So, what next for Americans

[ICantSpellDawg]

Don, may I ask what I hope is a constructive question? - in no way do I mean to belittle anyone's beliefs here.

It strikes me that the biggest impediment to putting a decent and humane bill on abortion is the polarisation of the issue in the States. The left defends Roe versus Wade (a truly awful ruling, it seems to me) because the opposition will brook nothing less than the complete outlawing of abortion (understandable if one accepts their premise that abortion is murder).

Do you think it is possible that a Democratic president with a very strong mandate plus a compliant Congress might be able to address this issue thoughtfully? Perhaps to propose a bill (maybe even a Constitutional Amendment) that would set a limit of (ideally) 12 weeks for abortion (with slightly longer limits for serious medical issues) or even the European standard of 20 weeks? Would there be a possibility of bi-partisan support for this (since really important bills usually need this)? Or would opening the can of worms result in ignominious defeat?

Perhaps the Democratic party is too far gone on the pro-choice defensive, but I seem to recall President Clinton putting it very well: "Abortion should be legal, but very, very rare."

Am I too optimistic?

It all sounds very good. "Legal, Safe and Rare" is what allowed people who were pro-life to hold their noses and vote for Clinton. Obama voted against the born alive act and against the partial birth abortion ban. He is of the opinion that the unborn are not human beings and have no rights if they are nto wanted by their mother. He has no desire to limit in any way the method or frequency of abortions because he believes that it is the same thing as having a tumor removed - does anyone have a moral problem with how many growths you decide to remove?

He ran on a platform of wishing to end the old cultural wars that have plagued us for so many years - people interpreted that in their own way - what he meant was that he was tired of not winning outright and his resolution of those old conflicts would be the total allowance of abortion without any compromise. Under his plan - even in comparison with other pro-abortion politicians - the life issue is further muddied until even after the birth of an unwanted child it doesn't receive human rights based on the mothers feelings.

The legislature was always capable of dealing with this issue until it was polarized and hijacked. I hope some moderates learned their lessons well from the Roe debacle.

"I don't want my daughters punished with a baby" would be his response to "legal safe and rare"