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Catholic group uses Obama for a pro-life ad
Fearful that Barack Obama might bring this country out of the Stone Age yet, CatholicVote.org has put together this pro-life ad, which asserts that, had Obama been aborted, he wouldn't be president today. Bravo, fellas. According to the Catholic group's executive director, "The purpose of our new ad is to spread a message of hope about the potential of every human life"—even if the prospects look grim at the beginning, as Obama's did. I'm not quite in agreement with the reader of this story who summed up the ad as "argu[ing] in favor of buying lottery tickets because at least a few of them will be winners," though I did think that was a pretty good line. But the criticism from the article's writer, David Waters, that the ad is "disingenuous" and "exploitative," sounds about right. |
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January 23, 2009 in Abortion, Barack Obama, Kiefaber | Permalink |
Comments
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I'm fine with this ad. What's the difference between this and the Humanists Atheism campaign? Except the fact that this one actually does a good job of creating a compelling argument while the Humanists campaign is all about tweaking the nose of religions.
Obviously, I'm pro-life. But I'm also a rationalist, if we did a better job in this country of raising our children, showing them love, educating them about safe-sex, from contraceptives to abstinence, then we wouldn't have to spend so much time worrying about Roe-v-Wade. My father's a preacher and he always said, you can't preach (or legislate) morality, you can only teach it.
Maybe this money would have been better spent teaching.
Posted by: PJL | Jan 23, 2009 10:28:31 AM
It's a fine ad if you believe the reason people have abortions is an assumption that the fetus will never amount to anything. Otherwise it's entirely beside the point. It doesn't offend me; it just wildly misunderstands the entire reason women occasionally rely on access to safe abortion.
Posted by: RVW | Jan 23, 2009 10:43:02 AM
PJL, I'm a staunch pro-choice advocate, but in issues as polarizing and emotional as these, I believe both sides are doing the world a disservice by fighting relentlessly. While I don't think abortion should be banned, it is no substitute for making good choices.
I wish more people (on both sides) shared your point of view.
Posted by: Nobody of Consequence | Jan 23, 2009 10:57:48 AM
RVW -- "safe abortion?" Safe for who? Oh, right, the mother and her conscience after she is sold the lie that she is merely extricating a blob of tissue. Not so safe for the baby being murdered. I'm glad Obama's mom didn't think of him as an inconvenience, a mistake, or a blob of tissue, aren't you?
Posted by: MMB | Jan 23, 2009 12:38:39 PM
I think it is a smart ad if you are on the anti-abortion side of the fence. And ads like this will have an affect without overturning row vs. wade. Abortions are down to the point where only .2% of American women have one. I personally feel like it is difficult legal question, but you can definitely give someone more to think about when they have to make that decision.
Posted by: thatguy | Jan 23, 2009 2:25:43 PM
All of these kids staying abstinent until marriage/college are stealing our opportunities for great leaders of the future! It's just not fair!
Posted by: Sara Anderson | Jan 23, 2009 2:30:40 PM
Is it me, or does it seem like the ad is implying that Obama SHOULD have been aborted?
Posted by: disputedCapitalist | Jan 23, 2009 2:42:20 PM
Um, "thatguy," your guesstimate of ".2%" is WAY off. In fact over 1/3 of American women have an abortion at some point in their reproductive lives. Look it up. Almost all of these women also have children. Many "pro-life" Republican women have abortions. (Seriously, look it up. The best data is from the Guttmacher Institute.)
The rate of abortion is pretty constant. It will only really go down when the rate of unintended pregnancy goes down, as in some European countries with low rates of both. Restricting access and making abortion expensive tends to push abortions later into pregnancy, but it doesn't reduce the total number much. Improved contraception use, on the other hand, definitely reduces the abortion rate.
That's part of why this ad is so wildly off the mark. People aren't having abortions because they are afraid their child won't be President, won't amount to much, etc. People have abortions because their life circumstances do not permit them to have a child, yet they have become pregnant anyway. If this Catholic group really cared about reducing the total number of abortions, they would obviously have a radical change of heart on contraception, and start promoting it instead of trying to ban it.
Posted by: Yikes | Jan 23, 2009 3:40:08 PM
Would this ad have been made if Obama were white?
Just asking. It seems unsurprising that this ad would show up right when we get our first black President, given the American obsession with blacks and abortion.
Posted by: Hmmm.... | Jan 23, 2009 3:41:44 PM
One day You Tube does a deal with ould red socks, the next they let this stay online...
Posted by: Albert Ross | Jan 24, 2009 3:24:42 AM
I swear this is exactly what the Nazis said about Hitler!
Seriously, so his mother chose to keep him. That's great. That's what being "pro-choice" is all about.
Pro-life is really the anti-choice.
Posted by: AJB | Jan 25, 2009 4:35:25 PM
I don't need to be pro-life or pro-choice to be pro-don't-let-the-government-legislate-moral-issues.
Posted by: john | Jan 26, 2009 10:52:09 PM
Quote: "If Obama had been aborted, he wouldn't be President."
Well if Hitler had been aborted, we might have avoided WWII.
It's based on the same logic. ^_^
Posted by: Josh | Jan 27, 2009 8:46:59 PM
I guess you have a point about evil people being born, but we should be able to deal with evil people when they arise. Remember, people knew Hitler was evil. Unfortunately, it took way too long for someone to intervene.
Posted by: Dan | Jan 29, 2009 6:56:04 AM
And if we were all aborted global warming wouldn't be an issue. It's such a retarded argument.
As is calling Pro-lifers anti-choice. Because with abortion you eliminate the choice of the child on what they might grow up to be.
It's all rhetoric and its all spin. It's just fucking name calling.
Why don't we all get off our bandwagons and focus more on educating the young (and old) women of the world who see abortion as a viable choice for birth control on measures that prevent unwanted pregnancies to begin with.
No logical person sees abortion as a long term solution. It's a stop gap measure. Again, I'm pro-life and would love to see abortion outlawed, but I'd rather see a day when people didn't need it.
Posted by: PJL | Jan 30, 2009 2:24:07 PM
"disputedCapitalist" and others who believe that "People have abortions because their life circumstances do not permit them to have a child, yet they have become pregnant anyway." WOW!! You should be ashamed to have such thoughts. This has absolutely nothing to do with someone aborting a child because they are afraid their child wont amount to anything. The point is that although the situation for Obama and his mother was not optimal (limiting circumstances) his mother chose to keep her baby! And despite the odds against them, he was able to flourish.
Posted by: BCHK | Feb 1, 2009 7:41:57 PM
God cannot be happy with what we are doing to his creation. I have two beautiful sons through the wonderful process of adoption. I don't know if they were conceived out of rape or what the cicumstances were but I do know that two women made the ultimate unselfish decision. They endured nine months of what was probably an unwanted pregnancy and then chose to give my boys a chance with no self reward. All the elements of a human being are present from the moment of conception. The exact blueprint of what we are for the rest of our existance. Would God ever condone destroying this? I think if we truly believe in God we can never end this life of his most vulnerable being. Unfortuneately we get involved in circumstances that are not according to our life plan but we have to face the consequences. We have a choice to have sex or not have sex. We have a choice to rob a bank or not rob a bank. Whatever we choose we know there is always consequences. We have become so self centered and selfish. I lucked out because I have an engineer and a microsoft specialist and basked in all the joys of motherhood because of someone else's unselfish heart. I am now fighting cancer but I have all I need to fight it.
Posted by: Autofill | Feb 5, 2009 9:31:27 PM
I have a granddaughter who was prematurely born at five-and-a-half months old - much more premature than Illinois Doctor Tiller "The Baby Killer" and Protege of former Kansas Governor Kathleen Sibelius now Obama's Health and Human Services Secretary in charge of the methodical extermination of foetuses!
Because she is loved and was wanted, and thanks to the miracles of modern medicine, she is a normal, healthy baby - though a bit overweight - who will celebrate her first Birthday in June. Obama, Sibelius, Dr. Tiller and their satanic minions are murdering, daily, babies far more viable than my granddaughter ever was. Imagine that!
If only Obama's slut of a mother would have had abortions as readily available as today's sex-crazed, irresponsible, "my-vagina-is-a sewer", young women do, perhaps we could have saved our Nation from Obama - one of its most "darkest" chapters in History...no pun intended!
Althor
Posted by: Althor | May 19, 2009 8:50:21 AM
There is an old line:
"Everybody was pro-life once."
Posted by: bartlett | Jul 21, 2009 9:38:10 PM
