Eye Recommend --- Abortion Like Right to Bear Arms

ABORTION LIKE RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS, by Eliott C. McLaughlin --
http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/05/justice/alabama-abortion-federal-court-ruling/index.html

An excellent argument with an outside-the-box perspective.

"What if Alabama passed a law that shut down all but two of the state's guns-and-ammo stores?

'The defenders of this law would be called upon to do a heck of a lot of explaining--and rightly so in the face of an effect so severe,' U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson wrote this week in a 172-page marjoity opinion striking down a provision of state law restricting abortions."

In 2013, Alabama Governor Robert Bentley (R) signed new abortion restrictions into law. One of the new requirements was that all doctors performing abortions in Alabama have admitting privileges at local hospitals.  This requirement would have closed all but two abortion clinics in the state.

In July of that year, Judge Thompson temporarily barred the state from enforcing that provision, considered a linchpin of the law, after pro-abortion activists filed a suit saying the provision was medically unnecessary.  

"Revisiting the issue in the court's Monday ruling, Thompson said, 'The court was struck by a parallel in some respects between the right of women to decide to terminate a pregnancy and the right of the individual to keep and bear firearms, including handguns, in her home for the purposes of self-defense.'...

...The right to bear arms means little if there is no one from whom to procure guns and ammunition, Thompson wrote.  Likewise, the right to abortions is meaningless if there are no medical professionals to perform them.

'With this parallelism in mind, the court poses the hypothetical that suppose, for the public weal, the federal or state government were to implement a new restriction on the procedure they must employ in selling such goods and that, further, only two vendors in the State of Alabama were capable of complying with the restriction: one in Huntsville and one in Tuscaloosa,' Thompson proposed.

'The public and courts would demand that backers of the law explain themselves,' the judge wrote.

'So long as the Supreme Court continues to recognize a constitutional right to choose to terminate a pregnancy, any regulation that would, in effect, restrict the exercise of that right to only Huntsville and Tuscaloosa should be subject to the same skepticism,' he said...

...Gov. Robert Bentley issued a statement Monday saying the federal ruling will make abortions less safe.

'As a doctor, I firmly believe that medical procedures, including abortions, performed in Alabama should be done in the safest manner possible.  This law ensures that if a complication arises there is continuity of treatment between doctor and patient.  This ruling significantly diminishes those important protections.'"

Well, "as a doctor," Mr. Bentley should also be aware that, should a rare emergency situation arise, the local hospital will admit and care for the patient whether the doctor has admitting privileges or not; but that fact doesn't mesh well with his true prejudice toward a woman's right to choose:

"(Mr. Bentley continued) 'We are extremely disappointed by today's ruling.  Abortion is a fundamental assault on the sanctity of innocent human life, and I believe that it should only be done as a last possible effort to save the life of the mother...I will always fight for the rights of the unborn, and support an appeal of today's decision." 

Anyone has the right to oppose abortion; but it would be a lot easier to respect their opposition if they would stop lying and throwing around claims that they are only trying to protect the safety of women's health. 

If you oppose abortion for religious reasons, be honest enough to say so.  Stop hiding behind phony medical safety issues.  If you want the freedom to worship as you choose, then allow me the freedom to do the same, even if we see Christ's role in my family planning choices differently. 

Keep YOUR religion out of MY choice; and I'll respect your choice to make a quasi-religion out of gun ownership.