Pro-Life Politics for the 21st Century.

During the Roberts confirmation hearings, Kansas Senator Sam Brownback, a staunch (code for fucking nuts) conservative opponent of abortion, brought along a very unusual visual aid, a visual aid who loves McNuggets. It was a 14-year old girl with Down's Syndrome named Abby Loy. Brownback showed her off as an illustration of one of the less well-known aspects of the abortion issue: the extremely high rate of abortions performed on fetuses identified as possessing the genetic precursors for Down's Syndrome. About 80% of pregnancies diagnosed with the genes are aborted. Brownback poked the young, smiling Abby with a pencil as she danced about in glee, making the argument that it is morally wrong to deny people like her the right to live due to a genetic disorder. There's an argument to be had there, I'm sure, but it's an argument designed to engage people already inclined to opposes abortion. Brownback is forgetting a crucial constituency with his line of reasoning: people (I won't name names) who want to turn retarded folks into surgically enhanced sex slaves! These people probably don't give a shit one way or another about abortion, abortion having nothing to do with retarded sex slaves, but they could be swayed decisively to the pro-life side by making this point: if fetuses with Down's Syndrome are aborted at such high rates, who can be turned into bio-engineered sex robots? It's a sobering thought that could easily turn more than a few votes to the Red column.