David, I’ll make the same observation for the umpteenth time: Your formative experiences and mine are uncannily similar. When I was coming of age, I heard Senator Kennedy take a particular line about abortion, over and over. (I’m talking about Ted, of course.) At least he was consistent.

He’d say, in essence, “You can’t be pro-life unless you support X, Y, and Z programs that I’m advocating. If a child can’t have the kinds of government programs I demand, his life isn’t worth living.”

I used to sum up his line as follows: “Be a socialist, or I’ll kill the kid.”

Thanks for the memory, as Bob Hope used to sing (in that same period, in fact).