Return of the welfare queens

ANONYMOUS SAID:

So you think that showing that poor women are more likely to have abortions proves that programs aimed at reducing poverty would not decrease abortions? For the record, I never said that welfare states reduce the abortion rate. I said that a broad social safety net, access to contraception, and universal health care that covers the staggering costs of pre and post natal care reduce abortions.

Of course women on welfare in this country will be more likely to abort their children! They're the people who suffer most from poverty, and can least afford more children! No welfare recipient in this country is getting the kind of support that would reduce abortions. In fact, I'd argue that our welfare system encourages abortion since in nearly every state the amount of cash benefits per child decreases with every additional child.

When there's not access to contraception, there's little to no safety net, and poor people don't have access to absurdly expensive pre-natal and post-natal care, more women facing unexpected pregnancies will choose abortion.

Because it's not just prenatal and postnatal costs that contribute to the decision to have an abortion. It's the overall cost of raising a child. That price is offset by programs that insure an income, housing, childcare, health care, etc.

She'll have free access to health care, free access to child care, and if she's working, a year of fully paid maternity leave.

i) So Anonymous doesn’t believe in welfare. He just believes in free contraception, free prenatal care, free postnatal care, free health care, free housing, free maternity leave, and free income for poor woman.

ii) Organizations like NOW, NARAL, and Planned Parenthood don’t agree with him that poverty contributes to higher abortion rates. To the contrary, they complain that poverty reduces abortion rates by reducing access to affordable abortion “services.”

iii) Apropos (ii), if the liberals come to power, universal healthcare will subsidize abortion on demand. Hence, that will raise rather than lower the abortion rate.

iv) I also reject his moral extortion, according to which we must subsidize promiscuity lest promiscuous men and women murder their kids. Should we decriminalize murder and bribe potential killers not to commit murder if we give them enough goodies in return? That’s not the proper way to deter homicide.

v) Finally, do you notice anyone missing from his description? He speaks of poor single mothers. Hmm. Where are the fathers?

Indeed, it’s a well-known fact that welfare renders the father financially expendable. So the “solution” which he proposes would perpetuate the cycle of poverty.

My position is not that the Supreme Court strategy only saves a few, while the social net strategy saves many. My position is that the Supreme Court strategy doesn't save ANY, while the social net strategy would save many.

That’s a lie! This is what you initially said:

However, I agree with Reppert that simply mindlessly trying to end abortion by overturning Rowe vs Wade is a spectacularly stupid and utterly failed strategy. It would only turn matters over to the states, and most states outside of the South would keep the practice legal.

So you originally admitted that overturning Roe v. Wade would save lives. You simply limited its effect to Southern states.

Can you name a single abortion that has been prevented by electing Republican presidents in the hopes that, some time during their term, they'll be able to appoint a conservative judge?

Organizations like NOW, NARAL, and Planned Parenthood blame Bush for preventing many abortions by reinstating the “gag” order and cutting off Federal funds for abortion overseas.

I believe that a social safety net can start saving lives NOW. I believe that universal health care can start saving lives NOW. I believe Barack Obama's health care plan will save more unborn children in his first year of office than McCain's supreme court strategy would save if he was president for 8 years.

i) You need to show that Obama’s health care plan is financially sustainable. I don’t share your gullible optimism. And I’m not alone:

http://healthpolicyandmarket.blogspot.com/2008/05/first-year-results-in-massachusetts.html

ii) Even if it were, it would include funding for abortion, which would raise the rate of abortion.

iii) Your position boils down to this: Obama’s health care plan would have to offset all of the additional abortions which result for his aggressive abortion policy.

Some of the highest abortion rates in the world are in South America, where abortion is illegal, but poverty is rampant. And some of the lowest abortion rates in the world are in Western Europe, where abortion is legal, but poverty is rare. I leave it up to you whether you'll draw the obvious conclusion.

Of course this disregards the fact that in Catholic countries frown on contraception as well as abortion.

I'm not for teaching Christian ethics in schools, at least not as a required course, but I think our schools can and should teach sexual ethics that people of all faiths and no faiths would generally agree on.

Yes, let’s have public sex ed courses with a curriculum which the Goth, the atheist, the feminist, the Wahhabist, the skinhead, the sodomite, the skirt chaser, the transgender, the pious Catholic, and the Hassidic Jew can all agree on.