In this video clip from John King's CNN program, the National Organization for Women's Terry O'Neill has an opportunity to be rational, honest and fair-minded when she is asked about the passage of Nebraska's new laws restricting late term abortions.She blows it. Badly.
Instead it is Julie Schmit-Albin from Nebraska Right to Life who shines. And she does so by staying coolly and confidently on point, emphasizing that the Nebraska laws acknowledge the amazing technological advances in the science of fetology since Roe v Wade.
For his part, King plays it square. He asks good questions, lets both women have plenty of time to speak, and he avoids editorializing himself. At one point, he refers to the central issue in the controversy as "the fetus, the infant." At another, he asks O'Neill, "You heard Julie, she makes a strong case that medical technology and other technology and scientific gains have made that [fetal pain at 20 weeks] a new fair test in this new world." O'Neill completely ignores the question -- even when King asks it twice.
Julie Schmit-Albin scores home runs when she talks about the clarity given the abortion issue by ultrasound pictures from the womb and about the Supreme Court's acceptance of a state's interest in protecting the preborn child.
At her bats, Terry O'Neill strikes out badly. 1) She refuses to address fetology's scientific advances since 1973. 2) She pulls out the same tired old chestnuts about going back to the 1950s (implication - coat hangers) and refuses to accept any restriction or even oversight of abortion whatsoever. And 3) O'Neill looked particularly foolish and fanatic, plastic smile notwithstanding, when she referred to sleazy abortionist Leroy Carhart as "a hero to all of the women who need medical care to terminate pregnancies for whatever reason."
