As you might have read in my Wednesday post, Ann Coulter declared on Twitter that when the Texas Supreme Court reversed a lower court decision and refused to allow Kate Cox to have an abortion-- was cruel. Some have suggested that Coulter had no business commenting on the matter, because she has never been pregnant. I will add that if pregnancy is a qualification for commenting on an abortion decision, I too am unqualified. I know precious little about the conquences of being pregnant with a fetus that suffers from the genetic condition called Trisomy 18. Heck, I am not even an obstetrician.
Although I am also not a physician, I can use google as well as the next person and suspect you are equally qualified, so I am disappointed that you would rely on so biased a source as the Post and the political polemics from Ms. Coulter for your information on this case, or trisomy 18 in general. I am, however, an attorney (retired) by trade and have a somewhat larger than average acquaintance with interpretation of court cases. So, I shall submit the following for reveiw. First, although it is true that trisomy 18 is generally fatal to the baby pre-partum or shortly after birth it is not universally so. You might wish to further acquaint yourself with the Trisomy 18 Foundation, whose website is helpful. It clearly establishes that such babies can and do survive, sometimes for extended periods. "Just as children with Down syndrome can range from mildly to severely affected, the same is true for children with Trisomy 18. This means that there is no hard and fast rule about what Trisomy 18 will mean for a specific child. Each child has their own unique profile of how Trisomy 18 is affecting their developing body and organs." Rick Santorum had a trisomy 18 daughter who survived and in fact, is still alive at age 15. Furthermore, other than the usual complications of pregnancy, there is no substantially greater risk to the life of the mother of a trisomy 18 baby than any other baby. This is, in fact, what was the salient feature in the Texas Supreme Court's decision; viz., that there had been NO evidence presented to the trial court in favor of allowing an abortion under its current law. As the Decision set forth, the law allows an abortion when:
"in the exercise of reasonable medical judgment, the pregnant female . . . has a life-threatening physical condition aggravated by, caused by, or arising from a pregnancy that places the female at risk of death or poses a serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function unless the abortion is performed or induced."
The doctor to whom the plaintiff had been referred in seeking to have an abortion under the law was Dr. Damla Karsan, an unabashed abortion proponent and activist, yet, the Court found that "Dr. Karsan asked a court to pre-authorize the abortion yet she could not, or at least did not, attest to the court that Ms. Cox’s condition poses the risks the exception requires."
The Court therefore concluded that insufficient evidence had been presented in the court of original jurisdiction, but did not permanently foreclose the possibility of an abortion, if the appicable standards were met, stating, "A pregnant woman does not need a court order to have a lifesaving abortion in Texas. Our ruling today does not block a life-saving abortion in this very case if a physician determines that one is needed under the appropriate legal standard, using reasonable medical judgment. If Ms. Cox’s circumstances are, or have become, those that satisfy the statutory exception, no court order is needed. Nothing in this opinion prevents a physician from acting if, in that physician’s reasonable medical judgment, she determines that Ms. Cox has a “life threatening physical condition” that places her “at risk of death” or “poses a serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function unless the abortion is performed or induced.”
Although you are usually punctilious in your examination of the evidence supporting or opposing a proposition in contention, you woefully failed to meet that standard in this matter. Your unquestioning acceptance of media-produced propaganda without any hesitation is disappointing and has undermined my confidence in your facilities of analysis, something I shall, sadly, need to keep in mind in the future. Or as all the cool kids say today, "Do better."
Thank you for speaking about this shameful episode in Texas. Here in Kansas the voters were not fooled when the "pro life" constitutional amendment was defeated in a landslide. The GOP left matters ambiguous as to what they would do if the amendment passed. Voters guessed right they would ban it completely like Texas. This case you wrote about has scandalized me to identify as a pro choice proponent. My ex wife had an abortion after a rape. Democrats really do have a blunt instrument of an issue.
Although I am also not a physician, I can use google as well as the next person and suspect you are equally qualified, so I am disappointed that you would rely on so biased a source as the Post and the political polemics from Ms. Coulter for your information on this case, or trisomy 18 in general. I am, however, an attorney (retired) by trade and have a somewhat larger than average acquaintance with interpretation of court cases. So, I shall submit the following for reveiw. First, although it is true that trisomy 18 is generally fatal to the baby pre-partum or shortly after birth it is not universally so. You might wish to further acquaint yourself with the Trisomy 18 Foundation, whose website is helpful. It clearly establishes that such babies can and do survive, sometimes for extended periods. "Just as children with Down syndrome can range from mildly to severely affected, the same is true for children with Trisomy 18. This means that there is no hard and fast rule about what Trisomy 18 will mean for a specific child. Each child has their own unique profile of how Trisomy 18 is affecting their developing body and organs." Rick Santorum had a trisomy 18 daughter who survived and in fact, is still alive at age 15. Furthermore, other than the usual complications of pregnancy, there is no substantially greater risk to the life of the mother of a trisomy 18 baby than any other baby. This is, in fact, what was the salient feature in the Texas Supreme Court's decision; viz., that there had been NO evidence presented to the trial court in favor of allowing an abortion under its current law. As the Decision set forth, the law allows an abortion when:
"in the exercise of reasonable medical judgment, the pregnant female . . . has a life-threatening physical condition aggravated by, caused by, or arising from a pregnancy that places the female at risk of death or poses a serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function unless the abortion is performed or induced."
The doctor to whom the plaintiff had been referred in seeking to have an abortion under the law was Dr. Damla Karsan, an unabashed abortion proponent and activist, yet, the Court found that "Dr. Karsan asked a court to pre-authorize the abortion yet she could not, or at least did not, attest to the court that Ms. Cox’s condition poses the risks the exception requires."
The Court therefore concluded that insufficient evidence had been presented in the court of original jurisdiction, but did not permanently foreclose the possibility of an abortion, if the appicable standards were met, stating, "A pregnant woman does not need a court order to have a lifesaving abortion in Texas. Our ruling today does not block a life-saving abortion in this very case if a physician determines that one is needed under the appropriate legal standard, using reasonable medical judgment. If Ms. Cox’s circumstances are, or have become, those that satisfy the statutory exception, no court order is needed. Nothing in this opinion prevents a physician from acting if, in that physician’s reasonable medical judgment, she determines that Ms. Cox has a “life threatening physical condition” that places her “at risk of death” or “poses a serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function unless the abortion is performed or induced.”
Although you are usually punctilious in your examination of the evidence supporting or opposing a proposition in contention, you woefully failed to meet that standard in this matter. Your unquestioning acceptance of media-produced propaganda without any hesitation is disappointing and has undermined my confidence in your facilities of analysis, something I shall, sadly, need to keep in mind in the future. Or as all the cool kids say today, "Do better."
Opinions like this only serve to move me firmly to the pro choice camp. I have no confidence in in your facilities of analysis.
Thank you for speaking about this shameful episode in Texas. Here in Kansas the voters were not fooled when the "pro life" constitutional amendment was defeated in a landslide. The GOP left matters ambiguous as to what they would do if the amendment passed. Voters guessed right they would ban it completely like Texas. This case you wrote about has scandalized me to identify as a pro choice proponent. My ex wife had an abortion after a rape. Democrats really do have a blunt instrument of an issue.