Amendment blocks federal funding for abortions

Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur says the amendment does not expand the Hyde amendment, but others say it does. We need to find out which is the case. Then the amendment language needs to be modified so it does not ban use of private money to buy insurance that covers the cost of an abortion. Even the Hyde amendment apparently has provisions exempting cases of rape, incest, and the life of the mother being at risk. I do not have a problem with a ban on government funds going to pay for an abortion in other cases, except in cases where two doctors certify that the health of the mother would be threatened, or that the child's life would be one of terrible suffering, because of some major, uncurable problem. Even though I am mostly pro-choice rather than anti-abortion, I am also pro-life in the larger sense. I do not think that choice should be taken away from women, but I do think that other means of discouraging abortion should be found - including better sex education, availability of safe and effective birth control, private attempts to find funds to support babies born with disabilities or to families too poor to afford them, sensible adoption and monitoring laws, and protections for women against rape and incest. I am also pro-life in opposing unjustified wars, and I don't notice very many anti-abortion militants caring about that. I also suggest that folks read Barry Scheck's book, Actual Innocence, about the number of innocent people sent to prison, some even with death sentences - it is an argument, with factual evidence, against the death penalty. So is the increasing evidence that so-called eye-witnesses are often mistaken and make false identifications, and that some prosecutors and cops are often amoral in their tactics, trying to frame the person they think is guilty, rather than prove it. n his book, Scheck cited the number of cases in which the strong suspect, the one the cops were after, turned out to be not the guilty one - about 40% of the time, I think, before completely accurate DNA testing helped exonerate the initial or prime suspect. That would be too big a risk. and there are still many cases where DNA testing is not possible - and still many inadequate labs, and procedural handling of evidence problems, where even DNA evidence is suspect - as in the unfortunate case regarding OJ. here have been many subsequent criticisms of both the labs and police tactics there, so scheck was correct in attacking them for their mistakes - if the so-called proof was tainted, and not proof. I think it is possible to frame a guilty man, in that case.

It is unfortunate that the so-called pro-life folks who are really only focused on opposing abortion, do not care about respecting other lives, and work against amoral prosecutions, and amoral and unjustified wars. It is also too bad that the most militant pro-choice feminists do not put more emphasis on prevention of unwanted pregnancies. Both groups should be working for a reduction in unwanted pregnancy. There is no excuse for opposing birth control - including condoms, and abstinence if possible - and also opposing abortion. I can think of only two reasons why folks have that double opposition - they want to perpetuate more cannon fodder for their kind of folks, or populate their kind of earth or heaven with their kind of folks. Both this aims seem vastly evil to me.