On this week’s interview Paul sits down with Elisa Martinez, Executive Director of the New Mexico Alliance for Life.
Her organization is a leading pro-life voice in the New Mexico Legislature and they worked to defeat legislation that would have allowed for assisted suicide and dramatically liberalized New Mexico’s abortion laws.
Unlike so many conservative causes in New Mexico, Elisa’s group won its major (defensive) battles. How did they win? What can other groups engaged in public policy throughout New Mexico learn from their success? What’s ahead for the 2020 Legislature and elections? Are there issues of concern that cross over from social conservatives to more libertarian/free market advocates?
Paul, as a Libertarian I would hope you would support a woman’s right to have control over her own body. The bill would have struck out current language in New Mexico statute that criminalizes abortion period. Your guest was able to push two untrue statements on your show. To support the full range of women’s reproductive choices is not supporting abortion until birth or infanticide as your guest would like us to believe. Late term abortions are performed when the health of a woman is threatened or a fetus is not viable. You should educate yourself about the real life tragic circumstances that women find themselves in when they have to make these difficult choices. You minimize the woman when you don’t address the real life circumstances that lead to these decisions. Sometimes a fetus is dead in the womb. Your guest would force that woman to carry that baby to term. No one is suggesting that live babies be killed. Some babies are born so severely deformed that they will not survive. Babies without brains. Babies with their organs outside their bodies. Genetic defects so severe that life can’t be supported. They die. They are not killed.
Apparently you don’t trust medical professionals to make informed, professional decisions in these difficult situations and you’d like the government to step in and legislate when these legitimate medical procedures can be performed.
Politicians should not put up barriers to reproductive health care. The decision to end a pregnancy is personal and should remain between a woman and her health care provider. Abortion is a safe medical procedure that is sometimes necessary and should be protected from political interference.
Thanks for your comment. As you might already know RGF does not take a position on abortion. PERSONALLY, I am a federalist on abortion. I don’t think the policy should be addressed at the federal level, but at the state level.
My primary purpose in bringing Ms. Martinez on was to understand how her group managed to stem the progressive tide on their issue. And, whether I (or you) like it or not, the fact is that in US/New Mexico politics there is about 99% overlap between those who would restrict abortion and those who support lower taxes, school choice, broader economic deregulation, etc.
Ultimately, politics is about coalitions and I am at least interested in seeing how this particular group achieved success in a very tough session for free market/conservative causes.
Just saw you on fox and friends . You should “RUN” for office !
Get real, Pat. Being pro-life never mean that a woman must carry a dead fetus to term. It’s pro-life, Pat. Also pregnancy does not threaten a woman’s life. Being pregnant is a natural state. Ripping up babies or sucking their brains out, or vacuuming them out of the womb is not natural and in fact is killing the human being. No stage of development does not negate that the person is a live human being. The woman has control over her body, and the time to decide if she wants to be pregnant us BEFORE she takes her panties off. The baby is a separate person with his or her own DNA. The woman who engaged in sex knew she could be creating a baby. If the woman doesn’t want to be a mother, put the baby up for adoption.