Here, Tiller lists the reasons why he will perform late-term abortions. Funny, seems like a lot more than "the mother is going to die or the baby will be born dead/in horrible pain."

Supporting Tiller means supporting a guy who would kill a viable child due to the "occupation and financial issues" faced by the mother.

Your presence here this morning means that something is going dramatically wrong in your life. You may be here to end a pregnancy early because of fetal abnormality to save your unwell, unborn child from a lifetime of pain, suffering, disability, and hardship.

On the other hand, you may be here because of some of your own issues of survival. You may have issues of domestic violence: rape, incest, spouse abuse, or child abuse. You may have issues of your own health.

You may have some serious disease process: cancer, lymphoma, diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, or any one of a number of the other medical problems that can afflict women of child bearing age. You may have some issues of age yourself.

You may be 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 years of age. On the other hand, you may be at the end of the other spectrum of fertility. You may be 40, 45, 50, 55, or even 60 years of age.

There may be some issues of poverty such as homelessness. You may have some occupational issues. You may have some financial issues.

But, for whatever reason that you are here... we find that there are many reasons why women find that continuing the pregnancy will cause substantial and irreversible impairment of their physical health, their mental health, their emotional health, their family health, age of the patient, safety and well-being... for whatever reason that you are here, welcome to Wichita, and thank you for the opportunity to be helpful to you.

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Which of these reasons seem frivolous to you? I'm kinda scratching my head here.

he was compassionate and understanding.

For killing a viable and healthy child? I think virtually all of them are frivolous with the exception of cases where the mother's physical health was really, truly at risk.

Where was his compassion for the viable children he killed due to their mother's "occupational issues" GD?

Working with hazardous chemicals? Answer: you don't know, yet you are confident you do. That combination holds potential to make all sorts of terrible things possible.

BlueEyes, You can tell the 12 year old that was raped by her father that she must carry the child to term. I will not do so and I oppose abortions.

BlueEyes, are you active in adoption services? Have you adopted?

SmagBoy, I am not an anti-choice person. I absolutely support complete freedom for a woman to terminate a pregnancy until the child is viable.

After that, I want to see a hell of a lot more evidence that Tiller and his crony saying a woman has "mental health issues."

If that's the case, I'd only ask you why you think you have that right? I can't imagine the unbelievable pain and suffering women go through to reach a point of terminating a pregnancy. And even if I thought I could imagine it, it would be folly of my to presume I knew a specific woman's pain or circumstances. What allows you to judge when a woman can terminate a pregnancy and under what cicumstances, regardless of gestation time?

No, not funny -- you're simply mis-reading the list IMO. The list is meant to be inclusive, cumulative, and synergistic, not singular. More to the point, it was not Dr. Tiller making the choice, contrary to what you imply. Instead, it appears to rely on the woman's judgement as to whether "continuing the pregnancy will cause substantial and irreversible impairment of their physical health, their mental health, their emotional health, their family health, age of the patient, safety and well-being..." Can issues such as poverty, homelessness, occupational or financial issues enter into it? Apparently so, based on his past experience. Are these singular or contributing reasons for a late-term abortion? Tiller's approach seemed to be that this was for the woman to decide; only she could best know what the circumstances are.

In aiming to help women who had made such decisions, Dr. Tiller apparently entered a grey area out of necessity at times. Much as we might like such decisions to be black and white, all too often they are not, particularly when deciding when to keep someone alive at any age. Those who have personally had to struggle first-hand with this issue should understand this point.

Your own circumscribed view of what's acceptable precisely illustrates why your own opinion is personal and arbitrary -- works fine for you, may work fine for others; works badly when you try to impose it on others. Late-term abortions appear to be decisions that are usually taken in anguish and suffering. It is not for me to tell others what decisions they should take in such circumstances, and it strikes me as naive moral self-righteousness for someone else to do so...

I don't have the right--SOCIETY has the right to intervene in the defense of a viable yet unborn child.

Should society also protect the pregnant woman? Does she have any rights?

Once the fetus is viable outside the womb, it has rights as well. Those rights must be balanced with the rights of the woman.

Tiller didn't do that. He acted as if the viable yet unborn child had no rights whatsoever.

BlueEyesAustin:

...Tiller didn't do that. He acted as if the viable yet unborn child had no rights whatsoever.

There is no gray with you is there BlueEyesAustin? Tiller was wrong. Period. There's no chance he could have been saving the life of the mother? There no chance he could have been trying to balance both rights that you speak of? There's no chance he turned anyone away? There's no chance that a late term abortion is ever medically, ethically or morally the right and just choice?