Michael Perelman wrote: <<I think the key is to make sure that the economics relates to real life problems. I have a different sort of abortion question. Abortion debates have significantly weakened the left, bringing a good number of working class people into the conservative fold.>> In a time of reaction almost all core left issues weaken the left. By back-pedalling on such issues leftists would merely guarantee their irrelevance and postpone the rising of a real left. <<How much was the abortion issue manufactured? By that I mean, how much did organizations frame the question in such a way that dialogue would be impossible in order to create the divisiveness associated with abortion?>> It was manufactured by conservatives. And they were successful in part because the "left" originally stated the issue in weakened form, as a matter of "choice" rather than of right to a legitimate service. This weaseling on the issue implicitly agrees that abortion is somehow wrong but still tolerable. But it is no more wrong than is an appendectomy. <<Was it merely that better off women could always arrange for abortions well before Roe v. Wade that the issue remained on the back burner?>> Partly anyhow. But the attack on abortion is at core an attack on women, which is one of the reasons there can be no compromise on the issue. <<Bill Sokol's wife (Cynthia Golnick???) wrote a book in which she tried to dialogue with both sides. Maybe it has some answers. I sure don't.>> The compromise position is to allow abortion for specific reasons (incest, etc.) but to deny abortion on demand. But this is intolerable. Abortion is not wrong (or even a moral topic) unless the fetus is a human being. But if the fetus is a human being, then even in the case of incest abortion is murder. If the fetus is not a human being, then an abortion is on the same moral level as chastity -- both prevent the coming into existence of a new human. Under whatever conditions allow the left to once again grow in strength, the issue of abortion will become less divisive. To dialogue with both sides (there is only one legitimate side) at the present time will gain nothing now and will create problems in the future. It is first of all a matter of principle: abortion on demand without hassle. Only *within* that framework does it become a matter of tactics or strategy. Carrol
