a pro-life pro-choice position. And argue for it with moral
\npassion. If you want to win a “values” debate, it helps to advance what
\nDemocrats value. And one of those obvious values is the fewer abortions
\nthe better. Beyond the polarizing rhetoric, a simple message: saving
\none precious life at a time.<\/span>\n <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The moral positions on abortion hardly seem restricted to “pro-life” and “pro-choice.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From the mouth of Andrew Sullivan, over at TNR.com: Hillary Rodham Clinton is absolutely right. I’ve waited many years to write that sentence, but, hey, if you live long enough. … I’m referring to her superb speech earlier this week on the politics and morality of abortion. There were two very simple premises to Clinton’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":709,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"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":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ontheweb"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5G3PH-ik","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/709"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1136\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/natep\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}