Posted on 03/08/2014 10:49:21 AM PST by SeekAndFind
This news hit yesterday, just before the start of CPAC 2014, but it seems to have attracted a little more attention today — perhaps in part because the CPAC conference has a controversy of its own over the pro-life issue. A new CNN poll shows a wide majority of Americans think abortion should be illegal in most or all circumstances, although it’s the circumstances that might be the issue:
About one in four Americans say that abortion should be legal in all circumstances, one in five say abortion should always be illegal, and slightly over half the public thinks abortion should be legal in some, but not all, circumstances, according to a national poll released Thursday.
A CNN/ORC International survey also indicates that a majority opposes taxpayer money being used to pay for abortions for women who can’t afford the procedure, with Americans split on whether women who receive government subsidies for health insurance should be able to get a plan that covers abortions. …
According to the poll, 27% say that abortion should be legal in all circumstances, 13% say it should be legal in most circumstances, 38% say that it should be legal in few circumstances, and 20% say abortion should always be illegal.
The intro gives the impression that pro-abortion forces are stronger, but the opposite is the case. What is telling here, though, isn’t so much the numbers in the majority but the composition of the minority. It’s easy to explain the absolutists on this side, who will offer bogus “clump of cells” science along with the “my [body] my choice” slogan with the ironically hypocritical attempt to silence the pro-life movement. However, those who want abortion as an option in most cases only number half as many as the absolutists, which means that the arguments about life beginning at conception may be having an impact.
On the other side, about three times as many people believe that abortion should be limited to “few circumstances.” The poll doesn’t specify, but these are presumably the usual exceptions: rape, incest, and a physical threat to the life of the mother. Since together rape and incest account for less than 1.5% of all abortions, and only 12% of those seeking abortions even refer to their own health as an issue as a non-exclusive reason (according to data at the abortion-friendly Guttmacher Institute), we’re talking about support for barring all but an an inordinately small percentage of the million-plus abortions a year in the US. An additional 20% would ban the rest.
That demonstrates powerful momentum for the pro-life movement. Ironically, though, this is the first CPAC in some time to not feature a panel on the pro-life movement:
Pro-lifers note there are important panels on the IRS scandal, immigration, Common Core, privacy, gun control, and criminal justice reform–issues in which pro-lifers would be keenly interested. Pro-lifers generally pride themselves on being “full spectrum conservatives”; that is, supporters of the three-legged stool: economics, national security, and moral issues. So they would not complain about panels covering these issues.
But they note other panels on career counseling, methods of making friends, pot smoking, making posts go Upworthy, and even one on Vaccines vs. Leeches, and wonder if there is no room for a panel or two on life issues–issues that motivate a tremendous number of grassroots activists who also vote conservative.
Yesterday I spoke with my friend Lila Rose of Live Action Films about the lack of focus on the pro-life movement at CPAC. We discuss the basis of liberty as the natural rights of human life, which should interest both conservatives and libertarians. Although we didn’t have the poll results in hand at the time, we talked about the momentum seen by the pro-life movement over the last ten years, both legally and politically:
Slowly, but surely....
I wonder if they counted the Todd-Aiken-bashers on FR. :-/
The Left continues to divide us over the exceptions, which represent under 4% of the abortions performed. My belief is that we can all agree to criminalize the 96% and then discuss the other 4%.
Of course none of those people are supposed to exist in New York.
That's the problem. Unless you are pro-choice, you aren't allowed to even talk about abortion because you hate women.
According to the poll, 27% say that abortion should be legal in all circumstances, 13% say it should be legal in most circumstances, 38% say that it should be legal in few circumstances, and 20% say abortion should always be illegal.So you would be able to get 58% support for making abortion less easy to get, but only 20% support for banning it entirely.
Meanwhile, later it has:
Most Americans have never favored using public funds for abortions for women who cannot afford them. According to the survey, 56% remain opposed, with only 39% favoring public funding for abortions.But that sentiment does not appear to extend to government subsidies for health insurance. The poll indicates the public is split right down the middle, with 49% saying that women who receive government subsidies for health insurance should be able to get a plan that covers abortion services and an identical 49% disagreeing.
The other 42% are murderers or murderer-sympathizers.
Abortion is murder and anyone performing, accepting, and supporting murder should be held accountable as well.
“few instances” usually includes life of the mother which is rarely an issue today but the murderers don’t let people know.
So we only have 20-30%? Why on earth is this a good thing??
If someone asks you a question about abortion, is that person more likely to be for or against abortion? Probably against it. The “for” people really don’t care about the statistics. So, many people will just give what they perceive to be the easy answer and say that they are against it. The voting results give you the answer about how people feel about abortion.
Aiken is a vain fool, Governor Palin and the tea party tried to get him to withdraw and not cost us a seat, but his vanity made him personally responsible for creating a democrat senator.
Palin was right.
Uh, hello Republican Party, Tea Party, Chris Christie et al!!!
Looks like a winning position with these numbers...
For goodness sake, take a stand and don’t run away!!!
We can almost leave this issue alone and trust the instincts and hearts of people seeing ultrasounds. If you fight to make it illegal, go ahead, but the more important war is the hearts and minds. And it is happening, year by year.
I do think more education is needed in the black community. A lot of people don’t know about Margaret Sanger. White people aren’t killing blacks in large numbers, blacks are killing their own unborn in large numbers, they need more info about the racism of planned parenthood.
Palin was right, and the results proved her out.
Conservatives didn’t betray you, so you don’t need to gratuitously attack them on threads, for an old election result which pro-life conservatives predicted.
If you remember, he was Michelle Bachmann and Huckabee’s choice, as the tea party and Palin chose others, and Bachmann totally went silent on the guy.
You go ahead and root for your pro-life(TM) candidates. For me, I’ll stick by those who are anti-abortion.
Yours might get elected, but they’ll do nothing while in office to stop the murder of babies. Mine might not get elected, but no one can call them liars, hypocrites, cowards, and abortion-enablers.
Wow, no wonder that egotist cost us a pro-life senate seat.
And, the results at the state level indicate a record number of pro-life laws being passed over the past two years, many of which are resulting in abortion clinics shutting down.
Indeed. And given the state of mind among many “conservatives”, it’s no wonder that, in spite of so many pro-life(TM) electoral victories, abortion is still outpacing all other forms of death.
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