During last night's debate, Sen. Hillary Clinton was asked about whether she would read a book to 2nd Grade Children about same-sex couples.   In her reply she said something which caught my attention, and when I re-watched the debate I heard exactly what she was saying.

Clinton said: "I think that obviously it is better to try to work with your children, to help your children with the many differences that are in the world, and to really respect other people and the choices that other people make, and that goes far beyond sexual orientation."

Was Hillary Clinton implying that sexual orientation is a choice, and therefore is something that can be changed?  Perhaps she mispoke, but the comment was certainly not taken out of context, so what exactly did she mean when she said that we should "respect other people and the choices that other people make" in regard to sexual orientation? 

We are facing two scary pushes from the extreme right in terms of reproductive freedom. First, as reflected in the Supreme Court's Carhart decision two weeks ago, there's a new willingness to stop short of protecting women's health and allow certain abortion procedures only in the extreme situation of a woman's life being at risk. This standard would allow states to outlaw abortions in cases (like this Irish example) in which the fetus is not viable outside the womb, forcing women to carry deeply traumatic pregnancies to term. The second push, as The American Prospect's Sarah Blustain reported on so thoroughly here, are "informed consent" laws like the one in South Dakota, which force women to hear ideologically-compromised statements on fetal pain, the sanctity of the mother-child bond, or adoption before allowing them to exercise their right to choose.

In light of these trends, the New York Times story today on the efforts of parents with Down syndrome children to dissuade others from ending Down syndrome pregnancies raises questions about how disability issues will factor into the shifting political and ethical debate on abortion. Because of new, safer testing methods, all women can now opt to screen for the disease with a simple sonogram and two blood tests in the first trimester. Ninety percent of women who receive a diagnosis of Down syndrome for their fetuses choose to abort. At some hospitals, parents of children with Down syndrome have organized programs to speak to obstetricians and genetic counselors about the joys of raising Down syndrome children, and have asked the hospital to put them in touch with expectant parents who have received a diagnosis of the disease.

As anyone who's had their life enriched by a loved one with a disability can attest, these conversations are incredibly fraught. But without judging any family's choice to either end or continue such a pregnancy, the issues remain the same -- the right to choose an abortion and the freedom from coercive pressure. Expectant parents should be given information, resources, and support as they make these complex choices. But expect the antis to boil this issue down into a talking point and portray pro-choicers as mad scientists trying to genetically manipulate the human race.

Cross-posted at TAPPED. 

Senators Ted Kennedy and Barbara Boxer and representatives Carolyn Maloney and Jerrold Nadler will reintroduce the Equal Rights Amendment in Congress today, and will announce hearings on women’s equality in the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. Conservative online media is already up in arms, lamenting the funding the ERA would likely provide, for the first time, to poor women on Medicaid who need to access abortion. Yes, the ERA would help progressives fight for women’s bodily rights. But it is also a crucial legal protection -- one first introduced in Congress in 1923 -- necessary to end workplace discrimination against women, fight wage inequality, and stop obviously sexist corporate practices, such as insurance companies covering the cost of Viagra, but not birth control pills. I remember Maloney speaking at a young women’s leadership event last summer and lamenting the Democratic Party’s move away from strong support for the ERA. Hopefully these new hearings, held under a Congress with its first female speaker, will be a step toward reversing that trend. The amendment simply reads:

Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.

It’s time to put the Phyllis Schlafly era behind us. What’s so offensive in 2007 about equal rights for women?

Cross-posted at TAPPED.

As residents and visitors to the DC area may have noticed, an organization called The Second Look Project has blanketed DC metro buses with anti-choice ads. Second Look (an initiative of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops) has eschewed the screed and scare-tactics of its anti-choice predecessors for the more nuanced “Have We Gone Too Far?”

This media-savvy incarnation of the anti-choice movement is hardly any more persuasive, however, being ultimately dependent on the familiar logical gymnastics and misinformation of the right.

 The National Women’s Alliance does a thorough job debunking many of the campaign’s claims, but some have opted for a more direct approach.