New Stanek poll: Do you plan to vote in 2010 or sit this one out?
Here’s my new poll question:
What are your voting plans for the 2010 elections?
Based on your party affiliation, let us know whether you’re going to let your political voice be heard or sit this one out.
Vote on the lower right side of the home page.
Here were the results of my previous poll question. Most of you think the Republicans will dominate both houses of Congress on November 3:
Click on the map to enlarge to find your own brightly colored flag. Even our International friends agree….
As always, make comments to either the previous or current poll here, not on the Vizu website.
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
I am 3rd party (Constitution party) so I can’t always vote (primaries) but every election I am eligible to vote in I do. And I have voted Democrat before because the Repub was pro-abortion and the Democrat was pro-life.
I am registered as unaffiliated (basically ‘no party’) but most of my candidates are republican (actually, all that are affiliated with a party are). I will definitely vote. I never vote for Democrats and never will.
I already voted, split my ticket after researching the voter guides for pro-life pro-family candidates. Most of the republicans were but some were not so I voted for a couple of 3rd party candidates and 1 Democrat (who was more pro-life than the Repub. opponent). May God help this nation.
I just hope that both parties realize that pro-lifers who are TRULY pro-life will not vote for a candidate just to support a party if that candidate is pro-abortion. I know that for me abortion is the litmus test for every candidate I vote for. I may agree 100% with everything a candidate stands for but if he or she is pro-abortion, thats the end of getting my vote.
Sydney – I’m quite the opposite – when a politician says they are pro-life, it is almost like they are telling me and everyone else that when they are elected, they will send me a free pony.
Unborn babies don’t vote – old people do – which is why even in this election year with so much momentum, there is 10x’s more talk about not touching old people entitlements than there is talk about doing anything with abortion.
I respect your view on it though and find your support commendable.
If I could vote I’d be looking for someone to the left of the democrats. Pro-choice, pro gay marriage and adoption, higher taxes and more welfare, universal healthcare, a livable minimum wage, that sort of thing.
Then the crime rate, the teen pregnancy rate, the drug abuse rate and the gap between rich and poor might drop closer to what they are in the countries which have all or most of the above. Oh, and a higher ‘happiness’ index too.
I’m voting. Used to skip midterms but they’re more and more important these days. And I say unabashedly that pro-life is the primary issue. I might have voted for Arlen Specter the first time with Reagan, but never since.
This is the issue of our times. As slavery was. And then civil rights. And in those times you could see 1% of the other side – if they somehow saw blacks as foreign non-citizens.
But I give the pro-choice side no excuse. It’s 2010. There may not be flying cars everywhere, but we sure as heck ought to be sophisticated enough to know where babies come from!
I disagree Hans. It was an issue in previous times. It’s had it’s historical moment.
We ended slavery, we allowed women and blacks to vote, we allowed blacks and whites to marry, we allowed women to have choice, next we will allow gay marriage.
Yes it’s 2010, people know where babies come from. That’s why abortion is permitted.
I’m voting mostly republican. Since I live in a single-party state, we have more than the normal proportion of conservative democrats and RINOs. I’m voting a conservative dem with a proven record over a republican who hasn’t run any sort of campaign and can’t get information on for the state senate. Other than that, I’m voting Republican. There’s no one up for a national position, though.
Not sure on our governor’s race, where we have an anti-life republican, an anti-life democrat, and 2 anti-life independents. Maybe I’ll look into it more and see if there’s a constitution party candidate.
I don’t have any party affiliation, but I’m definitely voting in November and both candidates I’m voting for are Republicans.
I maintain a Republican party affiliation so that I can vote in the primaries, but I lean heavily towards the Constitution party. I will vote for a strong Constitution Party candidate every time I get a chance to do so. I’m considering changing my party affiliation to Constitution Party.
As to whether I will vote… Already have! (absentee ballot) HOOAH! :-p
Just voted 10 minutes ago. Patty Murray, 6 more years!
Hal,
That’s super.
Jill,
There was a time when party affiliation was a private matter. Why isn’t there an option for “non-declarers” to answer this poll? Is “Independent” the only option?
I’d have absolutely no problem voting for a pro-life Democrat over an abortion-tolerant Republican (think of a hypothetical match-up between Zell Miller and Arlen Specter); but finding a pro-life Democrat north of the Mason-Dixon line is virtually impossible, and even the south has more and more slim pickings, in that regard.
Cranium,
I can’t see how abortion is an issue of the past. The excuses for it become flimsier with every passing day. Sonograms have now given us a womb with a view.
Over the past half century we’ve increasingly turned our heads from the humainity of the soon-to-be-born while it has become more and more manifest. While improving the civil rights of blacks and women, we’ve also taken back their right to be safely born. And they are more vulnerable for the loss of that right than others.
This is progress? No, we’ve regressed. When it suits us, we act as if we’re cavemen saying: “Ugh! Woman get fat!” We should know a little better than that.
We are hypocritical to the point of having a split personality. We hold baby showers, say: “You’re eating for two now!”, recommend folic acid, discourage smoking and drinking while pregnant. Or we turn our head and say: “That’s ‘women stuff’! No skin off my nose!”
Either blacks are Americans with all the rights of the same or not. Either women deserve to vote as any American does or not. Either we all deserve the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, or not.
Hans, I think the overwhelming majority of people are well aware of the details of pregnancy and fetal development. Newspapers and television have imparted reams of knowledge. They also know what an abortion consists of.
So you aren’t exactly ‘teaching’ people anything. All you are doing is shoving something in their face that they don’t want to look at. And even if some people are yucked out enough to start declaring themselves anti-choice, watch what happens when they have an ‘oops’.
And despite the repeated assertions that ‘we ended slavery so we need to end the killing of babies’, that’s just not how people see it. It’s more a case of ‘we ended slavery then we freed women from being enslaved by their fertility’. People do see it as progress.
Cranium, why must you insist on acting like a woman’s fertility is a disease? Do you think less of us women because we have vulvas and ovaries and uteruses? You seem to revel in disparaging female biology. Killing our unborn babies does not free us from our fertility. I don’t feel especially “enslaved” by being a woman but thanks for being a chauvinist once again. Its nice to know that those with penises look down on those of us who don’t have them.
Sydney M, I think it would be difficult for you to describe a more inaccurate synopsis of my position. It’s almost like you are being deliberately misinterpretative.
I have never presented womens fertility as a disease. I do not disparage female biology, at all. The fact that women can perpetuate the species puts them in first place in my opinion.
My point, on this occasion as on others, is that men have used women’s fertility to enslave women. I’m not going to elaborate because you know ‘how the story goes’ whether you agree with it or not.
Your last two sentences don’t deserve a response.
cranium,
(I’ll go along with the lower-case “c”. I guess you meant it when you said you didn’t have an over-sized head! [Where do people get the smiley faces from? I don’t want to type it out old school!] )
I think the majority of people are ignorant of many developmental facts of our extreme youth. Have you seen the Jay Leno “man-in-the-street interviews? We don’t have many large families anymore. People aren’t around babies enough to appreciate them.
Many post-abortive women on this site have admitted their ignorance at the time. It’s no insult for us to reiterate this.
It reminds me of the first time I took my dog to the vet. I thought she had a tumor under her eye. The vet said it’s an abscess. You shouldn’t give dogs bones because they splinter. Now how pervasive in our culture is “give a dog a bone”?
There are many things we have no idea about until we experience it. For many, that even means chilbirth.
I don’t think I said I didn’t have an over-sized head. Just not a fat one.Huge but elegant maybe? Dunno. I use lower case ‘c’ because ther’s nothing capital about me.
I type them out ‘old school’ – : - ) or ; - ) but without the spaces :-) or ;-)
don’t be lazy – actually others here probably know how to plonk a range of emoticons into text
I’m pretty sure most expectant women have a pretty good idea of how the fetus is developing and what is happening in their own body. There’s a lot more info across a variety of media than there is about pet care etc.
cranium,
Those of my ethnicity were often called “squareheads” -my usual username.
I wouldn’t count on an abortion clinic giving out much of that info. Counter-productive – in more ways than one.
You can keep saying that stuff Hans but the reality is that most expectant women would know at least as much about their pregnancy and fetal development as you are able to ‘show’ them with anti-choice campaigns and activities.
I used to live in an area which had been settled by Germans a couple of hundred years ago. It was known as the land of the $4 haircut - a dollar a side! Only mildly amusing of course. What got me though was that some spoke with an accent, after two hundred years of inter-generational growth and intermingling!
cranium,
This discussion is getting too heady for me now. ;)
Well whaddya know! It translates! ;)
I’m pretty sure most expectant women have a pretty good idea of how the fetus is developing and what is happening in their own body
And if she doesn’t? Planned Parenthood hardly goes through fetal development, cran.
They do not even use the word baby.
I have friends that call PP routinely and ask if it’s a baby at 12 weeks. They are told to go to the library and look it up.
The truth is BAD BAD BAD for the abortion biz.
Cranium, you absolutely disparage women. Our fertility is part of us, part of being a woman. I don’t feel the need to be “free” of my natural biological processes in order to be as “important” as a man. I would never advocate castrating men so that they are free of their pesky testosterone driven aggressiveness. Yet in a way you are advocating castrating women. You want women to be at war with their own natural body function. You espouse this view on this web site every chance you get. You think women are so weak that they can’t possibly deal for 9 months with an unintended pregnancy but that we must lay back, spread our legs and allow our children to be scraped out of our bodies in order to be “equal” to men.
Struth Sydney M, you’re still trying to tar me with a brush of misrepresentation!
I love women, always have. At social gatherings I usually spend more time with the women because the conversation is more relevant and interesting. The men tend to talk ball sports (boring!) and there is usually a competitive agenda on display, even if subtle.
Women don’t need ANYTHING to be as important as men. I never intimated that women need to be ‘free’ of their biology. Only that they themselves have control of it. The truth is that the misogyny and patriarchy of many cultures and societies have enslaved women through their fertility. My belief is that women must have ownership and control of themselves, their bodies and their fertility.
‘I would never advocate castrating men…’ – and I’m not advocating anything for women other than NOT being at the mercy, behest and control of men.
‘You want women to be at war with their own natural body function’ – complete and utter tosh! I advocate women not being at the mercy of their biology because traditionally men have used that as a weapon of control and ownership.
‘You think women are so weak that they can’t possibly deal for 9 months with an unintended pregnancy’ -what an absolutely ludicrous extrapolation of what I have said. CHOICE is what it is about. When a woman wants to produce offspring she can and will procede with a pregnancy, if she doesn’t want to then she has options. I am so far from thinking women are weak I don’t think you can even grasp it.
Why on earth would women want to be ‘equal’ to men. In all of history and even before, they have demonstrated who the stronger and more resilient gender is – them! What they still need to achieve is equal rights and opportunities, a fight that continues due to the fear and greed of men.
[Abortion] is the issue of our times. As slavery was. And then civil rights. And in those times you could see 1% of the other side – if they somehow saw blacks as foreign non-citizens.
But I give the pro-choice side no excuse. It’s 2010. There may not be flying cars everywhere, but we sure as heck ought to be sophisticated enough to know where babies come from!
ITA with you, Hans. The problem as shown in your last sentence, though, is that PP and other abortuaries use euphemisms (“fetus” instead of ”baby” is just one example) and lack of important information to keep many girls and women in ignorance of what abortion really is. If wombs had windows, there would not be any debate; the truth could not be suppressed.
cranium, as one who has actually carried more than one baby in my body and had the temerity to carry the baby of a crisis pregnancy to birth, as one who values that child (now grown), I can say to you that no argument can trump experience.
Your argument is purely academic. I have experienced the anxiety and turmoil of a crisis pregnancy. Though I was young and not as educated as I am now, I had a strong moral foundation, and that sustained me during that uncertain time. No matter how hard life was, I could not bring myself to willfully kill a completely innocent, defenseless, helpless human being whose very life depended on me.
I realize my words may mean nothing to you. If so, I sincerely feel sorry for you.
More power to you Claire. Good for you, really.
You made your choice and followed your personal beliefs. That’s good.
Just let others do the same.
‘too heady’ – that was funny Hans :-)
Claire, you’re right that these clinics won’t really inform their patients as to what is going on. But they haven’t really come to grips with the truth either.
cranium, you’re right that the information is out there. But what good is a library if you won’t read?
I don’t so much blame the women who have closed their eyes to this information. Or even some of those who help “commit” abortion.
I put most of the blame on the doctors, nurses, and biology teachers who are the “custodians” of the truth. Most would never participate in an abortion. But why aren’t they at the front of every March For Life by the millions?
They should be shouting: “No! We know that every life form begins as a single cell! When a human life is known to exist, we cannot end it except in self-defense!”
You made your choice and followed your personal beliefs. That’s good.
Just let others do the same.
As long as their choices don’t involve the abuse or killing of other human beings, no problem.
A nascent infant is a developing child in the same way a born child is a developing adult. To willfully stop that process at any point by killing the person is murder.
Claire, you’re right that these clinics won’t really inform their patients as to what is going on. But they haven’t really come to grips with the truth either.
To be honest, I can’t call abortuaries “clinics” because in my mind a clinic is somewhere to go to get medical help for healing, not for killing. At the same time, I understand what you are saying here.
Your last statement is quite thought-provoking. Do these abortionists and nurses truly not realize that the babies are real, live human beings? That they are snuffing out the lives of innocent human beings?
I realize they may be living in denial. It would seem they must do this in order to be able to sleep at night. And it would seem that weeks, months, and years of living this way would surely bring a soul-deadening numbness to their minds and hearts. That is quite frightening, to be honest.
It would seem that Nazi soldiers, “doctors”, and “nurses” who carried out the extermination of millions of Jews (including abortions) also had to come to that place of numbness and deadness of soul — a seared conscience that no longer cared what was good and what was evil.