Kansas overwhelmingly votes to protect Abortion access for women

Medical technology has certainly pushed that viability threshold ahead of where a fetus would “naturally” be viable outside the womb. I’m not sure that’s a great standard to use though to dictate a woman’s choices.

In the future, they’ll probably be able to bring a frozen embryo to term in an artificial womb. Does that mean even an embryo is precious life that 100% must be carried to term? Seems pretty ludicrous to me, but I know some already think that. But what will blow their minds is cloning. Medical technology ultimately shifts viability of a developing fetus all the way to null, any embryo can be cloned. Theoretically if a woman miscarried it could be reimplanted with a genetically identical embryo if that’s what was desired. That rather pokes a hole in the concept of the embryo itself being precious life. Which is why I always considered some degree of “consciousness” to be the more rational standard.

 

Jessica Valenti tracks some of the political fallout from the Kansas vote (embedded links)

The trend of Republicans playing down their enthusiasm for abortion bans continues, this time in South Carolina. When Roe was overturned, the GOP called for a special session in order to push a total abortion ban with just an exception for a woman’s life. But after Kansas—and watching the chaos among Republicans in Indiana—some South Carolina legislators aren’t so eager to enter the fray. Republican Rep. Tom Davis said, “It’s like you are playing with live ammunition right now,” and Rep. Bill Taylor sent an email out to constituents with the headline, “WHAT’S THE RUSH.” He says the state should wait a few years to see how their 6-week ban goes before enacting a total ban. Funny how quickly their tune has changed!

A refresher on a few other Republicans suddenly walking back their extremism (publicly, at least): South Dakota Republican Gov. Kristi Noem, who said on the day that Roe was overturned that she would call a special session on abortion, now claims it isn’t necessary because South Dakota is already “the most pro-life state in the nation.” (Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson said the same thing about the decision to not debate abortion in their special session.)

In North Carolina, four different Republicans seeking congressional seats who have been vocal about banning abortion have left abortion off their websites entirely—one candidate even scrubbed his page of his previous anti-abortion statement.

Wait, there’s more: After previously only supporting abortion to save a person’s life, Minnesota’s Republican candidate for governor, Scott Jensen, now says he’d be okay with rape and incest exceptions. Kari Lake, the Republican nominee for governor in Arizona, is running away from questions about the state’s ban with no exceptions for rape or incest; and Pennsylvania State Sen. Doug Mastriano, also running for governor, went from calling banning abortion his “number one issue” to insisting governors don’t dictate abortion policy.



Abortion, Every Day (8.9.22)

 

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