The XX Factor: What women really think.

Having Your Cake ...

To expand on your point further, E.J., that outlawing abortion is also coercive, I've got a question for the GOP party faithful that I've been chewing over since I saw a Minnesota politician (I don't remember her name, but she was wearing a lovely light-yellow sleeveless dress) at the GOP Convention extolling the virtues of keeping government out of our lives. How is being pro-life and anti-government interference not wanting to have your cake and eat every crumb? It's a combo that's always seemed wildly inconsistent to me, and I was reminded of it every time this pol mentioned that "the government has no place in our private decision-making" (I paraphrase), receiving thunderous applause each time. I kept thinking of the pro-life part of the GOP platform, which to me is very much in my life and private decision-making since, in E.J.'s words, "it forces a woman to carry to term, whether she wants to or not."

I think that each side of the pro-life/pro-choice debate needs to concede that its preferred plan has limitations, and I'm sure that the Democrats have similar contradictions in their platform (which I'm also sure will be brought promptly to my attention). But wanting the government out of every facet of our lives, yet also wanting to mandate legally (by repealing Roe v. Wade) that no woman can ever get an abortion? You can't have it both ways.