I believe that as you stated above, Tad.

And I do believe that the ban on partial birth abortion will not necessarily in any way hinder pro-choice. In fact, with the ban in place, it may go a long way in demonstrating a reasonable approach by the pro-choice adherents.

OD

"Abortion is lousy birth control." Psychologist Dr. Joy Browne

If "partial birth" abortions were purely elective, we might conclude the debate there.

But the real world does not meet this simplistic idealism.

Pregnancies can have complications.
Pregnant women can be in less than perfect health.

I'm not an obstetrician. But I heard an interview of an obstetrician on the radio, commenting on this recent SCOTUS ruling.
Among the comments:
This procedure is rare.
But among other reasons a physician might deem it necessary, if a pregnancy is going wrong, in a woman that has a heart condition, for the sake of the mother's life, this procedure may be indicated.

In addition, while it is a Catholic tradition that when only one life can be saved, that it be the baby's life, at the expense of the mother's life; there are other religious traditions with other priorities. If I recall correctly, the counterexamples offered included Judaism, and Shintoism.

I hold no objections over Catholic women, if that is their preference.

But Catholic women have no more right to impose their preference on Jews, & Shintoists than the other way around.

The 1st Amendment is a two way street.
They CAN practice their religion as they wish.
They can NOT inflict / impose their religion on others.

By what conceivable (pun not intended) reasoning would we presume our legislators would be able to decide more wisely this delicate matter, than the physicians and patients burdened by this circumstance?

Can you say "doctrinaire"?

I cant say I know to much about it, but if the baby is already mostly out of the birth canal, I find it pretty hard to believe they would have to kill it to save the mother.

My wifes blood pressure went through the roof when we had our son. To the point she may have had a heart attack. So they rushed her into the C-sec room, and got that kid out in 5 mins flat. At no time did the doctor ask us to consider murdering the child over it.

I agree with sear. The government is not comprised of obstetricians. If something goes wrong during my pregnancy, I'd want whatever my obstetrician deemed necessary to save my life.

Other procedures are grisly and we haven't outlawed them... I suppose next they are going to outlaw amputations because they're too grisly?

Chris you make a valid point about where do we take in account a measure of grisly? I mean, far too many medical procedures could be counted as "grisly"...

However, though the govt is not comprised of obs I am very sure that expert counsel from top-notch obs was taken into very serious consideration.

Just me thinking, right or wrong, just my 2c,

OD

I'm sure they did have expert witnesses, although I cannot find them right now. But I still question the validity of medical decisions being made by non-medical personnel. It makes no sense to me.

. . . it's the government. (j/k)

OD

Other procedures dont murder a fully formed human being.

There lies your problem. Your lack of knowledge regarding the history of the passage of this law. You made an assumption. You seem to forget that during the 104th, 105th, 107th and 108th Congresses, that there was presented testimony from medical authorities, including the claimed inventor of the procedure and from the AMA regarding this procedure. It was following this testimony that the Congress issued a statement of finding.

Included in those findings were:

If you wish to read the entire Congressional record regarding the findings and the evidence, you can do so here

dmk

That's serious.
Dying is even more serious.