American Taliban

One more reason to never go to South Dakota.

I'm grown. I don't need the government to be my Nanny State. I have an IQ in the triple digits and I am capable of making decisions for myself.

Pregnancy is one of the most personal and private experiences a woman has. The last thing any woman needs is the weight of the government and its bureaucracy wading in and micro-managing her life.

So unless you have the will to strap 33% of the female population of this country to gurneys at gunpoint for nine months to insure full gestation you need to respect a woman's privacy and intelligence.

National Background and Context

Abortion is a common experience: At current rates, about one in three American women will have had an abortion by the time she reaches age 45. Moreover, a broad cross section of U.S. women have abortions. 56% of women having abortions are in their 20s; 61% have one or more children; 67% have never married; 57% are economically disadvantaged; 88% live in a metropolitan area; and 78% report a religious affiliation. No racial or ethnic group makes up a majority: 41% of women obtaining abortions are white non-Hispanic, 32% are black non-Hispanic, 20% are Hispanic and 7% are of other racial backgrounds.

Contraceptive use is a key predictor of women's recourse to abortion. The very small group of American women who are at risk of experiencing an unintended pregnancy but are not using contraceptives account for almost half of all abortions—46% in 2000. Many of these women did not think they would get pregnant or had concerns about contraceptive methods. The remainder of abortions occur among the much larger group of women who were using contraceptives in the month they became pregnant. Many of these women report difficulty using contraceptives consistently.

Abortion is one of the safest surgical procedures for women in the United States. Fewer than 0.5% of women obtaining abortions experience a complication, and the risk of death associated with abortion is about one-tenth that associated with childbirth.

In the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a woman, in consultation with her physician, has a constitutionally protected right to choose abortion in the early stages of pregnancy—that is, before viability. In 1992, the Court upheld the basic right to abortion in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. However, it also expanded the ability of the states to enact all but the most extreme restrictions on women's access to abortion. The most common restrictions in effect are parental notification or consent requirements for minors, state-sponsored counseling and waiting periods, and limitations on public funding.