I can’t remember the last time I agreed with Tom Friedman:
In my world, you don’t get to call yourself “pro-life” and be against common-sense gun control — like banning public access to the kind of semiautomatic assault rifle, designed for warfare, that was used recently in a Colorado theater. You don’t get to call yourself “pro-life” and want to shut down the Environmental Protection Agency, which ensures clean air and clean water, prevents childhood asthma, preserves biodiversity and combats climate change that could disrupt every life on the planet. You don’t get to call yourself “pro-life” and oppose programs like Head Start that provide basic education, health and nutrition for the most disadvantaged children. You can call yourself a “pro-conception-to-birth, indifferent-to-life conservative.” I will never refer to someone who pickets Planned Parenthood but lobbies against common-sense gun laws as “pro-life.”
“Pro-life” can mean only one thing: “respect for the sanctity of life.” And there is no way that respect for the sanctity life can mean we are obligated to protect every fertilized egg in a woman’s ovary, no matter how that egg got fertilized, but we are not obligated to protect every living person from being shot with a concealed automatic weapon. I have no respect for someone who relies on voodoo science to declare that a woman’s body can distinguish a “legitimate” rape, but then declares — when 99 percent of all climate scientists conclude that climate change poses a danger to the sanctity of all life on the planet — that global warming is just a hoax.
The term “pro-life” should be a shorthand for respect for the sanctity of life. But I will not let that label apply to people for whom sanctity for life begins at conception and ends at birth. What about the rest of life? Respect for the sanctity of life, if you believe that it begins at conception, cannot end at birth. That radical narrowing of our concern for the sanctity of life is leading to terrible distortions in our society.
Respect for life has to include respect for how that life is lived, enhanced and protected — not only at the moment of conception but afterward, in the course of that life. That’s why, for me, the most “pro-life” politician in America is New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. While he supports a woman’s right to choose, he has also used his position to promote a whole set of policies that enhance everyone’s quality of life — from his ban on smoking in bars and city parks to reduce cancer, to his ban on the sale in New York City of giant sugary drinks to combat obesity and diabetes, to his requirement for posting calorie counts on menus in chain restaurants, to his push to reinstate the expired federal ban on assault weapons and other forms of common-sense gun control, to his support for early childhood education, to his support for mitigating disruptive climate change.
Now that is what I call “pro-life.”
The Republicans have always focused on meaningless slogans rather than on useful substance.
Lordy lordy lordy. Just when I thought Spouting Thomas was making sense, he lost me when he anointed Police state Bloomy. Bloomy is very typical of the so-called “Limousine Liberal” who throws a liberal shiny object and when we are distracted, proceeds to loot even more. Bloomy is the supporter of the real terrorists – Wall Street which has caused mass destruction with their financial weapons.
You didn’t think he’d get through an entire column without saying something stupid, did you?
If a majority of women vote for Romney and the Republicans in this election it will become clear that women as a group couldn’t care less about “women’s issues.” If women don’t care about women’s issue then why should anyone else? Why should anyone care about women’s health care rights? Women don’t. Why should anyone care about equal pay for equal work for women? Women don’t. Why should any care about abortion or women’s reproductive rights? Women don’t. If women vote in favor of Romney over Obama then they should sit down, shut up, and allow the superior gender to control their lives. Surely Romney’s Supreme Court nominee will protect women’s rights?