Via JivinJehoshaphat, I see that Andrew Sullivan is impressed with a reader’s argument for being pro-choice. The reader thinks his argument is so powerful that to reject the pro-choice position is to reject sanity. That’s a lot of weight to put on what is actually a rather weak argument. Said argument is that if pro-lifers found themselves in a burning fertility clinic, we would, to be consistent, have to save a trayful of embryos rather than a child; and that this alleged implication of our position shows its absurdity. JivinJehoshaphat, who kindly quotes my book, points out why the argument doesn’t prove what it’s supposed to prove.

But there’s one other point worth making: This emailer writes, “Few of us on the pro-choice side argue that our interest in personal liberty is SO great that we will abide NO restriction on late-term abortion.” As persuasive as this capitalization is, that’s just not true. The Supreme Court has made late-term abortions legal in all fifty states; four justices do not believe that legislatures should be allowed to regulate even the method of late-term abortion; and pro-choice organizations have fought tooth and nail to preserve these policies.