"Surgical or medical removal of ectopic pregnancies could also not be performed under this law."

[babylonsister]

I'm flabbergasted.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/06/08/9481/

snip//

Because 2008 is an election year, so-called National Right to Life and other anti-choice organizations are also focusing on state ballot initiatives to whittle away or wipe out completely women’s right to choose.

The Colorado Secretary of State’s office announced on May 29 that a random sampling of petitions indicated enough valid signatures to put “the Colorado Equal Rights Amendment” on the state’s November ballot. This law, with the outrageously misleading title, would change the state constitution to confer “personhood” and equal rights to fertilized eggs.

The law would criminalize all abortions immediately, including those to save a woman from death or permanent injury. Birth control methods such as emergency contraception, like the “morning-after pill,” intrauterine devices and some oral contraceptives, would become illegal.

Surgical or medical removal of ectopic pregnancies could also not be performed under this law. In ectopic pregnancies, an embryo imbeds in an organ other than the uterus, usually the fallopian tubes. According to a Mayo Clinic study, one in every 40 to 100 pregnancies is ectopic, and no ectopic pregnancies can result in a birth. If the embryo continues to grow, the tubes will eventually rupture and may cause massive hemorrhage, creating a life-threatening situation for the pregnant woman.

more...

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/06/08/9481/

[undeterred]

1. Spare the embryo and waste the mothers life

which means the embryo dies anyway. Now there's some stinkin' thinkin'.

[Lorien]

16. To the far Right a woman's life is worthless

she only exists to serve men and create more men. They probably think "well, she's failing as a mother, so she may as well die". Not much difference between them and the Taliban!

[Solly Mack]

2. Folks need not bother telling me it isn't about controlling women

"Good" women die because they didn't abort and "bad" women die because they do abort. ("God's will" and all that crap)

Isn't that how it goes for the pieces of shit who call themselves "pro-life"

Women die. Period. And either way, those POS feel justified.

Fuck.Them.All.

[alarimer]

3. I really hate pro-life people

They would prefer someone die from an ectopic pregnancy than remove it. Unreal. That embryo is never going to be viable anyway, so why the hell should they not be able to remove it. Fucking inhuman pieces of shit. Fundamentalist Bible-thumper assholes trying to stuff their belief down everyone's throats. They need to die painfully. Sick.

[Chulanowa]

10. It's not pro-life. It's anti-woman

Pure and simple. They regard female sexuality as the greatest crime ever to be faced by humanity. The woman who gets pregnant is being punished for her sinful licentiousness by god. That's what these people's position amounts to - that a pregnancy is a punishment for sin. And it's only sin for the woman, of course. They might frown on men who sow their oats all over hte place, but you'll never see a pro-life organization advocating paternal responsibility and liability.

[aquart]

17. Yes, we just told them this country isn't interested in respecting women.

We told them for months and months and months on every channel, in the newspapers, and on the internet. Why wouldn't they think this is the perfect time for such a law?

[Chulanowa]

43. I'm not following

But I'm really hoping you're not taking the opportunity to spin this travesty of a law into some sort of Primary bickery.

[Lorien]

18. So true. n/t

[and-justice-for-all]

24. Sure is anti-women...

back to the days when women were to remain silent and had no control over their bodies. They were more property than individual, the religious nuts want to go back to the dark ages. We simply can no allow that to happen.

[Edith Ann]

35. I thought Oklahoma

was the worst state to live in for women and children. It seems Colorado's crazies wants to out do our crazies. I'm tired of Christian Conservatives and their family values. I want people of Faith who value families to be elected. There is a difference. The problem with Christian Conservatives is they have no ethics. They are willing to do what ever harm they deem necessary to get their way. People of faith value everyone's family and seek to make a better life for all families. What ever happened to a woman's right to life. Ec topic pregnancies aren't viable. Why do these people feel it necessary to KILL women. When will people start valuing women for their gift of life instead of passing laws to KILL us.

[magellan]

4. This isn't "right to life". It's "right to impose MY belief on everyone else".

These people consistently place the rights of the unborn over the rights of the living -- to the ludicrous extent that they would see a woman die of a pregnancy that has no hope of being viable rather than allow the woman to live.

Never mind they don't give a damn what happens to a child once it's born.

It's all about their distorted belief pertaining to a fetus and imposing that belief on everyone else, nothing more or less. It's so twisted it doesn't even qualify as religious.

[Fleshdancer]

5. Forcing a woman's organ to needlessly rupture for the sake of controlling her

is a crime against humanity and I will not tolerate it. :grr:

[Iris]

7. I hope to God people pay attention to this before it's too late.

I have several friends who would be dead or infertile if this had been a law when we were in our 20s.

[greenbriar]

6. they better start charging men who Wack off needlessly

cause that is killing babies as well



oh thats right...its not women doing it

[Iris]

8. What I want to know is where are the men? You know, the ones who could end up as single fathers

when their wives die in childbirth or NINE FUCKING MONTHS before childbirth?

[Edith Ann]

48. Yes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

They are killing millions of babies at one time. I never thought of that. See how well we are indoctrinated. We need to advertise this on billboards all over the country.

[SergeyDovlatov]

9. I can't believe it... They cannot be that stupid

Probably ectopic pregnancies will be terminated, but then, the doctor will be charged with involuntary manslaughter and case dismissed by a judge.

I can't think anyone in half-clear mind will allow ectopic pregancy to go thru. It is just painful torture to death for all parties involved.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

39. That's at least voluntary manslaughter.

That's a sin of omission when it was OBVIOUS that the only way to save the patient's life was to remove the ectopic pregnancy, and the doctor refused. That's a clearcut case of negligent, or even intentional, homicide. Good medical practice would insist that the doctor operate to save the patient's life. I'd call that major malpractice on the civil side, as well.


I am a lawyer but I don't play one on TV.

[logosoco]

11. I would like for one of these "prolifers" to look me in the eyes and say

this is a good idea. My first pregnancy was ectopic, then I had 2 healthy babies, then I had another ectopic, then another healthy baby. But they think I should have died with the first one. How sickening! And if I would have died, my kids would not be here. This is so stupid!

[Edith Ann]

50. These people

probably let 3yr olds die from appendicitis because they don't believe in doctors. These people are a small part of the population we need to get them out of government.

[Raksha]

12. It will never pass, even if they have enough signatures

to get it on the ballot. I suppose the knuckle-draggers think that *IF* it passes, they could then make exceptions for things like ectopic pregnancies by statute. After all, even the Roman Catholic Church has always allowed exceptions for ectopic pregnancies, since there is no way the fetus can survive.

But they'd still achieve their REAL purpose of criminalizing birth control in Colorado. Assholes!

[Warpy]

13. That means every time a woman sheds a fertilized ovum

(which might be as many as 60% of them), she will be guilty of involuntary manslaughter.

I suggest all women of Colorado start mailing their used sanitary napkins and tampons to the authors of this bill so they can be examined for evidence of this crime.

Idiots. They never see the fact that there is a real human being involved in this and that she already has rights guaranteed under the constitution.

[NorthernSpy]

14. Nope, no danger at all in casting a pro-McCain spite vote this year!

It's not as though presidents have anything to do with appointing Supreme Court justices, and it's not as though Supreme Court justices have anything to do with slapping down nonsense like this...


:sarcasm:

[aquart]

15. Ah. A Hate-the-Mother law.

Hey, Colorado, go for it. Why should you lag behind Kansas and Idaho?

[Canuckistanian]

19. My mother had an ectopic pregnancy and it almost killed her

She could never have had children after that horrible episode.

That's why I and my sister are adopted.

These idiots should NOT have been given ONE SECOND'S worth of attention before being dismissed.

What the hell is going on in Colorado???

[GreenPartyVoter]

22. I think that my mother's ruptured or at least came close. I can't imagine not being allowed to

receive medical care for something so dangerous.

[MiniMe]

20. So they would rather wait until the embryo is older before it dies?

Since an ectopic can't survive, it would just delay the inevitable while putting the mother's life at risk. Besides, I'm pretty sure it would be unconstitutional, not that it will stop them from trying.

[NMDemDist2]

21. That law would have killed me in 1987

I was hours from having my fallopian tube burst due to an ectopic pregnancy

[EFerrari]

52. I called my friend who was a nurse once when Doug and I were on the road.

I told her what I thought and said I wanted to wait to get home before I went to the doctor. She asked me what kind of flowers I wanted at my funeral.

Good grief, these people are either nuts or sociopaths.

[opihimoimoi]

23. Short sightedness Based on Emotion often leads to Unnecessary CRAP

Holy Shit...they didn't cover that Base?....Blind SOBs

[Beaverhausen]

25. Not sure you heard this - a woman did give birth after a full-term ectopic pregnancy last week

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/05/29/2259761.htm

It was ovarian, not fallopian tubes, however.

First time ever, but I wouldn't put it past the woman-hating anti-choicers to point to this one instance as further reason to pass this law.

[JerseygirlCT]

33. How the heck did her ovary manage that?

I mean... where'd all the baby fit?

Shudders...

[lostnfound]

40. Actually I saw a Discovery heatlh program many months ago

about another such case of a healthy ectopic baby born from the outside of a woman's uterus. I think the woman lives in England. The woman and the baby both survived.
It may have been about this woman:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/beds/bucks/herts/4197194.stm

Here was another such case: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/671390.stm
It says one in ten thousand births are ectopic, which seems unbelievably high.

Of course these are irrelevant to the overall concept. It would be absolutely insane to expect a woman to play such Russian Roulette with her life.

[Edith Ann]

53. There are anomalies in the process,

however they are exceptions and probably not ectopic. A tube is very small and won't allow for the growth of the baby before it bursts. There have been cases of eggs being fertilized and growing in the abdominal cavity that have come to term and lived. This happens when the egg is fertilized after the egg is out of the tube but doesn't make it to the uterus. Tubes just are not elastic enough to deal with the growth of the baby.

[barbtries]

26. that's seriously absurd

are there people who think this would be a good law? just what i read above i would think would be enough to cause any thinking person to vote against it. my ex DIL nearly died from an ectopic pregnancy; if they hadn't performed emergency surgery, removing both the pregnancy and the fallopian tube, she would have. i recall at the hospital they gave her literature on grieving though. she didn't even know she was pregnant.

[rockymountaindem]

27. Even if this passes, which it likely won't

there is no way it would hold up in court.

[Edith Ann]

44. Maybe not

but how many would die before it was struck down? Even one is too many. I've asked this before, Why do these men hate women enough to KILL us just because we got pregnant? What kind of EVIL has too exist to do this to women. One person here asked, Where are the men? If your wife is young enough to have a child are you prepared to watch her die for no good reason other than some wingnut wants to pander to his base? If you have other children, are you prepared to care for them on your own? How are you going to explain to your children that their mother had to die, only because some legislator wanted to keep his seat and his power? This is way beyond abortion on demand. This effects all women. Imagine being that women with an ectopic pregnancy. Knowing you could live with and operation and being told the state is going to kill you without due process, so take your pain killers and die. I thought the death penalty was reserved for the most heinous crimes. When did giving life become a heinous crime?

[rockymountaindem]

46. The law cannot go into effect if there is an outstanding legal challenge

At least that seems to be how it went in other states. Fear not. The Colorado Supreme Court is 5-2 Democratic. As for the people pushing this law, I don't like them any more than you, and I'm a guy. There are plenty of us on your side.

[Edith Ann]

47. Thank you.

I'm glad I've been through menopause. I also have sons. I wouldn't like to see my granddaughter hurt though. Thanks again, I've been in a bad mood all day long. I feel better now.

[paparush]

28. An ectopic pregnancy endagered my wife's life. If not for emergency surgery..

I shudder to think what would have happened.

She had a Kaiser HMO at the time ('92) and they approved treating with Methatrexate (chemo drug). Three days later, she ended up in emergency surgery.

[Contrary1]

29. I came very close to dying back in the 80's.

For about 45 seconds I had the most excruciating pain I have ever felt. After that, it became a dull pain. I was busy with two young children, and thought (stupidly) it might have been gastric distress from the White Castles I had inhaled earlier.

And so, I tried to ignore it. Ate antacids like candy. By the third morning, I was unable to sleep. I stood up and collapsed against the wall. My husband drove me to the hospital around 3 am that Valentine's Day.

I knew something very serious was going on, given how many came running after my initial examination. A nurse was stationed at my bedside, while we waited for the surgeon.

I had been hemorrhaging internally for three days. The baby was not viable they told me. Another six hours, and I would most likely not have survived.

So, if I read this correctly...this group would rather I die from blood loss letting nature take its course, even after the embryo itself was no longer living.

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. It would have left my husband alone to raise two young children.

I can't even begin to understand the ignorance.

[Kber]

36. Mine ruptured in 2002

It was about 45 minutes from when I collapsed to the time I was prepped and ready for emergency surgery. In the mean while I lost about 2 litters of blood - a significant percentage.

All I could think about was that I wanted my husband to take my 3 year old son home so that he wouldn't be in the hospital when he heard that his mom had died. I thought it would make him scared of doctors.

Turns out I lived and gave birth 5 years later to a beautiful little girl, but mostly because, after the rupture itself, everything else went right.

Not an experience I'd wish on anyone.

[NC_Nurse]

30. Lovely. I guess we're just incubators now.

:puke:

[Fumesucker]

31. My wife came within a few hours of dying from an ectopic pregnancy

Back in 1985.

This law is a very bad idea.

[Kixel]

32. Do the Anti Choice people do this on purpose?

Obviously there is no way that this law would ever hold up. It looks like they are doing something to end abortions, yet they know they are not. It adds fuel to the fire, gets them in the news as being anti-choice, but doesn't really change anything. They get to keep the issue, make headlines, and seem "nobel" to idiots who don't think about the issue in shades of grey.

I don't know ANY anti-choice person who thinks that a woman with an etopic pregnancy should die. It seems its just a bunch of smoke and mirrors that no one other than the extremely naive thinks will truly erode abortion rights. I am more worried about bills that slowly erode abortion rights.

By the way-for those of you who have suffered etopic pregnancies, I am sorry for your loss! One of my best friends had one, she lost a tube and her pregnancy. It was really sad for her.

[JerseygirlCT]

34. I've seen speculation that they do

that they like to keep the issue hot-button - in fact, don't really want to win this fight - just want to keep it going. It raises lots of money and pushes their real agendas, politically speaking.

I'm not sure I buy it, but it's a thought for sure.

[Kat45]

37. They keep the issue in the forefront to whip up their base and

get them all to go out and vote against the Democrats.

[burrowowl]

38. And what about anacelphalic babies

who have no brain and cannot trigger delivery, we let the mother die a year later of a baby that has died and is rotting in her womb?

[alphafemale]

41. How could anyone defend this? This is insane.

I'd like to see the rational for this out of morbid curiosity.

[Mr. Blonde]

42. Judging by this

so far isn't this a few whack jobs who wrote up the most draconian anti-abortion law they could think of and then went around getting signatures?

If that is the case I'm sure they left out the more odious sections of their beloved law while getting signatures. Hopefully, a bare minimum of education about this will guarantee it fails miserably in November. It would be nice to think it would have a 100% against rating but that is hoping for far too much. Still except for a few true believers I would think most anti-abortion activists would realize this goes far beyond what they want. I know they are big into two in the bush is better than one in the hand, but this guarantees none in the bush either. Idiots.

[windoe]

45. It is ludicrous to expect doctors to

not save a life of anyone, it is against their oath. They can try to pass this law but public outcry will strike it down. This wedge issue of contraception, always comes up to demoralize the left and keep us in outrage mode, but it cannot be allowed to pass.

[EFerrari]

49. If that law were in effect, I'd be really dead by now.

How many minutes do we have once a tube ruptures?

This is just insanity.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

51. It's like that in El Salvador, and it's HELL ON EARTH. Read:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x3146191

[Holly_Hobby]

54. If anything like this passes, I will no longer have sex

I'll substitute with "toys". See how they like THAT.