BizzyBoy apparently never reads past a headline: Gallup poll shows virtually no change on attitudes on abortion

modernesquire — Fri, 15 May 2009 10:23:47 -0700

Over at BizzyBlog, Tom Blumer is whipping himself into near orgasmic joy over today's Gallup Poll that find that a majority of Americans for the first time identify themselves as "Pro-Life" as opposed to being "Pro-Choice."

Of course, Blumer thinks this is a titanic shift in public opinion on the issue on abortion. Instead, all the poll really shows is that the people identify the term "Pro-Life" as being more moderate than the extreme "no abortions under any circumstances" that Blumer and the Republican Party takes. On the actual policy issue of abortion, people's attitudes today aren't much different than they've been since 1975. Since Blumer loves graphs so much:

From the same poll, the same majority of Americans who view themselves as pro-life also support by 53% legal abortions in some circumstances (the light green line.) The dark green line represents the 22% of Americans who support legal abortion under any circumstances. That means that 75% of American support legal abortion in some form, while 23% support the Republican platform position of banning abortion under all circumstances.

This is not really that groundbreaking. All it says is that essentially most Americans agree with Roe v. Wade that held that there is a sliding scale during the gestiation and development of a fetus as to when the government can interfer and effectively ban a person from exercising control over their body by electing to have an abortion.

All it may mean is that whereas Roe v. Wade was once considered by the general public to be a pro-choice decision as the Court in subsequent decisions relied on Roe to uphold various state and federal restrictions on abortion the public now views Roe as being a moderate Pro-Life decision. Such decisions over the years, have had people in States with such restrictions, like Ohio, accept them as reasonable limitations. In fact, the reason more people may identify themselves as "Pro-Life" is that these restrictions, and not outright bans, have been implemented by "Pro-Life" forces in Ohio's legislature, for example. A court finds that Ohio's parental notification for minors to receive and abortion is constituational. The public itself finds the restriction generally reasonable. It was implemented by the Pro-Life faction. Therefore, I must also be Pro-Life, too. That's essentially the "phenomenon" the Gallup poll is picking up. By that definition, since I don't believe in abortion-on-demand, and support many of the restrictions in Ohio's laws, I must be Pro-Life, too, then Blumer. Can't wait to see you at the next meeting!

To the extent there's been any demographic shifts noted in this Gallup poll, it's largely constrained to self-identified Republicans becoming more uniformally pro-life with no exceptions. This "phenomenom" can be attributed to the shrinking Republican Party. As the party shrinks, only the hardest core base remains while pro-choice independents have joined the swelling ranks of the Democratic Party. After all, polling by Gallup and others have also noticed that demographical shift in party affiliation as well.

The American people still support legal abortion, but like any other constitutional right, they also support reasonable restrictions on that right.

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BizzyBoy apparently never reads past a headline: Gallup poll shows virtually no change on attitudes on abortion